My very first stall at St Andrews market back in the early 80's after returning south from living in Doon Doon, Northern New South Wales, for 3 years.Thought it is about time to start relating some of the stories and events of my earlier life. Writing this blog is a good way to begin working on the art of writing again.
As a teenager I wrote a lot, but then life really started happening and I 'got too busy' doing interesting stuff.
I once shared a studio with an amazing sculptress artisan Lizmania, who constantly wrote snippets of her life story on 'scraps' of paper, then stored them into small suitcases.
I'd always imagine the job she, or a biographer, would have one day of un-ravelling,
re ordering, deciphering, these random pieces of her life.
Well, apart from an A2 sized folio of photos and a very different sort of Curriculum Vitae in it, my life story is in my head.
This, will help me begin to document some of the interesting parts, in the hope one day that I will actually print a book with patterns of hats made without patterns, recipes of food made without recipes and inspirations for a creative life. This has been an idea in the back of my mind for some time.
Having spent 12 years living as a traveling nomad, has provided me with some almost 'unbelievable' stories ! ..... but they are in the future.....LOL
Well......... as a 14 year old I was very fortunate to attend an Alternative School, called ERA (Education Reform Association), where I began, to be allowed to think for myself, to decide what I wanted to do with my life.
It was a valuable experience , and we loved going to school. I didn't want to do my Higher School Certificate, but elected to stay at school that final year, and study things I wanted to learn about, whilst still in the security of the school.
It was a year of learning how to motivate myself, to try new things, something that has helped me throughout my later life.
I was also fortunate to have the time to work with the drama teacher Lynne, as her assistant/apprentice drama teacher, with the attached primary school.
Had I been doing my HSC, like the two other students who began this with me in the first term, I would not have had 'time', for the valuable experience, of learning how to create lesson plans with Lynne all year.
The year before, Lynne had taken a 'Term of Absence', to live in the bush, while she dealt with personal life.
We drama students, who had become very close and dedicated, from a Traveling Theatre Group in the first term earlier that year, decided to do our own Drama for the duration of her absence.
We wrote, directed, sang and danced an original Rock Opera, 'Genesis', and helped the junior high kids, with their own version of Rocky Horror Picture Show.
An incredible experience, to be involved in, as were all our weekly drama sessions, with Lynne.
We were actively working in some very avant garde forms of theatre, from 3-5pm every Thursday after school, a form of Movement Drama, non verbal Experimental Theatre. We once explored the theme, 'Sanity and Insanity' for several weeks or months, taking the final product to the school community as a performance.
A small group of us attended a Master Class held by the extraordinary Lindsay Kemp, at the suggestion of Lynne, who had been to the first one offered.
Before it started we felt very young and inexperienced, even thinking maybe we'd just watch, as we watched the professional ballet and theatre folk 'warming up' !
But as soon as Lindsay in wearing a bright red leotard suit, we were in our element, and some of the trained ballet folk were out of their depths, unable to 'let go', and "SHOW us that you ENJOY! leaping across the room in a Grand Jete.
All of these experiences, paved the way for my desire to create more understandable Non Verbal Theatre, (parents in the audience would say "Wow that was great !, but what did it mean when you all did......this or that......") We were still working in a 'personal dream state' .
'Seeing' and 'walking/dancing', thru an unseen world of creativity, self expression, and therapy, but it needed to be 'enlarged, and made clearer for an audience.
This work really helped me overcome a very debilitating, and isolating case of Stuttering, and Stammering, an inability to speak, that had plagued me, since the age of eight.
So when we saw an article, about another Australian returning home, from studying at Marcel Marceau's International School of Mime, I sent an application to join !
I then went off on a Holiday to Tasmania, with a friend, ending up staying there for 8 months. I received a reply to my application saying ' Dear Mr Jack Megan, Sorry not accepted" .
This was followed two weeks later by a Telegram saying " Further Cancellation, Has been chosen for next fall. Kindly advise your decision by return and send registration fees "!
And so, off I headed to Paris for an extraordinary year with the famous mime, and a school of International students from 19 countries!
Recently I wentsea Facebook recently to see who I could find, and found another student of the Ecole, and he sent me this photo of us showcasing our work on the school stage.
If you'd like to view some of Claude's work now, a mixture of spoken and mime/comedy, check out his adds for his father's invention the Twist Mirror, which he now sells.
He was one of the most talented and comic of the students, the youngest at 17, he'd have the whole room in hysterics. Once when he had nearly upstaged Marceau, Marceau told Claude, to try and use his facial expression a little less !But Claude was just a natural Chaplinesque comic, even when he was being himself, and shyly bobbing and saying "Pardon, Pardon " excusing himself for just being in the room ??
http://www.twistmirror.com/epages/61625346.sf/en_GB/?ObjectPath=/Shops/61625346/Categories/%22Clip%20Vid%C3%A9o%22
........to be continued..........
