Pearls from the Blue Oyster

Alex Bennett

A brave new world of art is unveiled in Dunedin today.

The Blue Oyster Performance Series will stretch the boundaries of what performance and live art is and what it can be.

"We do this every two years for the Fringe. This is the third, and by far the biggest, that we've done yet," Blue Oyster director Jaenine Parkinson says.

"It's a really exciting mix of local, national and international content. It's completely outside the realm of what people think live arts fits into. It encompasses a wide spectrum of what is, or can be, live art and performance art."

The performances, talks and films move between visual art, music and sound, dance, architecture, lighting, theatre, film and radio.

"We treasure this space, because it lets us go outside what the Blue Oyster usually does," Parkinson says.

"We want to present new territories and new possibilities for generating ideas and discussion. Discussion is the most important thing. We want to extend discussion about performance art in this series.

"A lot of the performances are based heavily around collaboration, which generates new ideas and possibilities.

"The idea of human presence is mediated through technologies, or other disciplines - like theatre, music, radio, film and photography - all fed into working with body, action, time and space. It's drawing on all those different sources," she says.

The Full [expletive] Moon collaboration, I Am A Strange Loop, on Saturday explores the concept of radio in art.

Radio One 91FM and Toroa Radio 1575AM will broadcast different material simultaneously, during a live music performance in the Otago Pioneer Women's Memorial Association building.

"The two radio stations are merging their programming especially for the performance," Parkinson says.

"The public can either attend the event on location, or listen in at home on Radio One or Toroa to create their own composition."

Another highlight will be Katrina Thomson's Core, a one-night performance at 169 High St, which will evolve into a month-long exhibition at the Blue Oyster.

Thomson has a string of previous Dunedin Fringe hits to her credit, including Ghost Train, Mothhearts in the Nighthouse and last year's epic 3rd Horse.

"The idea is to present a performance work that blurs the boundaries of theatre and performance art," Thomson explains.

"I see this style of work as an installation, which has moving parts. The uses of tableaux, or vignettes, are like choreographed stand-alone samples of scenes, imagery or action.

"Seemingly disparate, it is the rhythm of how they are presented that informs the overall feeling of the work. In a way it can be both cinematic and sculptural."