Shobana Jeyasingh CBE
Multi Award winning, Choreographer and founder of Shobana Jeyasingh Dance
The Voice of Her Gremlin
“Can I really do this?”
I often feel that everything I learnt from my last project has somehow become irrelevant, because this is a new piece of work. Each time it is like falling off a cliff and each cliff is different. That’s the nature of making creative work.
These things (conviction and doubt) run parallel to each other: You’re very convinced by something, you feel very passionate, you really want to do something, but at the same time you have the question of can I do this?
It’s not like being a music composer or a sculptor where it’s you and your materials. Here It’s you, your material, and other people; so you have to feel pretty strongly about something to be able to persuade people.
I find the more I know before I go into the studio the less frequent those episodes (of doubt) are. I’m a person who takes a bit of time. I’m not somebody who can just jump in and do something in 5 minutes; even in other activities not just dance making. I have to say I can be a bit indecisive because I am curious about options not tried . The best condition for me is to have time leading up to the rehearsal.
When your work isn’t based on a conventional style … you have to invent things in the studio from scratch with people with whom you might not share a physical language and it becomes more obvious that each time you do a piece you’re starting anew.
Let’s all go on a journey together, we are all a little bit vulnerable, maybe I have a little advantage because maybe I’ve been thinking about it longer than you have; but potentially in terms of the performance we are all journeying together. That’s the model I like to use.