2018
Book Club for Dancers - the next chapter
Saturday 29th September, Saturday 27th October, Saturday 24th November, 1.30pm - 4.30pm
@ Independent Dance, Siobhan Davies Studios, 85 St. George's Road, London, SE1 6ER
A novel is a place of encounter. We enter the body of the text and experience a consciousness moving through time and space. We tune into a writer’s quality of attention and ways of paying attention to direct experience. As we encounter the body of the text, so too does the text inhabit our bodies.
Through three workshops, and three novels, we will be invited to enter these places of encounter and experience literature and movement together. We will read a text then meet in the studio to explore our responses. We will form a group, each bringing our own unique way of reading into the space. We will examine elements of a novel’s craft, such as time, place, rhythm, gesture. We will continue this exploration through movement, allowing our observations and ideas to inhabit a physical space. This will create a zone where our experience as readers and movers will meet, where imagination and body will speak to each other. What residue of our reading might appear in our moving – what images, stillness, use of space? As a group we will develop our own vocabulary and lens for examining texts, finding fresh ways to engage with our reading in order to inform our growth as people, readers and performers.
This project is run through Independent Dance.
Improvisation: Voice & The Body
10 week evening course
Tuesday 25th September - Tuesday 4th December, 7 - 9pm
@ Chisenhale Dance Space, 64-84 Chisenhale Road, London, E3 5QZ
“Trust in the Unexpected.” – Emily Dickinson
These classes teach the basics of improvisation, developing your performance skills in movement, voice, and narrative. Over this ten-week course you will improvise in ensemble, duets, and solo, expanding your palette of expression and encountering your imagination afresh.
Simple exercises from the Action Theater™ system, and inspiration from fiction will provide rich pathways into language and physical narrative. You will learn how to create movement and text in the moment, using rhythm, imagination and your sensory experience. The training seeks to enable ease, pleasure, and trust in the unexpected. The course will culminate in a sharing for family and friends. This course is open to anyone with some experience in moving or performance.
This course is run as part of the Chisenhale Dance Space evening class programme.
NOW! Festival Berlin
2-6 May 2018
@ Studio Verlin, Berlin
The NOW! Festival is a festival devoted to improvisation. Over five days there are fifteen workshops as well as nightly performances. This year the festival focuses on the themes of voice, movement, language, ensemble and solo improvisation. Workshops include Action Theater™, Feldenkrais, Contact Improvisation, Instant Composition, Poetry & Improvisation, New Dance, Imagination & Language, Human Voice and Stillness & Time. The workshops are open to anyone.
Rebecca will be teaching 'PANTHEON', a language workshop on Sunday 6th May. She will perform a solo that evening.
Book Club for Dancers
Saturday 24th March, Saturday 21st April, Saturday 26th May, 2.30pm - 4.30pm
@ Independent Dance, Siobhan Davies Studios, 85 St. George's Road, London, SE1 6ER
Explore different techniques from fiction and investigate what they could mean for a performer; rhythm, image, gesture and symbol, landscape and the use of time. Each month we'll look at a different novel, then we'll work together in the studio to create a dialogue between our reading and movement practice. This project is run through Independent Dance.
UPDATE: The course is now fully booked.
Image: Jenny Moore
The New Arts & Music Programme - improvised solo
Saturday 24th February, 7pm doors
@ Sutton House, 2 and 4 Homerton High Street, Hackney, London, E9 6JQ
The New Arts & Music Programme at Sutton House returns in February 2018 with the first of the year’s events to be held in the chambers of the Tudor home of Sir Ralph Sadlier, advisor to Henry VIII and Elizabeth I.
"Moon Must Animal Food" by Jenny Moore
“Two Solos" by Rebecca Mackenzie and Seke Chimutengwende
Curated by I-D.A PROJECTS
Supported by care in the community recordings
Action Theater™ Monday Night Evening Course
Monday 22nd January - Monday 26th March, 7 - 9pm.
@ Eastbourne House, Bullard's Place, Bethnal Green, London, E2 0PT
This ten week evening class will introduce you to the basics of Action Theater, a form of physical improvisation training in movement, voice and narrative.
Working in ensemble, duets and solo, learn to create material using rhythm, imagination and your sensory experience. Discover how to deepen awareness, expand your palette of expression and encounter your imagination afresh. Playful and expansive, this course aims to help you discover ease and musicality in performance.
If you'd like to explore more, come along to the taster class on Monday 15th, 7 - 9pm.
2017
Action Theater™ UK: solo improvisation workshop
Saturday 16th December, 11am - 5pm
@ Eastbourne House, Bullard's Place, Bethnal Green, London, E2 0PT
Action Theater™ is a physical improvisation training that develops performances skills in movement, voice and narrative.
During this Saturday workshop, we will explore different aspects of solo performance. Working with simple exercises we'll connect to material using rhythm, imagination and our sensory experience. Playful and expansive, this class invites participants to follow their curiosity into new encounters with their peronal pantheon of gods, dreams and symbols. We will explore tools for communicating this to an audience. We will perform for each other, seeking to find ease, pleasure and attentiveness to our ever singing, ever connected pantheon.
Late! Night Solos - performance at TripSpace
Saturday 11th November, 9pm
@ TripSpace, Acton Mews, Haggerston, London, E8 4EA
A pioneering double bill of solo performances from Seke Chimutengwende and Rebecca Mackenzie. Through a spontaneous flow of events, they create characters, landscapes and narratives, sometimes expressed through words, sometimes through movement. Every solo is different as they find both the structure and theme in the moment of performance.
Action Theater UK: Portals - a workshop
Saturday 30th September, 11am - 5pm @ London Buddhist Arts Centre
Action Theater (TM) is a physical improvisation training that develops the range and dexteritory of body, voice and imagination.
During this physically led workshop, we will explore the three PORTALS to states and material. We will work in ensemble, duets and on our own, exploring and encountering new terrains. We will warm up our body, breath and imagination. Working with simple exercises we'll generate material using rhythm, imagination and our sensory experience. Playful and expansive, this class invites participants to follow their curiosity into new encounters with imagination, body, and the moment. We will seek to find ease, pleasure and trust in the unexpected.
Performance at Notafe Dance Festival, Estonia
Tuesday 11th July, 7.00pm @ Notafe, Viljandi, Estonia
Rebecca will perform alongside Ruth Zaporah, Nadine Sures and other teachers of Action Theater (TM) in this night of improvised performance.
Improvisation class at Independent Dance
Monday 8th May, 6:30pm – 8:30pm
@Siobhan Davies Dance Studios, London
In this physically led improvisation class, we will warm up our body, breath and imagination. Working with simple exercises we'll generate material using rhythm, imagination and our sensory experience. Playful and expansive, this class invites participants to follow their curiosity into language. We will seek to find ease, pleasure and trust in the unexpected.
The Cardboard Citizens New Music Ensemble with Rebecca Mackenzie and Alice Colquhoun
Friday 3rd March, 7:30pm
@Chisenhale Dance Studios, London
The Cardboard Citizens New Music Ensemble is an experimental music group whose members are all homeless or ex-homeless people. Its founder and director Reynaldo Young is a disaffected composer, performer and academic originally from Montevideo, Uruguay, now secluded in Lewisham. Working with the New Music Ensemble, Rebecca will fuse together song, text and movement.
2016
Improvisation class at Independent Dance
Monday 30th October, 6:30pm – 8:30pm
@Siobhan Davies Dance Studios, London
In this physically led improvisation class, we will warm up the body, the breath and the imagination. Working with simple exercises we will generate text using rhythm, imagination and our sensory experience. Playful and expansive, this class invites participants to follow their curiosity into language. (Part of Independent Dance Monday Night Improvisation programme.)
Sherborne Literary Festival
Thursday 13th October, 4.30pm - 5.30pm
@ The Digby Hall, Hound Street, Sherborne DT9 3 AA
Rebecca will speak alongside author John Holliday about China, missionaries and writing.
Late! Summer Solos - open studio
Saturday 17th October, 7.30pm
@ COTC, 64 Barnsbury Road, London, N1 0ES
A pioneering double bill of solo performances from Seke Chimutengwende and Rebecca Mackenzie. For this special evening, the audience is invited to the studio where we work, for a night of solo improvisation.
Literary Death Match - Stoke Newington Literary Festival
Saturday 7th June, 7.30pm - 10pm
@ St Paul's Church Hall, Stoke Newington Road, N16 7UY
Described by the LA Times as 'the most entertaining reading series ever', Literary Death Match is a mix of four authors who perform their work before a panel of judges - one of whom is last year's winner, the author and actor Will Smith. The event costs £6.
Alex Clark's Rising Stars - Stoke Newington Literary Festival
Saturday 7th June, 4pm - 5pm
@ Ryan's Bar, 181 Stoke Newington Church St, London, N16 0UL
Alex Clark, literary critic for the Guardian and Observer, interviews new writers, getting a feel for their unique voice in an intimate and friendly venue. The event is free.
Performed reading from In a Land of Paper Gods
Wednesday 25th May, 7 - 8pm
@ The Library, 112 St Martin's Lane, London, WC2N 4BD
In a collaboration with musician and composer Reynaldo Young, Rebecca will be deliver a performed reading from her debut novel at The Library, Covent Garden. Join us for an evening of percussion, text, song and imagination as we journey through the novel's vividly realised world.
The event is free but numbers are limited. Tickets can be reserved via The Library.
Performed reading from In a Land of Paper Gods
Thursday 24th March, 7 - 9pm.
Rebecca Mackenzie will be joined by composer Reynaldo Young in a performed reading from IN A LAND OF PAPER GODS. The performance will be followed by a question and answer session.
Tickets can be booked online here.
@ Pages of Hackney, 70 Lower Clapton Road, Hackney, E5 0RN
Late! Night Solos two night residency
Friday 11th and Saturday 12th March, 9.30 - 10.30pm
Rebecca Mackenzie and choreographer Seke Chimutengwende return to the Hen & Chickens in this double bill of improvised half hour solos. Through a spontaneous flow of events, they create characters, landscapes and narratives, expressed through a palette of language and movement.
You can book your tickets here.
@ Hen & Chickens, Highbury and Islington, 109 St Paul's Road, N1 2NA
Tinder Press New Voices
Thursday 3rd March, 7- 9pm
Rebecca Mackenzie will read from her debut IN A LAND OF PAPER GODS, and will be joined by fellow Tinder Press authors Sarah Duguid and Sarah Leipciger.
Tickets are available in store, over the phone on 020 8670 1920 or online at dulwichbooks.co.uk
@ Dulwich Books, 6 Croxted Road, SE21 8SW
2015
Late! Night Solos @ ImpFest '15
Each Friday and Saturday in September, 2015 – 9:30pm to 10.30pm
Late! Night Solos goes to ImpFest '15. A double bill of pioneering solos from Rebecca Mackenzie and Seke Chimutengwende each Friday and Saturday night in September as part of ImpFest (Impermanent Festival of Contemporary Performance) hosted at Hornsey Town Hall, North London's pop-up art centre.
Reading from In a Land of Paper Gods
Thursday, October 1, 2015 - 6:30pm
Tinder Press proof party at Henley Literary Festival. Join Imogen Taylor, publishing director of Headline's literary imprint Tinder Press and editor Mary-Anne Harrington for a glass of wine, readings from their two debut authors Rebecca Mackenzie and Sarah Duguid and a discussion about getting published.
Improvisation, Choreography and the Novel - a lecture
Thursday 24th September, 2015
As part of ImpFest '15, dancer-choreographer Seke Chimutengwende and novelist Rebecca Mackenzie give a lecture on the dialogue between improvisation and choreography, and improvisation and writing, as well as their own approaches to improvisation in performance. This will be followed by an audience discussion.
Improvisation class with Rebecca Mackenzie
Monday, December 14, 2015 - 6:30pm – 8:30pm
Improvisation class at Independent Dance. In this physically led improvisation class, we will warm up the body, the breath and the imagination. Working with simple exercises we will generate text using rhythm, imagination and our sensory experience. Playful and expansive, this class invites participants to follow their curiosity into language. (Part of Independent Dance Monday Night Improvisation programme.)
@Siobhan Davies Dance Studios, London