Masterclass 3, Odette Toilette February 2016

So here we are, halfway through the UCAN Create Masterclasses! They’re going so quickly!

Our third masterclass (which was in February) transported the project to a whole new level.  Ucan Create is all about creating, producing and showcasing your own work. It gives young people the opportunity to learn a new skill, work with some amazing people and create something new and unique. Each masterclass has been  as inspiring as the last and it’s impossible not to be excited and enthused in the company of our incredible masterclass practitioners.  Its safe to say that the wonderful Odette Toilette did not disappoint! Lizzie Ostrom is a lifelong scent fan, who in 2010 (under the name Odette Toilette) began hosting events for people to play with their sense of smell, from sniffable history tours to recreations of ancient aromatic rituals, Japanese incense ceremonies and scent speakeasies uncovering illicit perfumes.  To find out more go to www.odettetoilette.com.

This masterclass was an  introduction to the world of scents and how we can use them in our creative projects, including theatre and music productions. From scent-based storytelling, to turning a sound into a smell, or a scent back into song lyrics, we got to play with lots of different ideas that could be used in our work.

The masterclass started with a series of scent driven exercises designed to evoke and provoke the imagination. We began working as individuals and were each given a piece of cork soaked in a strong citrus smell.

One by one we were asked to share our own personal views and thoughts about the smell, we all had such mixed opinions.  Some strong emotional connections, be it love or hatred, some had precise memories and some people didn’t react at all other than recognising the smell itself.  It was extremely interesting to see how people react differently to scent. Next we were given a small sponge ball soaked in a powerful scent.  In partners we were asked to think of a space, world or location that this smell may inhabit. We were asked to imagine the air, is it thick? What’s the temperature? Colour exterior?  It was amazing how we could all create vivid and complex worlds all from this one sense and one scent.  It was an interesting place to begin a narrative, basing it on scent alone and noticing how smells can tell their own story, without words.  Finally we were given a small plastic pot filled with scent and put into groups to imagine a happening. It was a dark, herby and  evocative scent which caused much debate amongst the groups.  We all had to agree on what was happening, what event was taking place with this scent.  Again our imaginations went wild and people were conjuring all sorts of images and ideas.  The common thread between the groups was that this was a dark place with strange and wonderful things happening. The scent  turned out to be a commercial perfume! Based on death and decay, all the smells of crypts and  rooms!  Definitely dark and pungent places!  We soon learnt that scent is a very personal thing which works entirely on our own memories and thoughts. This can be very powerful when it comes to performance.

With theatre and performance in mind Lizzie (Odette) ran a very interesting exercises based on characterisation.  We were all given a scent, on a piece of card this time and asked to create a character. The aim was to use the scent as inspiration and a focus to form and develop our characters.  Who are they? What do they do? How old are they? What’s their temperament…? The list goes on!   Once we had all created our characters we were asked to enter an improvisation circle as our  characters.  Small scenes evolved from these weird and wonderful characters, which were all based and had derived from this one smell. It was amazing to see how each character was so varied and how individuals respond so differently to scents.

Our final exercise was truly unique!  We were using one sense to provoke and inspire and then translate it into another sensory experience. Confused? Don’t worry I was too, let me explain…  For a final time we were given a piece of card laced with scent.  Chemical and industrial, dirty and yet clean and oh so familiar.  We were asked to imagine what sound it makes. That’s right, what sounds does this smell create for you?  Sounds crazy I know but surprisingly it wasn’t as hard as it seems.  Of course these things are completely subjective so your own instinct is all that matters.  We were given a variety of

percussion instruments and asked to choose something that worked for us.  Whichever instrument recreated your personal sound. We experimented with rhythm, levels, pitch, speed etc… To finish, the entire group played as an orchestra, recreating the sound of this scent. What a bizarre but strangely wonderful experience to smell this industrial smell whilst listening to the sounds and rhythms of people’s own representation of it.

I have to say that this was one of the most unique and inspiring Masterclasses I have ever experienced.  It will be very exciting to see how we can use scent in different ways to inspire and create some new and interesting work.  We are also intrigued to see how we can weave all of these styles and art forms together to create an epic immersive experience! Personally this isn’t a masterclass that I will forget in a hurry!

Nostrils At The Ready!

What – UCAN Create Masterclass Three

Practitioner – Odette Toilette – Purveyor of Olfactory Adventures http://www.odettetoilette.com/

When – Friday 26th of February

Time – 17:00 – 19:30

Where – The Royal Welsh College of Music and Drama, Castle Grounds, Cathays Park, Cardiff.This Masterclass will introduce you to the world of scents and how you can use them in your creative projects, including theatre and music productions. From scent-based storytelling, to turning a sound into a smell, or a scent back into song lyrics, you’ll get to play with lots of different ideas to use in your work. Come prepared to sniff lots of interesting and unusual aromas.Lizzie Ostrom is a lifelong scent fan, who in 2010 (under the name Odette Toilette) began hosting events for people to play with their sense of smell, from sniffable history tours to recreations of ancient aromatic rituals, Japanese incense ceremonies and scent speakeasies uncovering illicit perfumes. She’s worked with many museums, galleries and brands including the V&A, The National Gallery, The Royal Observatory Greenwich and The British Museum. In 2015 she was on the team creating Tate Sensorium from creative studio Flying Object, which invited visitors to experience artworks with all their senses. Her first book,Perfume: A Century of Scents, is out now with Hutchinson.

Sounds like something you’d be interested in? To book a free space at this unique event  contact either Megan@ucanproductions.org or Mared@ucanproductions.org or call 02920870554

UCAN Create Master Class 2

Mathilde Lopez

On Friday evening the 29th of January UCAN Create ran the Second Master Class, this time with practitioner Mathilde Lopez. UCAN Create is all about creating, producing and showcasing your own work. It gives young people the opportunity to learn a new skill, work with some amazing people and create something new and unique.

Unique would definitely be one word I’d use to describe the experience of the workshop. From listening to Mathilde describe the work she’d previously done to represent pink through movement, we had the opportunity to discover how creatively she works. I found the session really interesting and thought provoking, as it made me start thinking about how I could work with space and text in a new way.

We began the workshop listening to Mathilde describing her previous work, which I think everyone would agree I could have happily done all evening. It was really intriguing to hear her explain that one of the things she does is to read the play or text in its entirety and to note down the first words that came to her before beginning to work on it.  

However, we quickly moved on to getting up and being creative ourselves. We got an insight in how Mathilde would utilize the space for a performance and through an exercise she explained and demonstrated how to work with and against space.  This then led into an exercise where we were asked to portray whatever colour was shouted out through movement and sound. We explored pink, yellow, black and even silver.

We then began to do a similar exercise but using words, by adding an action in order to change the tone of voice and over-exaggerate the meaning, which allowed us to explore new ways of combating text. This then led onto a series of exercises, while using an excerpt from one of Caryl Churchill’s works, Mathilde demonstrated how utilizing punctuation by replacing commas and question marks with an action or sound can be very effective. This adds dimension and purpose, making it a powerful piece to watch and listen to. Taking what we’d just learnt, in groups we developed this concept further.

After the workshop the general feedback was extremely positive.  Considering everyone was quite nervous and unsure what to expect at the beginning, we’re very proud of everyone for taking part and for giving everything a go.  Amy and Hannah explain this perfectly:

“Mathilde’s workshop was a real eye opener as it allowed me to approach text differently.  I enjoyed the completely different directorial style as it pushed me but also gave me a lot more confidence.” Amy. 17

“When the workshop with Mathilde first started I was a bit uncomfortable with the activities we were asked to do, she has a very strong personality and it wasn’t a style of directing I had worked with before.  When I looked around and saw how ridiculous everyone else was being I soon relaxed and got into things.  It turned out to be really enjoyable.  It was great to learn how you can put movement with words and how the slight change can impact the flow you want the words to have.  I would definitely like to do another workshop with her, she’s a brilliant woman and after I got comfortable I really enjoyable the workshop.” Hannah, 20

After the first two master classes being such a success we can’t wait to get stuck in to the next one.

UCAN Create Master Class 1

Fun, fast paced and engaging are just a few words that come to mind to describe UCAN Create’s first masterclass with yello brick.  http://yellobrick.co.uk/#stage-section

On Friday December the 4th UCAN Productions and yello brick hosted their first UCAN Create masterclass at the Cardiff University, School of Optometry and Vision Sciences.  UCAN Create is all about creating, producing and showcasing your own work.  It gives young people the opportunity to learn a new skill, work with some amazing people and create something new and unique.

The first session was run by yello brick.  We were taken on a crash course in game creation for theatre and unusual spaces.  Having the opportunity to work with UCAN members and a new group of participants was an exciting experience.   The first introduction into street gaming involved using dried spaghetti.  They made us play a game as a way of explaining the different parts of game creation, everyone found this really effective. Everyone was stood in a circle, joined to the people either side by a piece of spaghetti.  The aim of the game was to be the last pair standing with an unbroken piece of spaghetti.  They used this practical approach as an effective way of showing how the formula can work to create the basis of a very simple game and then built upon to create something more complex. We learnt that a game can be broken up into 4 simple parts.

We were then split into groups and given half and hour where we had to choose blind a genre, location and tech.  It was the group’s responsibility to choose the mechanic to create a game to share with the whole group at the end.  One group random selection were Zombies (genre), Castle(location) and Ribbon (tech).  With these three parts they created a game of Zombie Tag.  Another group choose sci-fi(genre), a bridge(location) and counters(tech), which they used to create a collection game.  Players had to collect the corresponding chips, which created a shape that then gave a code word.  This code word would get you across a bridge to a safe land.  Players only had 5 minutes to find the chips and only three pairs out of 6 could cross.

As an entire group we got to play each other’s games and then give each other feedback.  It was a great experience to see how quickly everyone had created such simple but effective funs games, which we all enjoyed playing.  This class truly gave us enough knowledge to go away and start creating our own games.  Maybe this is an idea for the next UCAN festival?  Who knows!?  

This masterclass was a great start to the UCAN Create project and we’re all very excited about the next upcoming sessions.

Megan and Mared

BIG THANK YOU MotoNovo Finance

Delighted to say that we have received an incredibly kind donation of £1000 from MotoNovo Finance! This money will be invaluable in helping us with the transport costs that UCAN Productions needs to make sure we can include as many people as possible. We would like to say a huge thank you to everyone who contributed, and a special thanks to Assistant Office Manager Lorna for delivering this very big cheque!