The Bigger Picture

DIY Ballroom / Live

DIY Ballroom / Live explores the concept of amateurism, and ballroom as a form of local, international and cultural dance. The project will feature a new video work based on found online footage of ballroom dancing, screened alongside a live participatory event; coupling analogue moves with digital and feeding the one back into the other.

Drawing on footage in the online public domain, DIY Ballroom develops ideas around ‘cultural dance’, ‘amateurism’, ‘aspiration’, ‘the local’ and ‘the international’, and will focus on amateur participation in ballroom dancing as a vehicle and arena for both cultural nostalgia and as representation of a heterogeneous ‘international’ culture.

DIY Ballroom Live is a site-specific event that will take place alongside a screening of the video work. Amateur dancers – young, old, and new – are invited to take to take to the floor in a seemingly spontaneous manner. DIY Ballroom / Live aims to reflect the diverse, local ‘amateur’ constituencies that both sustain and subvert notions of ‘international ballroom’. Sharing the same soundtrack, action in the street and on the screen will be momentarily mirrored via a live feed. Following on from last year’s Mobile Ballroom (a flashmob gathering instigated by the artist at London’s Vauxhall station), this event gives amateur ballroom enthusiasts the chance to dress up, show up, and make the world their ballroom.

For further information visit: www.myspace.com/diyballroomlive.

Biography

susan pui san lok is an artist and writer based in London. Recent and forthcoming projects include Golden (solo exhibitions at Chinese Arts Centre, Manchester, and Beaconsfield, London, 2006: publication forthcoming); Cruel / Loving Bodies (Hong Kong Arts Centre, 2006; Shanghai Duolun MoMA, and Beijing 798 Space, 2004); NEWS (artist’s book, 2005); Reassurance (SPACE Triangle, London, and Chinese Arts Centre, Manchester, 2005); Lightsilver (Beaconsfield, London, 2005); and The Translator’s Notes (Café Gallery Projects, London, 2003). She is currently a Research Associate at Middlesex University and an editor of the Journal of Visual Culture.

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