TEN, 2010 Performance

TEN started as an experiment for Patel to translate his video piece Kanku Raga into a live work. This evolved into his first piece for theatre with a duration of 50 minutes.

Through video editing in Kanku Raga Patel could replicate himself numerous times, playing a number of parts and rhythms himself. The main challenge in TEN was the integration of new performers that weren’t him. This process began in 2008 and saw the artist step physically out of the work to choreograph movement on contemporary dancers.

After a development period Patel stepped back into the piece as a performer and also it no longer seemed appropriate to have dance trained bodies in the work. After the first research phase, he felt the need to move away from telling the story through pure physicality and stylised movement, to telling it by focusing on three different people and their voices.

This piece looks at the idea of transference. Transference of a voice, a mannerism, an identity. It unpicks questions of Indian-ness and British-ness. It sits somewhere between live art, performance lecture and dance. It raises serious questions but is dealt through humour. For the first time, it provides a narrative setting for the non-linear nature of Patel’s work. It is performed by Mark Evans, Dave Higgins and Patel: A drummer without a drum, a performance poet without a poem and a visual artist without a gallery. Three bodies and three voices exploring British and Indian identity through Jhaptaal, the ten beat rhythm cycle from Indian Classical music.

WATCH TRAILER HERE

National tour 2010/11:
Southbank Centre, London
Royal Opera House, Linbury Studio Theatre, London
Rick Mix, London
Greenwich Theatre, London
Colchester Arts Centre, Colchester
Salisbury Arts Centre, Wiltshire
Arnolfini, Bristol
The Brewhouse, Taunton
Drill Hall, Lincoln
Embrace Arts at the RA Centre, Leicester
Mac, Birmingham
Greenroom, Manchester
Nuffield, Lancaster

International touring
Sydney Festival, Australia, 2011
Silesian Dance Theatre, Poland, 2011
France tour, multiple dates, 2012/13

International showcases
Decibel, Manchester, 2009
British Council Edinburgh Showcase, Edinburgh, 2011
British Dance Edition, London, 2012