JO SHAPLAND
I create and curate dances of change in materials and objects, film imagery and the body moving through space.
In these times of global uncertainty, we need to cultivate community resilience. It’s time to process and move on from grief, overwhelm and re-cultivate our human and nature connections through creativity. I’m passionate that creative, social connections are absolutely vital to all the species that share this beautiful planet.
Observatree wearable, kinetic sculpture performance project
The principle of transformation animates my performance work. Audience interaction and opportunities to facilitate creativity in a diversity of others is vital to this; through giving audiences agency I wish to inspire in them their own sense of creative possibility that leads to action.
This is important for how I engage with a diversity of people and communities to get involved in my work. There is always more to learn and I’m amazed at how creativity manifests through people in such a kaleidoscope of ways. I love to see this happen in and as a result of my projects.
My site-sensitive residency projects range from ruined farm-buildings to traditional proscenium theatres, from natural wilderness to urban architectural interiors, from arts centre residencies to climate activist interventions.
I have lived and worked in Wales since 1993, and have a deep connection to its cultural life and wild places.
Maybe you’ve seen me around. I’ve been smudging the border between sculpture and performance ever since I immersed myself in outdoor ritual performance festivals and other performance traditions in Japan and India from 1992 onwards.
Body-modifying costumes and dances of transition in Theyyam festivals inspired me to start making solo work and create collaborative projects. I work with underlying principles of the ancient Japanese Noh theatre tradition; I collaborate with Japanese Butoh artists in Japan and Wales.
“…Shapland’s dance skills afford her a supersensitive awareness of spatial characteristics, the body’s movement through deserted spaces or traces on walls and floors of activities and presences.”
— Robert Clark, The Guardian
“…haunting, painterly beauty…. remarkable presence.”
★★★★
— Elisabeth Mahoney, The Guardian
