In August 2023, Vivid Projects + Ikon programmed a series of free performances curated by Vivid Projects for Passionate Pilgrim, Melati Suryodarmo’s first UK solo exhibition. Suryodamo is one of Indonesia’s most important living artists, known for her strenuous durational performances that last several hours, testing the limits of mind and body.

This programme was developed in response to Present to Presence, a performance lab led by Suryodarmo and attended by the participating artists. Emily Scarrot, melissandre varin, Rosa Postlethwaite and Samiir Saunders produced work to engage and interact with the possibilities offered by Suryodarmo’s exhibition, through durational work. Instigating critical dialogue and creative exercise, Performance Art Laboratory signalled the first of our 2023/4 season, re-imagining our resources as Vivid Lab; a catalyst for practice-research.

Emily Scarrott: Not Lost At Sea

Not Lost At Sea was the result of Emily Scarrott’s workshop with Ikon Youth Programme, which encouraged thought about how to unpick performances and think about the ecological components of an artwork through responsive practice. This performance drew on the tools gained through participation in Melati Suryodarmo’s performance art laboratory, Present to Presence, at Ikon in May 2023.

“I am entering this project thinking about the ways that material, ecological and human bodies sit together within Melati’s practice. When Alastair MacLennan positioned a dead fish within his performance in Melati Suryodarmo’s laboratory, words of warning travelled far, wide and deep beneath the water. Now, fish take to the land to celebrate the life of their fallen sibling through eulogy and enquiry.” Emily Scarrott

Emily Scarrott is an artist, and writer from the Black Country particularly interested in making durational, unstaged performances informed by an ongoing preoccupation with science fiction and a curiosity in how we might practice desired worlds into being. Underpinning Emily’s practice is an exploration of the absurd as a queer landscape where reproduction of heteronormative values can be avoided. These experiences are led by a nourishing and tactile relationship with a single unfertilised hen’s egg. Emily has cared for the egg for almost four years now; he is doing quite well, and they go everywhere together.

melissandre varin: a rendition of stifled ghost-spells

In a rendition of stifled ghost-spells, melissandre plays with the (im)possibility to conjure and exorcise intergenerational trauma with small gestures. Approaching the moment as an ana-choreography composed with crumbling building blocks. The performance might emerge as an over-scripted improvisation of Blackness.

For four hours, the artist braids black synthetic hair whilst using molasses as a tool to interact with and transform the space around them. This performance draws on the tools gained through participation in Melati Suryodarmo’s Performance Art Laboratory.

“I am feeling very moved to have been invited into what feels like a historic moment for Birmingham and myself included. I am assembling a durational performance invoking braiding as a transmutation tool, small gestures forming everyday rituals, and trans-formation with and of (gallery) space.” melissandre varin

Through performance arts, moving image assemblages and site-specific installations, among other things, melissandre varin investigates love, intimacy and tenderness. Making from an Afro and Caribbean diasporic context, melissandre varin adds layers of complexity using a situated Black feminism.

Rosa Postlethwaite: Animating Tremors

This performance by Rosa Postlethwaite explores tension release through body and breath. The body is voluntarily shaking, long after a shock, to dispel energy. The materials for this work are a body, a room and a rosemary bush.

Animating Tremors draws on the tools gained through participation in Melati Suryodarmo’s performance art laboratory, Present to Presence, at Ikon in May 2023.

“My approach is to not plan too much but to really soak up the lab and act impulsively from the invitations. I’m hoping this will mean I can take in everything I can ‘in the moment’.” Rosa Postlethwaite

Rosa Postlethwaite works as a performance artist, dramaturg and facilitator across theatre, live art, dance and socially engaged art. They work collaboratively to make site-responsive performance, club nights, workshops and shows. Through performance Postlethwaite tries to deconstruct, slow-down, reimagine and remake forms of sociality in order to shake up the taken-for-grantedness of the way things are. Their work is informed by queer, feminist, anti-racist and socialist practices.

Postlethwaite is currently a PhD researcher at the Centre for Dance Research, Coventry University, and Aarhus University (2022 – 2025).

Samiir Saunders: Mind Control Victims Anonymous

Mind Control Victims Anonymous was an interactive poetry performance taking the form of a fictional mind-control support group navigating themes of free will, coercion and the relationship between an audience and a performer. Saunders explored the conditions of emotional endurance, vulnerability and care required for a completely improvised performance.

The performance encouraged audience interaction and participation, drawing on the tools gained through participation in Melati Suryodarmo’s performance art laboratory, and Saunders’ artist residency with Vivid Projects, 2022-23.

“I am excited by the opportunity to learn from Melati’s meditative and physically embodied approach to performance. I aim to expand my toolkit with strategies for deepening my artistic freedom, improvisation, and connection to my body.” Samiir Saunders

Samiir Saunders (b. 1996 – he/they) is a multimedia poet based in Birmingham, working primarily within the realms of spoken word, hip-hop, live coding, poetry film and performance art. Saunders’ creative work is dedicated to modelling playful vulnerability, in order to arm individuals with the tools to be curious, compassionate and vulnerable in their own daily lives and relationships. This work often lands on themes of Black joy, queer love, climate justice, shame, (mis)communication, intimacy and the Internet.