Red Cardigan and sticks
It has been tumultuous recently with Brexit, the Labour party machinations and the disturbing power struggles of people who would lead us.
I have always been of the socialist persuasion but I wouldn’t call myself very active. However this time I have been compelled to do something because for once I have seen the actions and example of a leader who has great human concern and dignity. I do believe that Jeremy Corbyn represents what constitutes a good leader. He always comes back to his source: caring for those less better off.
In 2010 I was working on a project for the RSC which I called Birnam Wood which conceived Macbeth as a women’s story. I am slightly stirred again by the current Conservative leadership campaigns which remind me of my work on that project which had, unfortunately, limited development – it was the recession. It still is the recession and I have found myself yet again reinventing the wheel observing the tree as a teacher as the wood begins to march.
I posted the following on Facebook when the Labour haemorrhage began. The offer still stands.
“Getting more and more disappointed with the people who are leaving Jeremy Corbyn’s shadow cabinet but encouraged by his new appointments. I would like to offer the ones who have resigned a free workshop with me working on physical exercises concerning leading and following. Leading and following effectively is very delicate and complex. It involves walking/moving with, alongside, sensing, being sensitive to: making it almost impossible to see that you are the leader and it is not the same as mirror work. It requires that the leader allows rather than dictates. Enrique Pardo (Pantheatre) introduced me to this many years ago – on a workshop in London when he was over in England. Pardo used to say it was about making your follower look fantastic, making yourself invisible, making your follower look as if they were the one leading. It’s one of the hardest things to do – give up on your own ego and help someone else make an action without anyone knowing whose idea it was, bringing them along with you without taking the credit for the action. It requires great skill with peripheral vision and great sensitivity in making actions in the unknown. It is not about copying it is about being with. I would suggest that Jeremy Corbyn is the perfect leader. Every time I listen to him I have felt as if he is with the flow of the people who do not have much power. He has given me some hope in the possibility of change.”
Since posting, the bleeding has stopped but we still don’t have a solution…..however, the man with honour continues to hold out an olive branch to those who are making his job difficult. Somehow I hope and believe things will change and heal. Jeremy Corbyn, despite the mass men and women who would fell him, stands strong with dignity.
This short film is a return, a short tribute to trees, leadership, peaceful protest and hope. Thanks to Helen Chadwick for her permission to use the music and thanks to Goethe, Shakespeare and Robert Bly, oh and Ian Cameron for the pic of me in the red cardigan.