GEMMA COLLARD-STOKES

GEMMA COLLARD-STOKES

Dance Artist

THE ARTIST

Gemma Collard-Stokes

Gemma Collard-Stokes is an independent interdisciplinary performance artist, researcher and educator based in Derbyshire. A common aspect across Gemma's academic and artistic work is the exploration of dance in it's therapeutic capacity. This extends from her doctorate research, ‘Dissolving Borders’ (2017), in which she demonstrated how principles of ecologically conscious movement improvisation can be applied to acts of writing in order to enrich articulation and assimilation of the suchness of a union between body, mind and Earth.
Gemma's current interests align with prominent subjects within women’s studies, such as motherhood, birth trauma, body image disturbances, aging and invisibility. These investigations centre on how dance, and in particular ecosomatic movement practice, can offer [re]connection for those who experience a growing sense of detachment from their body. This work is embedded in enquiry that seeks to explore the ways in which human relationships with land and environment (including the natural world of animals and plants) through bodily interactions can support recovery, connection and orient us in the world.

Pott Shrigley

Amiga Enterprises

Corporate Marble

Corporate Marble (lockdown version)

Crackpot

Crackpot Experiment

Croft

In Other Words

In Other Words [sketch]

Joan's Words

Movement Uttered

Oh Mother!

Paper Trail

Species

Species (spied her)

Transformations

Unquiet

[w]Rite

Touch

05:03

Gemma Collard-Stokes

Touch

This film responds to an invitation I received from the East Midlands regional representatives for the Culture, Health & Wellbeing Alliance. The invite was to give a provocation to frame the second of their regional gatherings. I was asked to consider the current crisis of touch experienced by many in response to the Covid-19 pandemic. Touch is an innate yearning in social creatures. To touch and be touched, rewards us, soothes us, instils confidence, consoles us, teaches us empathy, gives us hope and brings us together. So much of our developmental process relies on touch. We know from research with primates and young children that when we exist in isolation, life without the closeness of others has a detrimental effect. With touch and closeness such key factors to feelings of wellness, resilience and inclusion in community arts initiatives, how can the arts for health sector overcome this rapidly unfolding crisis of touch?

Crackpot

06:00

Gemma Collard-Stokes

Crackpot

Caution: video contains animal carcasses. Old lead mines, slippery rocks, abandoned farm properties, wet embankments, centipedes, shallow streams, leaky boots, carcasses, husks, scrambling, bathed bodies... The ruins of Crackpot Hall stand on the slopes of Buzzard Scar near to Keld, a small village in Yorkshire. Now ruined and abandoned the stories attached to its walls remain a reminder of the past activities of this place – a 16th Century hunting lodge, a farmhouse, lead mining site, the story of ‘Alice’ the feral child found living on the hillside, and the hard lives of those who worked and lived the site. In a bid to discover how the land spoke to me I visited this place every day for 12 days. Each day I walked, danced, wrote, sketched, sang, lay still and spoke with the land. I explored the old mining sites, played in the abandoned farm property, lost my footing and slid down wet embankments, paddled through shallow streams in boots that let in water, watched centipedes scuttle when I disturbed their stony homes, scrambled over rocks and witnessed the weather change the land moment by moment. This film documents some of those encounters attempting to share the feeling of my time with this landscape. Originally presented as a multi screen installation, this version includes all footage spliced together.