The Jocelyn Herbert Award
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"For me, there seems no right way to design
a play, only, perhaps, a right approach. One of respecting
the text, past or present, and not using it as a peg to advertise
your skills, whatever they may be, nor to work out your psychological
hang-ups with some fashionable gimmick." Jocelyn Herbert 1917 - 2003 |
The Jocelyn Herbert Award is given by the Linbury Trust and Jocelyn's family to the candidate who epitomises Jocelyn's belief in theatre. The successful candidate needs to have:
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A genuine interest in all aspects of theatre and belief in the importance of the collaborative effort needed to make the end result work at its best, in short a passion for the art of theatre |
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An exciting imagination and the artistic skill to visually demonstrate their ideas clearly |
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A respect and feeling for the original work being designed - text or music |
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A strength of personality and determination to see the work process through to the end |
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A desire for further study, time or simply some space to develop their ideas or missing knowledge |
The Jocelyn Herbert Award 2005: Ellan Parry
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Ellan Parry graduated with First Class Honours from Wimbledon School of Art in 2004. Artists and companies for whom she's designed include Gecko (The Race, London International Mime Festival and national tour 2005 - Total Theatre Award Winner), Lady Inert (Incipient Impediment, the National Review of Live Art, 2005), Brian (Billy Holiday, Battersea Arts Centre, 2005), Ellen Hughes and Penny Black |
(Sudden Silence, The Arcola, 2005), Allgood Theatre Co. (Jacques & His Master, the White Bear, 2005, and Hell is Empty, The Space, 2005) and Imagina Dance Theatre (Falling Angel, Rising Ape, Edinburgh, 2002 - Fringe Report Award Winner). Ellan was a founder member of art and performance collective The Society of Wonders, with whom she's devised and designed shows including The State of Mind of Ghosts (Chelsea Theatre LIVE 05 season), Sap (Brighton Visions Festival, 2004), Bellerophon (Carn Marth Quarry, 2003) and Pig Man Joe (Marlborough Theatre, 2002).
I want to watch, and to help make, theatre that intrigues, inspires and surprises. I want to work as part of a team of people who each do something unique and marvellous. I want set, costume and performance to interlock and overlap, each informing and enhancing the other. Through analysing, detecting, digging, divining or occasionally inventing from scratch, I want to pinpoint what I, my co-workers, and an audience recognise as something true. I like layers, complications and contradictions, sparseness and spectacle, Norse myths, comic books and the lady with the dancing dog at Crufts. I want to make work that's brave, funny, sad, detailed and unexpected. Be it in awe, delight or horror, I want people to sit forward in their seats and say 'oooooh'…