Decolonising clowning
Within the global clown community, many have been involved in discussion over how to proceed and how to re-examine our practices. A prime question which arises now is how to decolonise clown pedagogy. And the options and assumptions which are being problematised do seem generally to return to that ideology of vulnerability. In short, the same questions which the previous research had been nagged by are now re-surfacing as potentially the obstacles to a pedagogical practice which would not exclude the global majority.
Clown Congress Online 2023 "Laughing Through the Tears"
A dialogue recorded online on 25th October 2023 for the 2nd Clown Congress held in Bristol, UK.
Danielle Levsky and Michelle Matlock discuss their own personal clown approaches to the harmful stereotypes experienced as Black and Jewish women. In this wide-ranging dialogue they will asking each other such questions as: How has clowning historically reduced identities to stereotypes which do harm? How can clowning expose and heal reductive representations in order to tell the truth about our histories and celebrate our full humanity?
Danielle Levsky is a Post-Soviet Jewish multi-disciplinary storyteller who seeks to infuse the world with discovery, wonder, joy, and truth. https://criticturnedclown.squarespace...
Michelle Matlock is a performing artist, creative coach, teacher, director, producer and founder of Circle Up Productions (CUP), a live entertainment and performing arts education company based in Tacoma, WA. https://www.michellenicolematlock.com/
Decolonising Clown Pedagogy
In 2007-2010 I led a research project which questioned orthodox approaches to clown teaching that privilege notions of authenticity and the self through a search for vulnerability. At the time, I didn't realise it was these very individualistic notions in clown pedagogy that would later reveal themselves to be instrumental in maintaining white privilege in the field.
With the advent of the new political and cultural conditions we lived through in 2020 and beyond, since the influence of BLM made itself felt globally, this connection became obvious.
The original project was a 3-year Creative Fellowship (2007-2010) held by Jon Davison at Central School of Speech and Drama. The project explored clown/actor training within the context of 20th/21st century performer training practices and research. The prime focus was to ask questions about orthodox assumptions widely held within clown practice and pedagogy about notions of authenticity, presence, spontaneity and the privileging of vulnerability as a preferred method of access for students. Outcomes included policy recommendations opening up new avenues of performance and pedagogical practice which suggested alternatives to ideologies of the self which had had their origin in the very different conditions of the West in the 1960s.
A new, pressing, context for the original research has arisen over the past year (2020), with the urgency to respond to global movements that highlight institutionalised and structural racism throughout our societies. Within the global clown community, many have been involved in discussion over how to proceed and how to re-examine our practices. A prime question which arises now is how to decolonise clown pedagogy. And the options and assumptions which are being problematised do seem generally to return to that ideology of vulnerability. In short, the same questions which the previous research had been nagged by are now re-surfacing as potentially the obstacles to a pedagogical practice which would not exclude the global majority. That is, to examine the hypothesis that vulnerability is primarily open only to those privileged enough in our societies to live lives where they are not under constant threat.
This specific application of the research was not explored or envisaged explicitly in the original research, but our cultural and political moment clearly urges us now to do so.
This new research imperative also emerges from the ongoing study and discussions within the Clown Studies Courses at London Clown School, which began in 2020. Much of the debate in these courses has centred around how a greater understanding and analysis of clown history can open up new paths for our practice today.
My interest in pursuing these questions further led me to collaborate with several clown practitioners who have also been concerned to open up new avenues to explore.
Between 2021 and 2023, together with Amrita Dhaliwal, we worked on a project proposal to explore teaching methods and how they might be contributing to further exclusion of the global majority. Here is our introductory section:
Ever wondered why all clowns are white?
with Amrita Dhaliwal
Yeah, us too. I guess it might be for the same reasons other spaces are white. What if we looked at clown history and found a lot of racism, exclusion and privileging of access? Or contemporary clown teaching and found that insisting that the only route to clowning was to go through a kind of torture where the teacher makes you feel like shit. I mean, who would survive that? I did, but then I’m a white cis het man. What if there was a different way to teach it? That didn’t try and reduce you to a so-called neutral state before building you up again. That, instead, acknowledged and celebrated what you already knew. How you already clowned, and didn’t try and make you vulnerable in a classroom, when you already were vulnerable out there in the real world just because you are black, female, trans, queer, disabled or otherwise minoritised.
This research will explore the pathways of contemporary clown teaching through training workshops to understand how it upholds certain identities and where it falls short in serving minority identities. The workshops will be clown training with a revised pedagogy which has been developed by the researchers (Amrita Kaur Dhaliwal and Jon Davison) in collaboration over the last two years, exploring a decolonized clown pedagogy in the wake of Black Lives Matter. As contemporary clowning has a growing global footprint, exploratory research workshops will be held in Cape Town, South Africa, London, UK, and Los Angeles, USA.
The Mammy Project with Michelle Matlock
In October 2023 Michelle Matlock invited me to work on their solo show which used elements of blackface clowning. Specifically, I was tasked with coaching Michelle in exploring the limits of what a black clown today might be able to do with a clowning practice that is inextricably bound up in racism. Blackface can almost be considered a foundation of clowning. We might even suggest that clowning IS blackface, in other words a gross misrepresentation by means of mocking caricature of those defined as most minoritised in our societies. What options does all this leave black clowns, clown teachers and their students? If the only way to clown is also inevitably a form of racism, what clowning is possible, if any? Can performers re-appropriate oppressive forms to be reutilised as resistance?