ECHO 2/3/06

Still the ignorant live on among us, brandishing their juvenile insults at anyone they believe should be the victim of their words. They exist still in a cocoon of bigotry and hatred towards anyone they perceive to be ‘different’. They wear their hypocrisy with pride and hide their cowardice behind their gangs, egged on with liberal amounts of alcohol or drugs – this allows them to absolve themselves of any responsibility. Their belief system has been passed on by fathers, mothers, and by the culture they choose to expose themselves to – the popular push of hatred –

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And having to take control at rehearsals, seeing through the lack of preparation by the writer and director today – total confusion and inertia – so I take the script and rewrite elements of it to bring it to better life and it works – it’s a joy to know that it is possible to do so much so quickly now –

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There is an etched plate of steel in the water basin gazed on by twelve art students – hairy, skateboarding giggle-fits – but it is not of our world – the third floor of the university block has become a shrine to the winter migration of a falcon – the bird’s barbed edges have long gone but it has left this accident of chemistry ready for us - to attempt to understand the cypher there where it’s full strength urine has marked the plate, etching the surface – now washed and ready for ink – we like to think that maybe the creature has left us a message, some first for cross-species communication – its name – or a representation of a map of the places it has been in its pathway north – or a list of kills perhaps? - We move together, the students following me to the bench where the ink is warmed in its crucible and is giving off the rich oily smell as it gets close to readiness. I layered it on to the steel with a padded rag, working it into the shallow marks – we avert our eyes, not wanting to lose the surprise of what might be there, waiting for it to be transferred eventually to paper, the end of the process – and when it is, there is nothing immediately recognizable, it is literally the mark of bird piss, you can see where it had run slightly as the bird moved away – but that abstract form now delineated in black and white still maintains all the meanings we want there to be; each one a reflection of the individual - (NB it is a fact that falcon urine can be 3000 times more concentrated in uric acid than its blood levels and that is strong enough to etch steel) -