One Question – why don’t we…?  questions the mindlessness of our everyday lives, using a collusion of art forms – poetry, dance, music and theatre. Renee Liang interviewed producer and performer Gus Simonovic about the show’s inception.
 
What is the idea behind the show?
 

One Question – why don’t we…?  questions the mindlessness of our everyday lives, using a collusion of art forms – poetry, dance, music and theatre. Renee Liang interviewed producer and performer Gus Simonovic about the show’s inception.
 
What is the idea behind the show?
 
Printable Reality's idea is to take NZ poetry into a new era, joining a world-wide movement of performance and spoken word that takes poetry off the page and into the real world as part of modern entertainment.
 
The ideas behind the show: we all are, individually and as a society conditioned by our ways of doing things and our habits. From the smallest, everyday ignorant acts to creating a global crisis of unimaginable proportions. We are all just mirroring our immediate environment, not really paying attention to where all of this behavior is taking us. In this era of controlled democracy, free thinking, opinion and authenticity of any sort is characterized as “alternative”. Most people are so engrossed in this conditioning that they don’t even consider questioning: why do we to things this way? And more importantly: why don’t we do things differently? This show sets out not to give answers, not to change the world ... but to open that essential conversation between and within us.
 
The show features many different groups and performers (Printable Reality and the Literatti, MIC, AUT dance company) and many art forms (poetry, theatre, music, moving image and dance). How did all these groups come together to work on the show?
 
Printable Reality has set out to become a national organisation that opens opportunities and supports the art of performance poetry. For this project Printable Reality is acting as a producer, supporting all those creative and talented people who share belief in the power of the spoken word. The Literatti are a leading performance poetry troupe in NZ and our coming together was a natural process. Our shared vision is that poetry has to be lifted off the page and delivered in a contemporary and exciting new way incorporating elements of theatre, movement, music, dance and visual imagery. We are very fortunate to be working alongside some amazing musicians and artists from Moving Image Centre, AUT Dance Co, The White Wall movement troupe - to deliver this poetic multimedia experience.
 
What's the process of collaboration been like?
 
It has been absolutely wonderful. The Literatti's creative process has been mastered over the past five years. From the very beginning, when we were making decisions of how to most succesfully create the first Kiwi-made poetic-theatre show, I had absolute confidence in Christian Jensen's creative vision, and the great bunch of performance poets that helped him create the show. Having a couple of outstanding musicians, visual support by MIC, improvised movement by The White Wall and dance element from AUT Dance Company - made this cleverly conceived production in to multi-layered artistic creation, like nothing New Zealand have seen before.
 
What is Printable Reality about? What are you up to next?
 
Printable Reality is all about poetry, raising profile of performance poetry and bringing it to the widest possible audience in NZ. We are modelling ourselves on the London-based Apples and Snakes. Printable Reality is evolving and being continually re-shaped by poets and other artists that are part of the big vision to deliver more meaningful entertainment to New Zealand audiences. In the near future our focus is going to extend into implementing an artists’ development program and engaging with a community by running performance poetry workshops for schools and the public.
 
Printable reality is an umbrella organisation which supports talent, brings together resources and creates opportunites, rather than being a performance group itself. Printable Reality organises poetry events in different venues around Auckland. It produces multimedia performances that have a strong poetry/spoken word element. It supports and creates opportunities for poetry/spoken word artists and facilitates artistic collaboration across different disciplines. Printable Reality was chosen by the Auckland Regional Arts Trust for the ART Venture 2010 program. ART Venture is a unique acceleration programme that brings together the arts, business, education and investment communities to back creative, entrepreneurial practitioners and producers working in the Auckland region who are keen to contribute to Auckland’s arts, cultural and economic development.
 
At the moment, Printable Reality is running three, monthly “In VOICE and Music” events across our lovely Supercity: Chocolate Theatre in Albany, Whitespace at Ponsonby, and TSB BankWallace Art Centre at Pah Homestead. We will continue forging new partnerships locally and internationally, all in aim to enable performance poetry to take its rightful place in New Zealand's rich and colourful art landscape.
 
We are bringing live poetry to the streets and squares, festivals and celebrations, poetry readings and music concerts, weddings and birthday parties, gallery openings and fashion shows, fundraisers and corporate events, gardens and carnivals and we are taking every possible road that further opens hearts and minds of our people.

Further information:
Check www.printablereality.com for more details.
 
And of course, at 2011 Auckland Fringe Festival – join us in celebration of the first kiwi-made poetic-theatre show:
 
“One Question: Why Don't We?”
 
25th and 27th of February at The Basement Theatre!