As promised, we present to you the thoughts of the collaborative artists behind Dimensions & Demons, to be performed at the Esplanade Recital Studio on 5th November, as part of Singapore Writers Festival 2015.
“The work of Ferry and Stephenie Ye, Rain City is a series of bittersweet narratives that charts a course through a web of parallel existences and possibilities.”
What does the idea of “Dream Worlds” mean to you?
Ferry: Something we cannot control, but have time and again through dreams, received guidance, premonitions, and inspiration.
Stephanie: A realm in which one’s aspirations and desires are fulfilled… though any moment now, you might discover it’s all an illusion.
What is your final work/concept about?
Ferry: Stephanie wrote a brilliant story about parallel lives and what we perceive to be a desired life. Rain was a primary focus in the storyline so I then added an underlying story arch – the origin of the song “rain rain go away”.
Stephanie: I’m quite interested in the idea of alternate realities: every time you choose to turn right, other yous in other universes choose to turn left, go straight, walk backwards, do a cartwheel… What happens if two realities were to collide?
What was the process of collaboration like?
Ferry: Very smooth! From the get go we had very similar desires, wants and direction for what we wanted to do. So from the initial suggestions it was pretty much full steam ahead and a very clear intention.
Stephanie: Ferry had a very strong vision of incorporating certain visuals into our performance, and she roped in an amazing artist, Kate Pocklington, to help with that aspect. I’ve been able to sit back and watch them bring my story to life!
Were there any compromises in the artistic vision for the sake of collaboration?
Ferry: Not really. We respected each other’s line of work and expertise and worked to accomodate the text, music and visuals. The only give and take was mainly melding all the three elements – narrative, visuals, music together so that the timing is right and it flows well.
Stephanie: The main challenge has just been adapting our (rather ambitious) proposal to the time, space and technical constraints of this project.
What form will the performance take?
Ferry: Haha it will be a surprise! But a hint: We didn’t feel that a music performance + visuals being the main focus or music + spoken word would work for us because stories were a very strong focus of ours.
Stephanie: I shall have to be mysterious about this too.
What should the audience takeaway from the performance?
Ferry: To go out in the rain more often 🙂
Stephanie: I’ll leave it to the audience, in all their different realities, to choose…
Stephanie Ye is the author of The Billion Shop (2012), a chapbook of four linked short stories, and the editor of From the Belly of the Cat (2013), an anthology of cat-themed Singapore short stories, both published by Math Paper Press. Her work has been staged as a dance performance in New York City, translated into German for an art exhibition in Berlin, and used as an O-level examination text in Singapore. She graduated from the MA in Creative Writing (Prose) programme at the University of East Anglia in 2014, where she held a UEA Creative Writing International Scholarship and won the Weidenfeld & Nicolson Best of UEA Short Story Award. An honorary fellow in writing of the University of Iowa via the International Writing Program, she is a recovering journalist. http://stephanieye.com/
Ferry is one who exists as a mystery, elusive; aloof, teasing the curiosity, changing the mind. The solo project of Jean Low, lead singer and guitarist of Giants Must Fall, is the creative output of a very diverse, sometimes confused individual who just likes to make things look pretty and sound pretty.
Tickets available from SISTIC.
More info.