The August Forecast by Benjamin Hancock

Benjamin Hancock joined us for The Makers Program back in May and led Chunky Move’s Rewards for the Tribe Workshop.

Practice makes …

Throughout my career I have had the opportunity and interest to expand my modes of performance, carving a path to redefine how we look and label the body in its ability, strength, sexuality, virtuosity, masculinity and femininity. This has been achieved within my body of work and represented in varying forms including contemporary dance, cabaret, drag, roving and roaming presentations.

My interest in dance is to embody, impose, question and redefine the world around me. Embodying, observing and questioning the placement of rules on how we understand social structure, the body, environment, sexuality and our selective understanding of history. Within my practice, the process and performance of questioning what already exists then highlights and magnifies particular themes and ideas which then impose, challenge and fantasize new directions, ideas and answers to the histories and ingrained belief that we so strongly hold onto as individuals and community. These are completely presented from a personal and individual place. The scale and how much theme or research is magnified is dependent on the theme of the work or who I collaborate with.

My current exploration in movement is a weave between choreography and improvisation. A place where the body can experience articulation and a real-time awareness between the spectator and performer, creating a tension between the unknown and expanding the expectation of decisions made and forced upon the body through space, time and dynamic. I see the body as substance, matter and particles, a vessel that can redefine the knowledge of how we view and understand the potential of the human body and its decisions through movement, lifestyle, environment, gender and sexuality.

Underlining my practice and interest is how masculine and feminine qualities can be viewed and imposed via the body, imagery, and environment. My exploration of these within my work can be equally subtle and overt depending on how they relate to the themes of the work or what type of environment I’m presenting the work in.

In today’s world we have such a present sexual/gender/identity scale which can no longer place the body in a single category of what’s masculine and feminine. My goal is to present an individual scale that can embody, embrace and intertwine these embedded binaries, celebrating the possibility, availability, potential and freedom we all share.

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MEET THE ARTIST: BENJAMIN HANCOCK

Benjamin Hancock is a dancer, choreographer, and performance artist, who is currently based in Melbourne, unceded Wurundjeri country. He has featured in works by Australia’s leading choreographers including Lucy Guerin, Prue Lang, Melanie Lane, Antony Hamilton, Lee Serle, Sue Healey, Martin del Amo, Narelle Benjamin, and Gideon Obarzanek.

As a solo artist, Benjamin often inhabits fantastical dispositions that invite audiences to embrace parallel masculinities and femininities. He has presented solo performances at Chunky Move (Next Move), Lucy Guerin Inc (Pieces for Small Spaces), Performance Space (Day For Night), National Gallery of Victoria (Melbourne Now), Mona Museum & New Orleans Biennial (Prospect 3 USA).

Benjamin has also collaborated with contemporary artists, such as Dylan Martorell, Belle Bassin, Lichen Kelp, and Fayen d’Evie, to develop and perform works presented at leading Australian galleries including the Art Gallery of NSW, the Ian Potter Museum of Art, and Heide Museum of Art.

He received an Australian Dance Award (2017), Helpmann Award Nomination (2017), and Green Room Award (2016) for his outstanding performance in Lucy Guerin Inc’s ‘The Dark Chorus’. His performance in ‘Princess’, his solo work choreographed for Chunky Move (Next Move) received a Green Room Award Nomination (2015). ‘Princess’ also won two Green Room Awards (2015) for outstanding sound design and visual design.

Acclaimed as a performance artist in drag cabaret and club venues, including BARBA and Honcho Disko, Benjamin often plays with the spectacle of camouflage and masks, within egalitarian choreographies of drag. These performance entities have resonated beyond the club scene, leading to commissions at Aesop, Tourism Australia, NGV, Art Bank, Mona Foma and Dark Mofo, ACCA, ACMI. Collaborations continue with performance artists James Andrews, The Huxleys and Discordia.

Since 2015, Benjamin has been a core member of the drag cabaret ensemble YUMMY, which has performed at Underbelly Festival (London), Edinburgh Fringe Festival, Brisbane Festival, Auckland Live, and fringe festivals in Melbourne, Adelaide, and Perth. ‘Yummy’ won two Green Room Awards (2018) for best production and cabaret ensemble.

Benjamin graduated from the Victorian College of the Arts in 2008 with a Bachelor of Dance, and was the recipient of the inaugural VCA choreographic award in his final year.

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