Friday 28 June 2013

The birth of Maho



Conceived and born in Shipley and currently in development at various Bradford locations, Maho's founding principle is 'Never any rush' as demonstrated here by co-founder Ms. Chemaine Cooke, at one of our early thought shower sessions.






Pictured here, collaborator and Bradford person, Michael 'Qi' Metcalfe in a cube made of bamboo, masking tape and string in our Shipley loft space.

Inspired by our 3 month woodland creature retreat in this beautiful free space made available to us by East Street Arts, we decided to form Maho, a dance company born in and dedicated to promoting dance and contemporary performance and art in Bradford, made with Bradford people. 

Photography: Hope Musgrave

In true 'Never any rush' fashion, we talked about being a dance company for a long time but have now actually begun to use our bodies as well as our mouths! We have been having gentle introductions with our lovely Bradford based arty friends. Last week Yvonne Carmichael made us look like ladies and filmed our hands and feet with delicious results. You can see them at her exhibition Fri 28th June - Thurs 4th July 11-6 (except Sunday). If you like you can have a look here www.yvonnecarmichael.com at a previous retail aesthetics project we helped her with. She is ace and clever and we look funny.

There was also a great gig this week with the super Suzy Russell, Lorna de Lorna and friends. As part of the Bradford Festival we interfered with the routine of Bradford's commuters by laying a lawn in the middle of the bus station and wrestling on it, amongst other things. We were beautifully accompanied by the best of Bradford-based improvising string musicians, via Sheffield, Seth Bennett on double bass, via Hull, Abi Vulliamy on viola, and via New York, Seth Woods on cello.