Flyer High

Sonja and I went on a little journey this morning as we attempted to add to the fantastic image she has taken of Tobias for our publicity.

It began with me trying to follow her impulse of using the "happy birthday" ideas of the play by putting the phrase on the image.



This was too simple and looked bad, so we looked at some other images of birthday messages:



How cute, huh? Inevitably they contain little question marks that make you want to open the card. Although of course they are about as subtle as a sledgehammer - with an anvil attached.

I'd had the idea that the message was something that cut against the image of Birthday clown. We had a look at a few images of Forced Entertainment's Tim Etchells current exhibition A Short Message Spectacle (an SMS) which has neon signs of extemely personal statements placed in awkward locations around Norwich, England.





I also read out some of my early (April? May?) attempts to express the play in one single, personal sentence:

"I know that I am me because I can see you"

"I know I'm me because I can be someone else"

"I know the world is real because I can create a false one"

"The world must be real because it is so false"

(These started as something different but eventually morphed into a subjectivity tautology, I don't know why)

It seemed like it was about finding the right words that expressed some sort of conflict with the image, and also clouded the idea that it was a birthday card. After playing in this playground for a little while, we came back with this:


Using a particular syntax to express some sense of anxiety for the viewer - is it a question? A statement? Command? Suggestion? An ACCUSATION, even?

The logo I have been using to describe the company found its way in down the bottom in both labeling this as a piece of technological theatre and presenting the anxiety arising from happiness and sadness together, in the same motion.

What do you think of the Flyer?