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Arabesque | Ariadne's Thread
from inside women's spaces
 

Janelle Mendham, Jan Dineen, Christl Berg, Llewellyn Negrin

A beautifully unruly and gently subversive improvised play based on drawing room activities that once displayed a woman's accomplishment and breeding.  

 

Initially an in-situ response to Hadley's Hotel Public Drawing-Room for Ladies (1896) - Arabesque extended, re-invented and now travels. 

                          She’s unravelling literally and existentially                                       and she’s doing it with abandon

                                                           

                                                                    disorderly and disruptive and not amenable to discipline or control             unruly   

 

                      confounding    

mix up something with something else

                                                                                                                                absurd                             wildly unreasonable, illogical

 

         Spillage business         In industrial production, spillage is the loss of production output due to production of a series of defective or unacceptable products

                                                   

 

                                                                                                                                           unchartered waters                places not yet explored     

                                                                          unfamiliar situations in general        

 

                                    a complex structure in the inner ear containing the organs of hearing and balance                 labyrinth

extremely beautiful and delicate                                           

exquisite

 


                                 He asks what she is doing?           ‘a long crocheted line that has no meaning’             just like life  he replies

 
 
Its immediate effects are to cause the blood to circulate more freely, and promote the actions of various organs of the body.   
The Dictionary of Daily Wants, London, Houston and Sons, 1880 . p361

Photography and video @ Hadleys - Amy Jackett

all other Photography - Chris Brown

many thanks

Ruth Hadlow   Project development through the Creative Research Program
Anne Marshall  Oboe @ Hadley's and MAC
Amy Jackett  Curator, Hadley's Orient Hotel
Christopher Brown  Photography 

Hadley's Orient Hotel 
Moonah Arts Centre | MAC
Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery TMAG

 
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Ariadne's Thread was conceived for the Unravelling Ornament exhibition at Hadley's Orient Hotel
curated by
Dr Llewellyn Negrin 


 

Artwork, design and content Janelle Mendham  © . All rights reserved.

Adapted from website by Patrick Toohey

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