Boots and Other Myths, Elaine McCague, Photographer Micaela Vetere
What role does place play in your work?
Place is always the starting point. My history of site-specific performance has taught me to listen closely to landscapes, architecture, and atmospheres, letting them shape the language of the body and materials. In Boots and Other Myths, working in rural contexts grounds the research in raw, elemental environments that heighten instinct and physical response.
Who or what are your biggest influences as an artist?
I draw from aerial circus traditions, visual art, and myth. More than anything, I’m influenced by instinct — responding physically to what arises in the moment — and by the possibilities of the circus body to move beyond spectacle into poetry.
How do you approach collaboration in your practice?
Collaboration is about trust and exchange. I create frameworks where ideas can bounce, shift, and surprise, allowing the work to grow beyond my own perspective. I understand that time is a factor to allow others’ ideas to be absorbed into the process, and value the ways they expand and challenge my own instincts.
What’s a place or moment that has shaped who you are today?
Encountering Fatt Matt in a cafe in Western Australia, ringmaster of a small circus out there. The curiosity of a normal man wearing well-dressed clown shoes while having coffee was absurd, and it led me to seek out the world of circus, absurdity, and impossible feats. An absurd moment in the ordinary.
Can you describe what you’re working on during your time in the studio?
I’m developing a performance under the working title Boots and Other Myths. Studio time is focused on exploring the physicality of the piece on the rope, and the challenge of interacting with the object of a pair of working boots, whilst experimenting with abstract and absurd scenarios. I’m collaborating with writer-director Carmel Winters to shape the narrative, allowing ideas to emerge through play, instinct, and the interplay between object, body, and space.
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