Mill Street Studios

Experiment. Create. Present.

Test Pressing is a dance project group with a focus on projects that reach & engage the community. Test Pressing tests different dance & conceptual ideas, & develops these ideas, finally presenting the outcomes as a performance or work ‘in development’.

The Test Pressing group was established to give student dancers, a taste of making a contemporary dance work in a professional context, and a performative experience that is different to eisteddfods or on a traditional stage. Aged between 16 and 19, the student dancers were guided by choreographer Claire Marshall in many aspects of making a contemporary dance work.

This, the first project for Test Pressing was called “Extract”. It was a 42-minute immersive contemporary dance work performed by five students of Mill Street Studios. The piece was inspired by exploring memories triggered by a specific space. For the dancers, this saw them drawing on various memories of Mill Street Studios and explored themes of hierarchy, acceptance, pressure, anxiety in a dance class environment.

The agenda for the audience is the first day of classes, and the characters emerge around the audience as the story unfolds.

Choreographer Claire Marshall worked in the “immersive dance” formula she established making her immersive works SlowDive, Video Set, Hey Scenester. Claire mentored the students in various aspects of making a dance show including marketing, ticketing, promotion, costuming, sound, and (very DIY) lighting and stagecraft.

This video shows a few snippets of the 42-minute work performed on the 2nd of December 2017 at Mill Street Studios in Goodna, Qld.