FIRST TRIMESTER

Krishna Istha will be taking over the Studio Theatre for a week, working on First Trimester, a 1-to-1 interactive performance interview set in a fertility clinic, in a quest to find the perfect sperm donor.

Register to take part

First Trimester is one part of Krishna’s M:OTHERHOOD Project, initially born from Krishna learning about their own mother’s experience of birthing a child that went missing from the hospital the day of the birth, losing another daughter but gaining a son in Krishna, and their own personal desires and fears of wanting to carry a child as a trans person into a world that’s slowly falling apart.

Fertility and reproductive rights have long been explored in feminist performance art, often in a trans-exclusionary way. As a practitioner who uses feminist tropes as a way to broach the trans experience, this project feels like a rich way to investigate the process and identity of motherhood. The proposed works ask the audience to reflect on ancestry and the price of biology (in relation to queerness, gender and race).

Using elements of documentary making and film, First Trimester is a one-to-one performance interview with a quest to find Krishna and their partner the ‘perfect’ sperm donor. Inspired by painter Paul Thek’s Teaching Notes, the audience will be asked intimate and probing questions that raise social and political conundrum. When looking at donor databases, Krishna found that the information often logged for donors focused on things such as eye colour, hair colour and academic accomplishments—which are of no use to them. They set out to create their own set of questions, to learn more about potential donors and why they might choose to donate to a trans couple, while simultaneously asking bigger philosophical questions about what makes a good parent.

Krishna’s week at Roundhouse will be an open-door studio, letting people into their research and developmental processes. The industry—producers, artists, performers, academics etc.—are welcome into the rehearsal space every day to witness and unpack aspects of the development process, and to experience elements of the show that might require the team to work collaboratively with more bodies. On the last day in the studio, we will open the space up to a wider audience for a round-table sharing of the work to get feedback and thoughts on the shape the show is taking.

The purpose of sharing work in this way is to challenge and interrogate artist development processes, to create transparency around the R&D process, and to open up questions about how we develop work and the models that we know don’t always serve the work itself.

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The team: Krishna Istha, Paula Varjack, Julia Croft, Michelle Williams Gamaker, Rent Rea and Ruby Glaskin.

What the week looks like:

Over Krishna’s week in the studio, they would love to invite fellow creatives & makers to come be part of the open workshop sessions taking place from Tuesday – Friday, 10am – 5pm. If you are interested in joining any of these sessions, please fill out this online form.

Tuesday: FORM — In this session Krishna will be interrogating the form and structure of their project, with a focus on the film and documentary elements of the project.

Wednesday: LOGISTICS & DESIGN — Exploring the logistics that go into creating three pieces of work that sit alongside creating a human baby, as well as the design elements. This session will include conversations with producers, production managers and the designer.

Thursday: TEXT — This session is all about the text & language in the show, finding the right way to communicate questions to audience members/potential sperm donors. The team would find it most useful for queer and trans folks who are, or hope to be parents some day to attend this session.

Friday: TEST — Delving further into the questions, Krishna will try them on the attendees. The purpose of this session is to help Krishna refine and find the right questions to be used in the show. Towards the end of the day Krishna will host a FEEDBACK session facilitating a roundtable sharing where they can bring together some of the learnings and questions that have come up through the week. Think of this as an ‘in-conversation’ with the team.

This show is part of Roundhouse PROCESS – a work-in-progress series interrogating artistic processes and artist care – part of the Roundhouse’s year-long theme of Liberation.