Hand in Glove: Reflections on a performed costume exhibition and the stories behind the garments

Abstract

Abstract This article details a conversation with seminal choreographer Lea Anderson, following her performed exhibition, Hand in Glove, which was staged at the V&A Museum, London, in April 2016. Hand in Glove featured over 300 costumes and accessories from the archives of Anderson’s two renowned contemporary dance companies, The Cholmondeleys and The Featherstonehaughs. These companies played a prominent role in the evolution of British contemporary dance from the 1980s until their dissolution in 2011. Costume and design have long been utilized as transformative elements within Anderson’s work, giving rise to characteristic intertextual layering, blurring of boundaries and the destabilization of hetero-normative representations of the dancing body. Hand in Glove occupied the Raphael Gallery at the V&A from 22 to 24 April 2016 with vignettes from ten of Anderson’s works performed by students from London Contemporary Dance School. The conversation with Anderson outlines the process involved in the mounting of Hand in Glove alongside accounts of her early works, and the influence which design and costume exert in her choreography. Anderson describes her collaborations with designers, in particular Sandy Powell and Simon Vincenzi, and the ways in which her work with costume has evolved over time. Reflections on the implications of the exhibition itself (as a rare opportunity to view costumes performed live within a gallery space) are thus placed within the wider context of her choreographic practice and visual influences.