OCTOBER 2023 · WITNESS
Nocturnes @ The Dukes, Lancaster
Lancaster city centre, Lancashire
Nocturnes is Adam Z. Robinson with Jilk, a music collective, at The Dukes in Lancaster. Ghost stories, live score. The audience turns up in costume — skull makeup, Ghostbusters jacket, flower crown — which means the crowd is as much the subject as the performance.
Robinson works with a microphone, no set, the musicians behind him. He tells the stories straight, no theatrical staging beyond the light and the score. The work is in the words and in what the music does underneath them. Jilk play the atmosphere rather than the melody. It's the right approach for the material — the score is weather, not decoration.
The eye contact through the makeup is strange — the paint adds distance and removes it at the same time.
The Dukes Theatre — October 2023
I was shooting in the venue's ambient light. No flash, which means high ISO and waiting for the moments when people were still. A performer in blue and orange skull makeup and a flower crown looked straight into the lens. The eye contact through the makeup is strange — the paint adds distance and removes it at the same time. Someone in the audience had orange mallets. I don't know why. They held them like props in a ceremony.
Robinson at the microphone, gesturing with his hands, the musicians soft in the background behind him. The stories are told precisely. He has the control of someone who has worked the material until it does what he wants it to do.
The audience member with skeleton face paint in the front row had put effort in — the paint was detailed, not hasty. It was Halloween week in Lancaster. The city outside was dressed up too. Inside The Dukes they were doing something more considered than dressing up for the sake of it.
Audience member wearing skeleton face paint at The Dukes Lancaster
Performer with blue and orange skull makeup and flower crown at Nocturnes
Costumed audience members holding orange mallets during the performance
Adam Z. Robinson speaking at the microphone during the Nocturnes performance
Performer in red and white skull makeup among costumed audience members
Storyteller gesturing expressively at the microphone with stage lighting
Audience member in Ghostbusters jacket with prop gun at Nocturnes event
Adam Z. Robinson performing with live musicians visible in the background