WITTA (Writing In /To /Through Art) is a practice-as-research initiative developed by Lizzie Lloyd (Senior Lecturer in Fine Art and Art & Writing UWE Bristol).
Its name reflects an interest in works that develop interrogative, relational, enquiring, speculative, generative, playful and performative approaches to art through words, and words through art. It looks to actively and experimentally consider how work developed at the intersection of art and text allows for creative/recreative/uncreative, wayward and imaginative thinking.
Freya and Cinzia’s ongoing collaboration spans writing, performance, sound and moving image. Dialogue is central to the way they create and produce their work. Their exchanges – private, public, remote, rehearsed and improvised – encompass research, anecdote, humour, and cultural criticism.
Their shared practice combines their individual interests in modes of performance within socio-political contexts, often referencing narrative constructs such as theatre, pop music, cinema, and soap operas. Previous works have escalated real and imagined experiences of work, relationships, and domesticity, to explore perceptions of aspiration and failure.
Freya and Cinzia are currently developing new work that considers methods and processes of private and public performance in relation to consumerism and emotional “health”. Their current research explores acting improvisation techniques that are prevalent in “self-help” and confidence culture, and potential frictions between individualised therapeutic pursuits and collective politics. For their presentation at WITTA, they will be sharing live and recorded works-and-thoughts-in-progress.
