The Two Leaves

The Two Leaves

From the dirt and the roots grows a tree and from the tree there grow branches and blossom and from the branches and blossom grow leaves...

The Two Leaves is a story created from looking at at nature and imagining that leaves have the ability to love. Of course this is a cross metaphor for us as human beings and the reason I chose leaves is because they cannot love. It draws your attention to the difference between us with 'souls'/free will or whatever you want to call it and everything else. What makes us human is that we can think and then act upon The Design for Living which dictates that we all need communication/love and ritual/purpose in our lives in order to be content or happy. Humans need water, food, shelter and this Design where as leaves, plants and animals (although debatable) do not.

The two leaves first appear in Spring as buds together side by side and as they mature into green things they fall in love just in time for summer. As the wiff of Winter approaches the girl leaf changes colour to an orange and the boy leaf exclaims that she has changed. They fight a little and then a lot as he too changes to a red. The Winter comes and the girl leaf crinkles into a brown shade and old with time reminds the boy she loves him very much. He too is getting older and crinkling brown with age. She falls first but he quickly follows and the two lay at the foot of the tree and their whole world. As the snow buries them close together they molt into the earth and become one with the soil so that when the snow is cleared nothing remains of the two leaves until Spring returns and in their place on the ground shoots grass and buds which follows up and up into the branches of the tree where again there appears two leaves amongst hundreds.

The Play and Film

To represent the change in seasons and change in colour of the two leaves I filmed myself spray painting a mass of leaves. First white, then green, red and brown. This film footage was to be used in the film that would be projected onto performers.

Leaves spray painted white

Leaves spray painted green

Leaves spray painted red

Leaves spray painted brown

I then developed the idea of projection: I made these two large leaves (below) by weaving twigs together, pulling a white sheet between the frame and lastly cutting a hole in the top. This hole was for the performers head to go through and so these large leaves became both their costume but also something to project onto. When the film of the spray painted leaves was projected onto the leaves with the actors inside them the leaf was seen to change colour.

The Frame of the leaf projection board - twigs tied together with string

The leaf frame with white material stretched within it to create a projection board for the film. The actors head goes through the hole.

The Two Leaves
Projection boards for the film but also costume for the actors.

Using a script written for me by Cameron Forbes based on my original idea the show like shown below.

This footage quickly edited together played over the projector screens and throughout the performance.: