Focus: Paula Varjack and Chuck Blue Lowry

Who are you and where are you from?
We’re Varjack-Lowry. We’re a company based in London made up of Paula Varjack and Chuck Blue Lowry. Where we’re from is a bit of a tricky question for both of us. We’ve lived and feel connected to a lot of places. But the short version is we have both lived most of our lives in London, both of us are dual heritage (Paula: British/Ghanian Chuck: British/Italian) Chuck was born in Guilford and Paula was born in Washington DC. 

What is it you do?
We make performances, videos and workshop experiences, both online and in person that draw from our background as filmmakers, theatre makers and facilitators. Over the last two years our work has become increasingly digital, so we have also become very interested in referencing and using social media as a frame –  for commenting on and raising questions about social issues and pop culture. 

How long have you been doing it?
Both: As a company we first began working together in 2018 where Chuck was lead artist and Paula was guest artist on a project called Decorum, a series of projects by intergenerational arts charity Magic Me co-led by Sue Mayo. Decorum explored what ‘good behaviour’ means for women in the 21st Century. Paula was then lead artist on a site specific theatre piece All the Lights are On, exploring women with experience of homelessness and/or the criminal justice system for Clean Break and Cardboard Citizens and invited Chuck to be a guest artist. 

Varjack Lowry was born after this project, where we then began to develop iMelania through the Barbican’s Open Lab scheme.  Since then we have gone on to make a number of digital commissions, and facilitate workshops and teach online practice. We recently co-curated our first festival – Get On the Internet early this year. We’re still fairly new as a company but we’ve managed to pack quite a lot in. Despite the pandemic, somehow we’ve managed to keep working. (the focus and play around digital work has very much helped!) 

Paula: I never quite know where to date it from because I’ve worked across so many disciplines. I originally trained as a stage manager and then in filmmaking. In terms of my work as a performance maker I guess I would say since 2013 which is when I  made my first solo show. Since then I’ve been making work across art forms, theatre, cabaret, video, sound pieces, and online

Chuck: I originally trained as a performer then switched and studied filmmaking at Central Saint Martins. I graduated in 2016, and since then have worked on a variety of projects, specialising in filmmaking, participatory and documentary style performance projects. 

What inspires you?
Popular culture, social questions, marginalised stories, the unsaid. If there’s something that people feel uncomfortable discussing, we find it interesting to unpick why and get under it. Both of us are very visually led, but we are also big talkers, when we’re working on something a lot of the project is deep diving into research and then having lots of conversations around it. We have different ways of making work but they complement each other very well. 

Tell us about your work
Our work is visual, thoughtful and entertaining. Both of us have worked in film, theatre and participation, so our work often combines all of these interests. We often use twinning in our work, matching our outfits both in and out of performance! Our most recent piece, iMelania, is a digital performance that takes place on your phone and laptop simultaneously. The piece explores what it means to be foreign and female, using Melania Trump, the second foreign born First Lady of the US (and married to one of the biggest critics of immigration) as an avatar to explore ‘acceptable’ foreignness. The experience is a bit like you’ve got access to two devices that belong to someone else, and for fifty minutes you are going to see and hear everything they are viewing, writing, hearing and scrolling through.  Before that you’ll arrive at a little island with the rest of the audience. It’s on a site called gather and feels a bit like a nineties video game. It has hard borders and you can’t leave. 🙂 It will leave you thinking about the question of where you are from and what it brings up, and even give you a chance after to talk about it with the rest of the audience on our digital island. 

What have you got coming up in the future?
You can experience Varjack-Lowry as part of GIFT: Gateshead International Festival of Theatre 2022. Their digital experience iMelania takes place online on Friday 29 April at 3.30pm and Saturday 30 April at 7.30pm. You can find out more about the performance and reserve your Pay What You Decide tickets here: https://www.eventbrite.com/cc/imelania-317549 

We are filming an exciting digital performance project, called TheBabyQuestion in July this year with an amazing creative team and the performers Luca Rutherford and Catriona James. Expect a top of the pops style chart show exploring being childless/child free. It will be released towards the end of this year, so watch this space!

We are also currently in the very early stages of developing two new projects; one exploring an outsider’s guide to football culture and the other about the dark side of the beauty industry. We have been lucky enough to enjoy a residency week at ARC in Stockton as part of this research and development process.

Finally, we often run workshops about collaboration, remote practice, digital practice and making performance, so keep an eye out for upcoming workshops and come hang out!

Where can people find out more about you?
You can follow us on our social media handles @PaulaVarjack and @ChuckBlueLowry on Instagram, Twitter and Facebook and by using the hashtag #VarjackLowry

You can experience Varjack-Lowry as part of GIFT: Gateshead International Festival of Theatre 2022. Their digital experience iMelania takes place online on Friday 29 April at 3.30pm and Saturday 30 April at 7.30pm. You can find out more about the performance and reserve your Pay What You Decide tickets here: https://www.eventbrite.com/cc/imelania-317549