The Girl from Nowhere, a solo work by live artist/theatre maker Marisa Carnesky, explores women and displacement, otherness, ethnicity, cultural belonging, sexual identity, and memory, in relation to East European immigrant and refugee women’s experiences both past and present. It looks at aspects of journeys and the boundaries of time, geography, and the body. It deconstructs popular imagery of ‘Gypsies’ looking at woman’s body as a site of conflict and as a nomadic site. It utilises aspects of fairy tales from the Baltic and Balkan regions as well as stories from refugee women who have worked in the sex industry.
The work is composed of six short sections that utilise text, choreography, visual spectacle, specially designed magic illusions with mirrors, experimental sound, and documentary-style projected images.
The Girl from Nowhere was devised and researched as part of the process of the development of Carnesky’s Ghost Train, a large-scale touring project that uses a specially constructed amusement-park Ghost Train ride and features a cast of six female performers from various refugee and immigrant backgrounds. Ghost Train will premiere in 2003.
