16mm black and white film telecined to HD video, 17 minutes 11 seconds.

Boléro Shrug explores the way learned gestures produce and hinder our own sense of agency. Pivoting around an Olympic Weightlifting move called ‘The Snatch’ – a powerful and aggressive movement that incongruously begins with a shrug, the camera enters into a repetitive and mesmeric choreography with objects, collaged figures and human performers to the soundtrack of Maurice Ravel’s one-movement orchestral piece Boléro.

The film includes collages made with West End Women and Girls’ Centre – a charity and community centre that builds confidence through group work to women in the west of Newcastle upon Tyne.

Boléro Shrug was first screened at WE: a film forum, which was curated by Leah Millar as part of NewBridge Project’s Hidden Civil War programme, October 2016.