An invisible ball passed between each other. 

Transfer to hand stacking game.

Weigh against each other, to make up for.

Look to the camera for reassurance.

Marley Starskey Butler’s exhibition Compensare: For the Swallows We Weigh has been developed during a ten-month placement at Beacon Family Services, an organisation in Birmingham providing therapeutic and relational play services for parents, carers, and families. Their approaches support children and their parents or caregivers, particularly those in adoptive or fostering families, to make sense of their family’s world and strengthen their relationships. 

Set against a backdrop where political priorities and funding decisions continually shape access to therapeutic services, the exhibition illuminates how these systemic forces intersect with the lived realities of families and the professionals who support them. Embedded in the inner workings of the organisation, Marley engaged in wide-ranging conversations with staff and observed their use of Theraplay® and Dyadic Developmental Psychotherapy (DDP) techniques, which gave root to this new multidimensional artwork. 

By observing family and carer-child-therapist interactions, Marley attuned to the subtle nuances of verbal and physical communication within these therapeutic practices, reflecting on the experience of consciously working with each other’s energies and ultimately connecting through the joyful medium of relational play. Drawing on these reflections, and blending them with overarching themes that emerged through staff discussions, they built a library of notes and instructions designed to be translated through movement and sound into films and music.

Marley worked with movement artists Kim Bormann and Marley Starkey Joyner to translate this material, directing them with multilayered prompts and choreographic devices that allowed them to progressively move from relational play games to movement that explores the emotional, psychosocial and political landscapes that shape family support.

The resulting choreographic experiments are presented as films alongside a newly composed piece of music, inside a large circular carpeted area whose design has been reverse engineered from glitches in the video recording system and converted into a space for movement, listening and watching. 

The swallows know there is hope,
There is always hope.

Address: Eastside Projects: 86 Heath Mil Ln. Deritend, Birmingham B9 4AR

Opening Times: Wed to Sat 12pm - 5pm