Visual Vernacular
Erwan CIFRA
Visual Vernacular was created by Bernard Bragg around the 1960s.
It is art in deaf language and a completely visual technique!
A mixture of visually iconic sign language and bodily expression accompanied by mime. The aesthetics of communication brings internal and external freedom. The body expresses itself and the hands follow and guide the narration. It is a communication in the space where everything is said without words. A passionate visual art!
We work on rhythm, movement and the special effects which give life to a very aesthetic visual narration.
„Visual” in fact is naturally linked to the deaf culture whose essence is the view, the adjective „vernacular” derives rather from the reference to the spoken characteristic of a limited area, emblematic of a dialect, but still more specific.
The live videos from Instagram are available in the YouTube playlist, check them out !!
I offer you my services of variety activities
The workshops are exciting exercises to develop your body and facial expressions. Thanks to VV, you can master controlling the body, eyesight, technique, iconic gestures, and special effects. But also to improve your motor memory and your sign language. It turns out that learning VV requires a lot of energy but also a smile. With many fantastic exercises, you can stimulate your brain and develop your creativity.
The duration of the workshop is flexible according to your needs and your budget. The ideal is 30 hours to have level 1 but there is the possibility of going further up to level 3.
I guarantee you that time will fly fast before you realise!
You will discover and better understand is that it means « Visual Vernacular » and its principles. I present to you the original story since the creation of VV and its evolution until today. There will be demonstration with some examples of VV videos. Defining of VV techniques will be presented. You will be able to participate in short exercises related to VV which will be really fun.
The duration is 3 hours, possible to flexible extension.
I guarantee you that this conference will be fun, intense and very interesting!
I can do the shows for your association, celebration, birthday or wedding or any events. A story is about 5 minutes long and possibly make a pack of several stories according to your needs.
Also, I’m doing an hour-long show: « 2080, who killed sign language? ». A mixed expression between VV and sign languages. This performance is intense, which had won 2 awards in 2019.
Please do not hesitate to contact me if you wish to know more details.
My video shows are available on my social network icons, also there are more videos to watch on my YouTube channel.
If you have an individual or team project, make your VV show or VV videos, obviously, you want to improve your VV by optimizing your bodily, facial, gestural, iconic, expressions and many more so I am here to reassure you the excellent quality of your show!
See my planned agenda
Trainer, Coach & Performer
Erwan CIFRA, born in Nancy, grew up entirely in the world of LSF (French Sign Language), thanks to bilingual education of LSF and written in French. Since his childhood, the universe of the visual in multimedia was his passion such as films, comics, 3D animations, video games, manga.
In 2000, he became a teacher for French Sign language (LSF) for hearing people. During that time, he enrolled in several courses, for example audiovisual, video editor, web design, web animation and has a BTS technician diploma, level III in Multimedia & Graphic Design. A vast experience allows him to connect all cultures of the deaf language and video animations. This mixture of cultures allows him to develop his work as a Visual Vernacular.
Since 2015, he worked with a great deaf French actor Simon Attia in teaching the personal and professional development of future tutors as well as in teaching and presenting VV. Heir to Simon’s art which he adapts to his own personality, he creates his own VV which he wishes to transmit to future artists which is already developed and operates in Europe and internationally.
In November 2019, the play called “2080: who killed sign language?” was presented for the first time and won 2 awards for the best screenplay and best actor at the International Festival of Theater Arts « Territory of Gesture » organized by Mimic and Gestural Theater in Moscow.
You can see my history of professional career from ‘My Career’ button below
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