Sue Austin has made a short film, Creating the Spectacle!, in which she is seen submerged in the Red Sea, swooping about gracefully in a wheelchair equipped with scooter motors and wing.
The film, which is quite unlike anything you’ll ever have seen, is being shown during the Paralympics at various venues around the country.
Austin is also giving a number of live performances at a leisure centre on the south coast.
Austin learned to dive with Sharm El Shiekh’s Camel Dive Club in 2005 and returned this year with her Freewheeling team to develop her equipment and act and to film.
She was able to use Camel's suitably deep diver training pool and operate from its hardboat in open water.
Camel instructor Catherine Bates worked as a technical adviser to help adapt Austin’s wheelchair, with twin scooter motors fitted beneath the seat and a large Perspex underwing to provide glide and stable manoeuvring.
The aim of the Paralympics screenings and live performances is, Austin has said, to “generate a public debate about the nature and value of contemporary arts practice shaped by the experience of disability, hence transforming preconceptions about disability”.
Screenings are scheduled for Paralympic Live Sites from 27 August to 9 September; at the ICCI immersive 360 degree arena in Weymouth from 29 August to 9 September; and at the Southbank Centre, London SE1 from 1 to 9 September.
On 29 and 31 August and 1 September, live performances are being held at Osprey Leisure Centre in Portland, where viewers can join Austin in the water with scuba gear or watch on poolside screens. Tickets are required.
Qualified divers can enter the water with their own kit, while people without scuba qualifications will be able to enter the pool while tended by experts from the local Fathom & Blues dive centre.
Creating the Spectacle! can be seen on the Freewheeling website, at www.wearefreewheeling.org.uk/?location_id=1849.
Footage of Austin performing in a pool, filmed at Camel Dive Club, can be seen at DIVER TV. A Camel instructor, Tamer Salman, appears with Austin.
Programme and tickets - www.wearefreewheeling.org.uk/freewheeling-performances
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