213 things about me
Originally commissioned by Arts Commissioning Programme Unlimited as a moving image installation and exhibited at the 2015 Edinburgh Festival, ‘213 Things about Me’ was also presented as a theatre performance by actor Rosa Hoskins staged at the Battersea Arts Centre in May 2018.
It has now been produced into a 7-part narrative podcast published by Disability Arts Online as part of their Covid Commissions season. Additional funding was provided by Unlimited.
video installation
“I did that list. I’ve got 213 things.” What she had to say was touching, funny, moving and sad. It’s both an exploration of how society presents to someone with a developmental disorder and it is also a tribute to a woman who came to the conclusion that her life was over – and so she stopped it.
Talking about the 2015 video work ‘213 Things About Me’ to Disability Arts Online: "Essentially it’s a portrait of a woman the film-maker knew for 16 years who took her own life in 2013. On one level 213 Things About Me is a personal statement. It is a film about how people who have a logical perspective on life find a lot of things that people do and say difficult. But on another level, in the way that the personal is political, there are undertones." more
theatre
'213 Things About Me' having started life as an art installation at Edinburgh Fringe, evolved into a 60-minute monologue performed by Rosa Hoskins at the Batersea Arts Centre in 2018.
Theatre blogger Rev Stan, Q&A and review: "Loaded with wit and humour, sharp observation and understanding. It is based on the life of Rose, a friend of the play's writer and director Richard Butchins who is a documentary filmmaker. When Rose was diagnosed with Asperger's Syndrome, Richard asked her to write down five of her good traits. She drew up a list of 213 but later that same year she committed suicide." more
podcast
'213 Things About Me', a seven-part podcast series about thinking, living and dying from an autistic point of view created in 2020.
"It tells the true story of ‘Rose’, who was diagnosed with autism aged 36 and took her own life six months later. 213 Things About Me is told through a list of Rose’s traits, which she made immediately after being diagnosed with Autism. She possessed numerous talents, teaching herself 12 instruments, a bunch of languages, complex mathematics and other extraordinary things. Ultimately she was unable to find a place in the world." podcast