Ben Grieve 1995

With The Big Blue Crush Club trio Ben played the guitar and sang the most beautiful harmony with the brother-and-sister duo.

1 9 9 8 

a card-letter from Ben sent from Berlin on 31st May 1998.

Luiz, hello.

I'm sorry I haven't replied to your letter for such a long time. There's a wee card tho.

I don't seem to be writing to anyone very much at the moment. I think of things to write to people but I can't sit still long enough to get through a whole letter or even a postcard so I have a bunch of half-finished letters and cards from a month out of date that I can't send now cos nothing means anything after that amount of time in Berlin. Are you still singing in the choir? Did you get a job with St. Vinnies? Howz Annandale? Blah blah. Have you got a copy of 'Bella ciao' lyrics? Have you seen Bondi waves recently? Wann kommst du in Berlin an? Sprichst du ein Bischen Deutsch? Auf wiedersehen. Ciao Bella x x.

Benjamin Grieve

c/o Martin del Amo

Johanna Stegen Str. 16

D-12167 Berlin

Germany

P.S.S. I'm really just trying to fill the last bit of space now. Did you see the Eurovision song contest? Germany goes wild over this competition which was fun. Dana International was the winner, an Israeli trans-sexual. I liked her, even tho her voice was only so so, she was pretty stunning. She attracted the wrath of Israeli religious fundamentalists so she must be doing something right! Berlin is being taken by ManhattanersI fear, but is full fo little places behind closed doors. X

Friedrichshain - Lenindenkmal, Berlin 

Luiz Amorim, my dear. Hello from Berlin.

I got your letter a while back and I started a reply the same day but never got back to it. I have been a terrible correspondent while here but what can I do? I am a slack tart. I have also been so overwhelmed by everything with so many new impressions and new people, friends to meet (Martin’s friends) language etc, etc.

I am doing a German course 4 days a week which is so much fun even if it’s a bit hard. Around 20 students from: Poland, Turkey, France, Morocco, Canada, Angola, Zaire, Brazil, USA, Mozambique, Argentina and of course this little Australian. The German we speak is very funny… actually I forgot Itally as well. There’s a spunky funny Italian boy in the class who just keeps talking in this weird combination of Italian, Spanish and German which of course has us all falling around laughing in class. Unfortunately the Canadian and American team is (English speakers) the one I am stuck with too often. Debra from Boston and Barry from Halifax. I spend a reasonable amount of my time trying to get rid of them.

Martin is also very busy with his performances and stuff. It has been so lovely to meet with him again and in his place, his life, his Berlin.

This statue in Friedrichshain doesn’t actually exist any more, but the suburb is actually just about my favourite part of Berlin so far. Mitte (which means middle) is the suburb where all the squatters took over after the Wall went down but is now slowly being taken over by tour buses and boutiques. Friedrichshain on the other hand is not so close to the business centre and is being colonised by Punks instead, as well as still inhabited by its old East Berlin residents. If I can come back to Berlin after my tour (I start work in Amsterdam in one month) I would love to live in Friedrichshain. The only problem is the time of year. If I live there I’ll be cold, cos they don’t have central heating, you have to use coal.

Anyway, I’d better go now. Thank you so much for your lovely letter and article (strange to read Australian paper in Berlin) and thank you too for the send off you & Peggy gave me . Your little dictionary has been very handy and reminds me of your generosity of spirit each time I look up a word. Bye for now. Lots of love, Ben xx.  

1 9 9 9 

While Ben was in Berlin, Germany, he wrote his first ever e-mail to Peggy Giakoumelos who was living in Tokyo, Japan.  

Pegs Pegs Pegs

Berlin, 23 July 1999, Friday

Hey Peggy,

I’m on-line honey. How the fuck are you? I’m very, very extremely embraced humbled ashamed and sorry to have been such a bad correspondent since last saw you running off down the old King St. as I was about to leave the country.

I am not sure this e-mail will make it to you though cos Martin (he is my boyfriend) says that it is unusual to have an e-address with a capital at the start which is what you gave me in your last card. Also this terminal has been a little temperamental of late, so we'll just have to see, I suppose. Your card was as lovely as I have come to expect of your communications. Hey, are you UTS (University of Technology Sydney) graduate or something or does communication just come like totally natural to you like ‘oh naturel, n’est ce pas? … chou chou… sorry I am getting ready for a bit of French speaking soon but more on that later, love And it all sounds as if you’re having the right kind of time for this time of your life. 

I am also still enjoying the feeling of anonymity that is so possible in a new place but I must admit it sounds like Tokyo is a kind of anonymity on overdrive. Sounds fantastic. I almost feel like coming to see you over Christimas instead of the other way round. Speaking of which, I don’t know if I’ll be here at that time cos I am doing a show in Belgium starting in about 2 weeks which will be touring through the winter. But I will keep you posted on my whereabouts so you can make plans and if you want to visit, you will be more than welcome of course. If I am in Berlin then it is easy but I might be somewhere else exciting with a flat all of my own like Luxembourg (which is probably as dull as dish water but it sounds so nice, deLuxembourg living darling) and you might be able to stay there. Who is to know?

Anyhow, that is where the French comes back into the story. I am in Belgium for 3 months of rehearsals and I can do some visits to the French sectors quite easily apparently and I can’t wait, I really can’t wait, Pegs, I can’t wait… I’m wetting myself as I write at the very prospect of another new place but a new place that I already have a linguistic connection with this time… and maiteete, I can’t fucking wait, maieete.

Germany is still pretty German and hey, don’t knock it, scheethart. I got a job with a jerk with a twerp or a turd – how absurd that it scans and it rhymes but it does. But I did and he was, all that and more as well as being vaguely talented in a psychopathic kind of way. I was working on a show as a performer and ended up as the choreographer and assistant-director which would have been nice but I didn’t get the pay rise that I should have and the director was impossible to work with but it is all just a very depressingly familiar story really and I am glad it is all over. I feel that the next phase in Belgium is very crucial. I must save money in order to fund myself to go and meet some French work and 1 director in particular either in the breaks that I get on tour or early in the new year when we finish and then I am back in Prozac City (Sydney) to rehearse Burn Sonata before it comes to Berlin baby. What a fucking whirly gig and I forgot to mention that the Belgium piece goes to Adelaide Festival in March if all goes according to plan just before I start on the Burn Sonata saga… 

Mind fucked am I? Well, yes… and as for that Brazilian tart, how is she? I owe her a letter or 23 I think. What kind of book was he featured in? Your card was a bit smudged on arrival, my dear. What did you get up to with it, pet, or was it smudged en route so to speak. These posters they get up to some monkey business, you know. 

I miss the beach too and that is about the size of it, and I miss some special people like you of example and Luiz. But how cool and strange is that when you consider that not one of us is there right now, that we are on 3 different continents, not one of which is where we met in the 1^st place. But most of the people I love just don’t belong, they just don’t and I love them all the more for it. 

But listen, love, I have to be off now like an old cheese as they say cos it has taken me 2-and-a-half weeks to type this and I need a break (my typing is improving). I’m up to almost a word a minute. Drop me a line or 2 to say this e-thing is working and also does Luiz have e-access and address? If not I guess I’ll have to post something soon. Martin says herro back to you and I send you a big squeeze with lots of love and fond regards. 

Bye for now, love Benoula X.

2 0 0 3 

The disappearing dancer 

He was at the height of an avant-garde dancing career, having just returned from Europe, but Benjamin Grieve has been reported missing earlier in suspicious circumstances.

The 38-year-old, who had been living in Newtown for 3 months, was last seen by a taxi driver who dropped him off in Bondi on 2 October 2003.

'He is very well known in the circles he moves in,' said Benjamin's brother, Stephen Grieve, who asked anyone who may have seen his brother in the last few weeks to contact police.

'He is very energetic and very fit - he has given his life to performing,' his brother said. 'It's been very difficult for the family. You spend half your time thinking the worst and the other half hoping he is still alive.'

Mr Grieve vanished on Thursday, 2 October 2003. That morning he left a friend's home in Enmore and was later seen walking along Parramatta Road, Lewisham.

A taxi driver who was the last to see Mr Grieve told police he dropped him off on the corner of Campbell Parade and Ramsgate Avenue in Bondi just before 2 pm.

A day later, his black backpack was found in the water at Little Manly Cove on 3rd October 2003.

Detective Senior Constable Virginia Gorman said divers searched the area from the Spit Bridge to North Head and found no sign of a body.

Mr Grieve was working as a carer at the time, but did not turn up to work that day. 'He called in sick,' Senior Constable Gorman said. 'It's uncharacteristic of him not to let anyone know where he is.' 

If you know anything about where Benjamin Grieve may be, please contact Newtown police station on 9550-9199. 

The Daily Telegraph, October 2003.

Ben Grieve was an astonishing artist and a dear friend.

He was raised in Canberra, lived a long time in Sydney, then in Berlin for 5 years before returning to Australia May 2003. On 2nd October 2003, he went missing. His body was found on 14 November 2003 at Manly. He was buried in Canberra in December, at a ceremony attended by his partner Martin Del Amo, his family and friends. Nobody knows of his last hours. We do know he’s gone.

Benjamin Grieves was an actor, dancer, performance maker, musician, singer, writer and thinker. All these skills coalesced in an idiosyncratic and utterly memorable marriage of physicality, musicality and intellect. It made him a wonderful artist. In performance, Ben was electric, elastic, alert. He had a kind of jerky elegance, an ability to move in multiple directions simultaneously, unwinding minute gestures to reveal an endless array of tiny narratives across his body.

Ben began training and performing in Canberra in 1983 with Canberra Youth Theatre’s Troupe. He went on to perform with the Ensemble Theatre Project, Fortune Theatre and People Next Door. In the late 1980s and early 90s he worked with an incredible range of artists and performance makers, including Sydney-based companies Death Defying Theatre, Entr’acte, One Extra, Stalker and Nikki Heywood. He performed at Performance Space, in schools and outdoors, in international festivals, in Europe and with his band, The Big Blue Crush Club, in pubs, clubs and at parties.

In the late 90s Ben’s desire to train, rethink his practice and broaden his professional horizons took him to Europe. He freelanced in Germany, Belgium and Holland with small ensembles and premier companies such as Schauspielhaus Hamburg and Company Felix Ruckert.

Most recently, in Sydney, Ben performed exquisitely in Rosalind Crisp’s tread at Performance Space, reminding Australian audiences of what we had missed during his 5 years away. He also worked as the physical trainer on The Living Museum of Fetish-Ized Identities, generously offering his skills and encouragement to his peers. Around this time he also worked as a community carer.

I’m lucky to have worked with Ben in the early 90s. As with many of his colleagues, we became friends. We’d spend intense times together, then stay in irregular contact, but were always able to pick up where we left off, with one intimate detail or another, sitting in the kitchen chatting, gossiping, giggling into the night about recent exploits and dilemmas—personal and professional. We’d compare work experiences and aspirations, our states of hair, insomnia and relationships.

Ben was unencumbered by worldly possessions—though he was in his own way extremely stylish in his endless collection of midriff tops. He was encumbered with enormous desire. Desire to participate in our world meaningfully but lightly. Desire to make great work. Desire to critically unpick his surroundings, himself, and all that makes up this complex culture.

He interrogated life in general through his performance work and learnt much about his own life through performing. He was always interested in work with political and emotional depth. Making work was serious business for Ben. He gave it a lot. He was wickedly funny and could make tragedy, confusion or loss seem hilarious on stage, in the dressing room, at the after party, even at 6 AM boarding the minibus as it began its trip to Penrith for an 8.30 AM school show.

He was simultaneously generous and demanding of his collaborators. Demanding in the sense that he wanted to collectively crack it, to break through a work to create heart and intellect. He wasn’t petty or sycophantic. He wasn’t interested in industry success or recognition or a cosy career path. He was driven to make great, urgent and beautiful work. And he often did.

Many of his collaborators and friends gathered at Performance Space at the end of 2003 to farewell Ben and engage in a collective act of remembering. While mostly Sydney-based people were able to attend, the event reminded us of how many worlds Ben inhabited over time. He passed through many people’s lives but always with an intensity that was unforgettable. Perhaps Clare Grant put her finger on it when she described the effect of Ben’s reflexivity on his collaborators/ mates: “He watched what he made through a lens that was so complex you found ways of seeing you didn’t know you had.” There’s no doubt this was hard work for him.

A few days before he disappeared, Ben joined the closing night party of The Living Museum. He was elated and as usual, wickedly funny. He was wearing a pink wig, dancing around the space, giggling as he sang cheesy pop songs. He said goodbye at least 17 times.

When I spoke recently with Jane Packham, a very old friend of Ben’s, I asked her the name of a show that she and Ben were making in the late 80s which I never saw but heard so much about at the time. She laughed and said, “I don’t remember, and if you’d asked Ben he probably wouldn’t have remembered. All I know is that I loved him with all my heart.” For many of us whose relationships with Ben began through making work but extended into intense and enduring friendships, this is our experience also — we know we loved him and we know we miss him.

Fiona Winning

The photograph of Benjamin Grieve by Heidrun Löhr was taken at Rosalind Crisp’s tread, Performance Space in May 2003, his final performance.

article published in RealTime -  issue #59 - Feb-March 2004 - pg. 11

My reactions about Ben Grieve's death

São Paulo, 17 April 2004.

Dear Peggy

I have just finished reading Ben’s obituary written by Fionna Winning. She wrote beautifully about him; it shows that she really loved him and at the same time I feel that she didn’t actually got really close to Ben either... just like most of us.

It is a strange feeling when you think about people who committed suicide. One feels left out of their lives. It’s just like they have got bored with life, which you happen to be part of, or they couldn’t care less.  In a way, people who commit suicide don’t really care about anybody’s but their own lives. Or at least they have stopped caring about people’s lives - maybe momentarily - they have stopped thinking about other people’s at the very moment of their ultimate action.  I’m not saying this is necessarily true. I’m just saying what I feel about them.  In other words, they go their own way and don’t give a second thought about those who stay behind.

Amira, that 24 year-old Lebanese girl who took a mouthful of sleeping tablets and died overnight – left her house mates (myself and Silvio who happened to be undocumented migrants) with a big problem to solve - used to repeat that phrase “such and such couldn’t care less”.  I learned this sentence with her for my command of the English language was not really good in 1983. 

Now, coming back to Ben; it was good to read about him. I felt like I was looking at him and trying to understand it but not getting it at all. I still think it’s been a waste. He was such a likeable person and we badly need lovely people in this grey and mean world.

But I guess Ben got tired of the whole shit. I wouldn’t blame him at all.  He probably was much more sensitive than us. It is a hard world to live in. I don’t blame him for taking this way out. Just like that Don McLean song called “Vincent” he wrote about Vincent Van Gogh:

” ...For they could not love you,

but still your love was true...

and when no hope was left in sight on that

starry starry night...

you took your life as lovers often do...

but I could’ve told you, Vincent

this world was never meant for one as beautiful as you.”

“Starry night” is a famous painting by Vincent. McLean wrote his song around this particular painting.

P.S.:  I met Ben in 1987. I remember the year because it was the year my Father died. I had been unhappy and somehow I knew I had to change my social life in order not to give in to sadness and dejection so I joined the Solidarity Choir so I could mingle with other people at least once a week - Thursday nights. After being in the Choir for a few months I spotted a very young Ben at the tenors' section. He was so different from the rest. One could see he was a special person. I thought he might be gay but then again he might be not for he shared a flat with a girl his age in Bondi Beach. 

Sometimes after Choir practice I would take a bus on Oxford Street and headed to Bondi Beach to visit my old friend Mariza. Once I noticed Ben was in the same bus so we talked to each other. He invited me for a cuppa at his flat. I went in but stayed only a few moments. I felt uncomfortable speaking English then. I would only speak what I thought was strictly right and tried to prevent the conversation becoming too broad afraid I would not be able to inter-act. 

After that I saw him a couple more times and Ben quit. I guess the choir practice must have been a bit uninteresting for someone like him who knew so much about music and performing.

A few years later, when I was accepted to live in Ningana Housing Collective – it must have been late 1991 – I saw Ben again. I knew straight away who he was but neither of us mentioned we had met each other before at the Solidarity Choir.  

Even though both of us lived on the 3rd floor we were not really close. Ben was mostly friends with Barbara and her young sun Josh who lived at the 'apartment', a bigger flat than the rest. He also had a special friendship with Christian, a Queensland gay fellow who lived on the 3rd floor too. 

Ben was never close to Kaye and she was my best friend in Ningana... and then there was Antonio too who lived on the flat right opposite mine on the 3rd floor. Antonio had Aids which in 1992 was a death sentence. Antonio was a professional dancer who was born in Spain but grew up in Sydney and spoke English with no accent. He sort of had a crush on Ben or at least fancied him but Ben never corresponded with the same feeling. As Antonio became more frail and cantankerous he could hardly desguise his opposition to Ben having once told me Ben was 'wishy-washy'. Antonio had a big chip on his shoulder. I pitied him and visited his flat almost daily. 

Christian who lived on the flat next to mine after one climbed up some 5 steps was a constant visitor to Antonio too. Christian who was a typical Aussie was rash to Antonio. I once witnessed a scene I dreaded. Christian started telling Antonio off saying he was this and that... he was an Aids carrier who didn't have a will of his own etc. Christian was saying all these things 'in jest' but I could see Antonio was crashed. When Christian went out I told Antonio he shouldn't accept this kind of behaviour for a real friend would never do such a thing. He agreed with me and sort of avoided Christian for a while. 

 and I became good friends with Antonio... so Ben was automatically excluded from being my friend...  but I guess that even if it wasn’t for Antonio, I would never be a close friend to Ben... because Ben was never close to anyone.  He could be very good socially... he would go to Barbara’s and stay there for hours... but I don’t think he was close to her... although she might be close to him.

Christian used to use Ben... used to go into his flat when he was away... he used Ben’s stuff and things... I thought it was not right... but Ben never said a word... he accepted Christian the way he was... a vulgar person... that is why I think Fionna is right in saying that Ben ever cared a bit about material things.  His flat was never locked... even when he was away for weeks on end.

Well, maybe I am repeating myself... but I got in the mood of remembering things about Ben and there is not much I can say about him - a lot of feelings - but not  many“facts” to talk about.

Fionna wrote quite well about their professional relationship but not much about Ben as a person.  Maybe Ben wasn't really close to anyone. Well, I might as well close now. Luv, Luiz.

A reply to Michael, 8 November 2021. 

Hi, Michael. I'm glad I could read your message even though you erased it from the blog comment section. I first met Ben circa 1987 or early 1988. I used to sing bass at the Solidarity Choir and that Thursday night Ben showed up to sing in the tenor section. We used to rehearse some place off Oxford Street. I noticed him mainly for his youth and good looks. After rehearsal, instead of going back to Glebe where I lived I went to Bondi Beach to visit a Brazilian friend of mine. When I was on the Bondi bus I noticed Ben was on it too. He was with a girl and I thought he was probably straight. There was no way of knowing it for I had not been introduced to him being 'cooped up' at the basses' section. Ben was back at Choir practices for maybe 2 more times and quit. 

 

After a few years I moved into the Ningana Housing Collective on Anandale Road in Annandale and was extremely glad to realize that boy I had seen at the Choir practice 3 years before lived in the same building. We actually lived in flats next-door to each other on the 3rd floor, sunny-side. That was early 1992...and that's how I came to know Ben more intimately. 

I still think of him after all these years. He is still alive in my mind. I started learning English pretty late in life... I was 22 years old, in 1971, when I moved to the first English-speaking-country (USA). When I moved to Australia in 1981, I had the chance to mingle with white people which was beyond my reach in the USA... mainly because I would end up in a Portuguese or Spanish milieu... I'm only telling you this to claim I'm still making progress in my English proficiency... Every time I feel I've given a step ahead I think of Ben... I don't know why...maybe because one of my 'face-muscle-stretching' exercises is about the word 'been' or 'ben'... So his smiling face comes up to me and I think about Ben for a few moments.  

I felt I was close to him but not completely...maybe it was my own fault. I felt we liked each other a lot but we never had the chance to prove it. We had the chance to play guitar and sing together... He taught me a couple of Jacques Brel songs in English I would never come to know otherwise. He wrote the lyrics of 'Moliendo café' in Spanish onto my song book. I still have it written down with his own handwriting. He also wrote the Eurythmics' 'Who's that girl?' and 'It's raining again'... every time I play them I feel Ben is with me. From all the friends I've had who have already died I think Ben is the most alive... I feel like a can talk to him even though I don't believe in 'life after death' or any religion... But Ben was so real... I can still feel it today. 

I used to play the guitar but only privately. One day, Ben took me with him to bask in that tunnel under Broadway-George Street that leads to Central Station. Ben was a profissional basker... I probably sang one song, gave it up and went back home. Ben stayed and did what he had gone there for. But I was glad I had the courage to go all the way even though I didn't 'fit' the bill. 

Another instance...I remember going down Oxford Street in the early hours of the morning after (probably) a Mardi Grass night... I met Ben who was in drag...and we walked along together for some blocks... He told me those high-heel shoes he was wearing  were killing him but he kept on playing the game... he was the centre of attention... he was a real actor and musician and singer.

One Holy Wednesday,  Ben took myself and Peggy Giakoulemos to a Catholic seminary church in Lewisham where priests performed the candle-snuffing service I hadn't seen since I was a child in a small city in Brazil in the late 1950s. I think we were happy that night... I can assure you I was. 

In another Holy Week we went to a Greek Orthodox Church Easter service on Cleveland Street. Peggy Giakoumelos took us there. It was another unforgettable night... That was about the time Ben was performing in one of those theatres near by.   

 

I could go on reminiscing about Ben for hours... because I feel good when I think about him. He was always good... the best. 

It's funny I ended up meeting Michael Collins when Ben had already moved out of Ningana. Michael was a nice fellow too. I lost contact with everyone for I moved back to Brazil in late 1998. It's great to know someone who met Ben and still remember him. Sometimes I feel like shouting in protest to his death... but then I accept it for that's what he wanted. All the best, Luiz Amorim.