You wouldn’t expect model skeletons, Nosferatu and ornate tea sets to dominate an interview with a stand-up comedian, but it’s all par for the course for a chat with Emma Holland. Holland’s latest show, Don’t Touch My Trinkets, is a self-described show-and-tell where she shows off her artistic background.
“I come from a visual arts background, I’ve said it in every show. I have a visual arts degree so I’m always looking for ways to put it to good use and monetise it,” Holland says.
“I also spend a lot of free time in art galleries and I just started noticing very specific behaviours that I didn’t notice anywhere else. People will walk around with their hands behind their backs like they’ve been arrested. There are a lot of Capri pants. [They’re] the only place where I see people linger on ornate tea sets. I’ve never seen anyone stare at a tea set that long in my life.
“There’s just all these little things where these behaviours only happen in that one specific environment. I wanted to take that environment and put it on stage in my own way.”
All of the trinkets on show are art pieces made by Holland, featuring paintings, sculptures, collages and even a diorama. While most of the trinkets are being kept under wraps, we do get one teaser.
“There’s a sculpture of my husband as Nosferatu that I built,” Holland says.
“I had to go to Eckersley’s and buy a lot of clay and God bless them, they love to ask what you’re making. I’m not a good liar and weirdly in social interactions, I can’t think on the spot so I just have to tell the truth. I was like ‘I’m making a sculpture of my husband as Nosferatu’ and there’s a lot of silence you have to fill after that.”
Carrying that amount of trinkets can prove a logistical nightmare but “being used to travelling with weird objects” has helped Holland adapt to the challenge.
“The first ever show I did, I had a model skeleton and I ended up having to buy an extra bag. I had to disassemble it to put it in the bag. There was one point where I didn’t zip it up properly, and I tripped over at the airport and like, one of the bones came out. I don’t think you’ve lived until you’ve yelled the phrase ‘oh no, my bones’ in the middle of a domestic terminal while you’re trying to shove it back into the bag.”
Holland has become increasingly present on Australian television screens, featuring regularly on the rebooted Thank God You’re Here, with its improvised premise making it “way scarier” than performing stand-up comedy.
“It’s no joke. They hide everything from you, they put you in a separate make-up trailer; when you’re walking, they’ll put an umbrella over your face so you can’t see anything. By the time you get onto stage, you just have to say whatever. Stand-up’s different because at least you have that script to back you up; you can do crowd work, you can riff but you always know there’s a background to come back to.
“It improves you as a performer because you have to learn to let go and just lean into what’s happening around you and be present in the moment. I think that’s a big key to being good at stand-up because the audience is different every night; just embracing what they are offering, energy-wise, and giving them a show that is specific for that night. It’s a good mindful exercise.”
Emma Holland – Don’t Touch My Trinkets, The Courtyard of Curiosities, until 2 March