May 21, 2009 at 11:55 am · Filed under Artworks, Theory, Thoughts
I recently read Patricia Zimmerman and Dale Hudson’s “Cinephilia, Technopilia and Collaborative Remix Zones” published in the latest issue of Screen. Zimmerman and Hudson perform what they call a “radical historiography” to indulge “interventionist pleasures.” This methodology has me thinking about remixing history in dance and what this is.
If I were chose a movement to return to it would be Judson. How can we reengage avant-garde activism in today’s digital culture? Trajal Harrell seems to do just this drawing not only on Judson, but also on voguing and European tanztheater. In his most recent “Quartet for the End of Time.” He takes what has happened and pushes it forward, remixing and opening potentiality in critical movement practice.
This remixing is not a repetition, and appropriately so. Can movement be repeated? No. When I wave my hand in the air I perform the same choreographed action (a wave of the hand) multiple times, the movement that I perform morphs with time based on variables such as body fatigue or rhythm. Rather than perform an exact repetition of my movement, I loop the choreography. When I loop choreographed movement it is not repeated, but layered. The movement is the same, but calling my movement a loop as opposed to a repetition shifts a perception that enables progression within and beyond repetition. It seems that the historiographic remix enables movement loops.
March 14, 2009 at 1:05 am · Filed under Thoughts
Tonight I’ll go to dinner with German dance dramaturg Anna Wagner. After her lecture last week I’ve been thinking a lot about what it means to be a conceptual choreographer who works with a dramaturge. As someone who enjoys theorizing through her artistic work, I’m curious about my need for a dramaturge since I enjoy theoretical research myself, or if dramaturge would actually encourage me to indulge my love for theory even more. Trajal Harrel works with a dramaturge as he creates his incredibly specific and successfully stylized work. Both Trajal and Yvonne Hardt, choreographer who works with Wagner, enjoy theoretical research themselves and have mentioned how working with a dramaturge only helps them specify their ideas and choreographic arch. I experienced how frustrating it can be to choreograph a solo when you’re the only dancer. I wasn’t able to watch the piece from start to finish, so couldn’t adequately follow my spatial narrative. It seems to me that Yvonne uses her dramaturg as a tool especially when she’s dancing on stage. Perhaps having someone who I’m working with and who intimately knows both my theoretical and choreographic impulse would help to be my eyes as I work through my own movements myself. Or, perhaps this is not exactly what a dramaturge really is…
March 9, 2009 at 3:24 am · Filed under Events, Link
I just found the “dtwmain” posts on YouTube. Thank goodness for Dance Theater Workshop and their embrace of the Internet as a positive force in the contemporary dance community. Check out their amazing archive of performance and conversation…
…some of my personal favorites:
MAP ME by Charlotte Vanden Eynde & Kurt Vandendriessche at Dance Theater Workshop. Fall 2007.
Stephen Greco in conversation with Trajal Harrell prior to Quartet for the End of Time at Dance Theater Workshop. Fall 2008.
