am floating on
a plane of subsistence
usually never quite existing
in:substant/consequent:ial
lives (sort of) in 2 dimensions
but with curved spaces
rounded bulging places
is/am/are indeterminate
crowding the limits
of infinite universes
ever-expanding
(marijuana-type thinking)
cannot, willnot, amnot
violating (mis)understood
axioms am-->are idiomatic
of unrealized ideals
skips along edges of
whatever
since all edges are the same
width (less-ness)
are eliminating
elements
that can be
(n)either created (n)or destroyed
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
Sunday, January 10, 2010
I hope they'll take me...
Here's a smattering of what I'm telling SLC about myself. I hope they like me...
It is so obvious to me that my late start in dance, and my love of literature (and words and syntax) are connected to the process and the product of my choreography. My passion for creating dance is constructivist; it is the same passion that some people have for building cabinets. I am inspired by exploring concepts, creating images and then manipulating movements and phrases to build a work of art. I construct dances similarly to the way I would write a story, poem or (even more so) a research paper. This is likely because, of all of the arts, literature moves me the most deeply, allows me to enter into it the most fully, and seemingly would be the ideal direction for me to go in my own expressive endeavors. Words are like magic to me. However, I dance instead of writing. Why? I’m not sure; myriad reasons, but most likely: I dance because it feels good and right. My body wants to move, and I love to create patterns of moving bodies in space—to see bodies move. It turns out that the challenge of expressing myself through dance is somehow more do-able than the challenge of living up to all these great novels and poems I’ve read. The novelty of dance keeps me intrigued and adventurous. I don’t feel bogged down by rules, and (perhaps in my naïveté) I act out of a sense of joy.
My body “thinks” differently than a highly trained dancer’s body. I create movement that other dancers might not because my most ingrained habits as a mover do not come from the barre. Unlike most of the dancer\choreographers I’ve met, my dances are conceived outside the studio with a long process of research, writing and diagramming before I even begin to move. In addition, much of my choreography is directly influenced by literature. I have choreographed narrative and non-narrative pieces inspired by favorite stories and novels and have even danced with my favorite books on stage with me as props.
While there are too many writers whom I admire to fit in the allotted space here, there are fewer choreographers who really make a strong impression. The world of “art” dance is relatively new (although dancing has been a part of human life since before written language), and perhaps that is why there does not seem to be a rigorous and theory-based aesthetic like there is in other arts. Of the few choreographers who really move me, I am impressed and inspired by the work of Bill T. Jones, because his layers of complexity, meaning and imagery allow audiences to enter his pieces from wherever they are. I feel a strong connection and affiliation with the work of Miguel Gutierrez and Candice Salyers, two very different choreographers who respect and illustrate the humanity of performers and thus of all of us. These choreographers allow and encourage vulnerability and interpersonal connection to take place on the stage. I’m interested in that exploration and believe that it may be the next change in dance. It is the opposite of what is happening in “contemporary” dance, which is an ever-increasing level of technicality with an ever-decreasing level of craft and meaning.
Saturday, December 19, 2009
Sunday, October 18, 2009
Candice Salyers' Chamber Series takes us down The Rabbit Hole: A Review
Event Description:
Dancer and choreographer Candice Salyers, will perform at The Rabbit Hole, 805 Main Street, Fitchburg on Friday, October 16th at 7:00 PM. Her solo dance/movement 'Chamber Series' explores qualities that exist within the transformation of perception and the perceiving of transformation. This site-adaptive dance work travels through a series of intimate and expansive spaces, and stems from the artist's desire to inspire care about human being and to expand imaginings of what is possible for human becoming.
Review (by Cindi L'Abbe):
Sometimes the dance world leaves me feeling cold, and not just cold, but helpless. I believe that dance, as much as any other art, has the possibility to be both incredibly emotionally compelling and painstakingly well-crafted. The dances that I see most often, however, seem to be more self-indulgent and (at the risk of sounding a little "red") decadent than either compelling or well-crafted (to say nothing of being both). This world doesn't seem hospitable for my own dances, nor does it offer me dance that feeds me and forces me to grow. Candice Salyers is one of a limited group of dance artists who renew m y faith in the art form and in myself.
Full disclosure alert: Candice has been a teacher of mine and a close mentor. I have affection for her personally, but she is also, to quote a new-agey friend of mine, "a powerful presence". Her small-space performance at the Rabbit Hole on Friday night provided the perfect opportunity to magnify and focus that power.
The performance began outside on the sidewalk, with Ms. Salyers who was (in spite of the cold) dressed in a lovely white camisole dress that evoked lingerie and formal evening attire. Lying on the sidewalk, thus attired, in downtown Fitchburg elicited a couple of cat calls from passers by. These did not at all detract from the performance, an exploration of the body as an objet d'art, flesh, matter---an exploration of seeing and being seen. In fact, later, the outline of her body chalked onto the sidewalk and bordered with small white-painted G.I. Joes, she wrote in the negative space, "My inner world is a post 'male-gaze' society." Somehow, Ms. Salyers, as a woman and an artist has moved beyond the objectification of a cat-call and if she does not feel objectified then it seems unlikely that she can be.
In the second section of the work, Ms. Salyers directed us inside the bookstore where she began moving slowly with her back to the small audience among the bookcases. As a performer, Ms. Salyers is impossible to look away from; even her smallest movements are imbued with obvious meaning and intention and she seems to always move from her innermost self with all of her might. Tucked into the stacks of books she moved in slow motion with a quality of seduction which made the audience feel that they were looking in at a private moment. At one point she slowly slid her strap off her shoulder and then back up. This coquetry (partially inspired by the ways Marie Antoinette might seduce someone, in other words, the flirtations of a powerful woman) was amplified by her use of direct eye contact. It was fascinating to see the reactions of audience members with whom Ms. Salyers made and held eye contact. Often she would smile at them, and at one point played a game of peek-a-boo by always finding the eyes of one audience member while spinning around. Some audience members reacted as though they'd been "caught" looking at Ms. Salyers, which is intriguing and led me to question what we are thinking of the people we see when we see a performance. Do we dehumanize performers so much that we fool ourselves into thinking that they don't know we are there?
Given the slow movement, the simplicity of the composition and the single-pointed focus of solo work, it may speak to the "powerful presence" of Ms. Salyers as a performer that no one's attention seemed to flag. I attribute this to something else (or rather, something additional); simplicity allows us to focus and humanity\meaning\consciousness intrigue us. How many dances have lost me because of too much movement? I have not known myself to ever complain because there was too little dancing in a dance.
Following Ms. Salyers up the spiral stairs of the Rabbit Hole, I was struck by the playfulness and kindness of her piece thus far. The last two sections of the work would prove to be no less intriguing, but, for me, more haunting, abstract and beautiful.
Part three of the performance was danced on a floor covered with rose petals. Given the themes of the piece throughout, the seductive nature of rose petals could not be ignored. The movement in this section demonstrated, more than any of those previous, Ms. Salyers' tremendous strength and technique as a dancer. However, her dance was much more than a display of virtuosity. Every movement of her hands, a foot, the top of the head was clearly intentional and meaningful. The repetition of a phrase which grew and crystallized with each repeat was so compelling that I didn't notice (but was informed by friends later) that the audience was once again, disconcertingly confronted with the objet d'art\flesh question. Flipping her body with power and strength, Ms. Salyers revealed her underwear, her thighs and the feminine nature of her body. Having danced in a work of hers in 2005 (Belief is a Persistent Angel), I couldn't help but see similarities. The primary dancer in the 2005 work has performed a similar solo in a similar costume with similar results.
The final section of the work at the Rabbit Hole consisted of a solo that I'd never seen, but had heard described. The fact that Ms. Salyers explores the underlying themes of her work over the course of years, is additional evidence of the intellectual prowess and attention to craft that she embodies. A worked and re-worked piece satisfies the audience with its completeness much more than the staged result of a stint at Jacob's Pillow, never mind the lights and set and flash. Familiarity with the work of a choreographer and their process is also satisfying, so my full disclosure clause applies here again.
During this last section a slide projector projects a single slide with the text, "My body lacks nothing.", while in one of the most beautiful pieces of dance I've seen (excepting perhaps a similar segment in the aforementioned Belief...), Ms. Salyers raises herself from the floor to standing with full understanding and experience of every movement. The most stunning moment, for this observer, occurred when, standing on one foot, she slid the other leg off the floor and slowly, reaching through the sole of her foot and toes (Ms. Salyers has some of the most articulate toes I've seen) she searches for and encounters the floor, feeling it fully before placing her weight on it. Once she was standing, she joined the audience (after smiling at us) and the projector clicked, "(except for you)".
To paraphrase Ms. Salyers, my inner world is a post "meaningless dance" society. She lives in that world with me.
Dancer and choreographer Candice Salyers, will perform at The Rabbit Hole, 805 Main Street, Fitchburg on Friday, October 16th at 7:00 PM. Her solo dance/movement 'Chamber Series' explores qualities that exist within the transformation of perception and the perceiving of transformation. This site-adaptive dance work travels through a series of intimate and expansive spaces, and stems from the artist's desire to inspire care about human being and to expand imaginings of what is possible for human becoming.
Review (by Cindi L'Abbe):
Sometimes the dance world leaves me feeling cold, and not just cold, but helpless. I believe that dance, as much as any other art, has the possibility to be both incredibly emotionally compelling and painstakingly well-crafted. The dances that I see most often, however, seem to be more self-indulgent and (at the risk of sounding a little "red") decadent than either compelling or well-crafted (to say nothing of being both). This world doesn't seem hospitable for my own dances, nor does it offer me dance that feeds me and forces me to grow. Candice Salyers is one of a limited group of dance artists who renew m y faith in the art form and in myself.
Full disclosure alert: Candice has been a teacher of mine and a close mentor. I have affection for her personally, but she is also, to quote a new-agey friend of mine, "a powerful presence". Her small-space performance at the Rabbit Hole on Friday night provided the perfect opportunity to magnify and focus that power.
The performance began outside on the sidewalk, with Ms. Salyers who was (in spite of the cold) dressed in a lovely white camisole dress that evoked lingerie and formal evening attire. Lying on the sidewalk, thus attired, in downtown Fitchburg elicited a couple of cat calls from passers by. These did not at all detract from the performance, an exploration of the body as an objet d'art, flesh, matter---an exploration of seeing and being seen. In fact, later, the outline of her body chalked onto the sidewalk and bordered with small white-painted G.I. Joes, she wrote in the negative space, "My inner world is a post 'male-gaze' society." Somehow, Ms. Salyers, as a woman and an artist has moved beyond the objectification of a cat-call and if she does not feel objectified then it seems unlikely that she can be.
In the second section of the work, Ms. Salyers directed us inside the bookstore where she began moving slowly with her back to the small audience among the bookcases. As a performer, Ms. Salyers is impossible to look away from; even her smallest movements are imbued with obvious meaning and intention and she seems to always move from her innermost self with all of her might. Tucked into the stacks of books she moved in slow motion with a quality of seduction which made the audience feel that they were looking in at a private moment. At one point she slowly slid her strap off her shoulder and then back up. This coquetry (partially inspired by the ways Marie Antoinette might seduce someone, in other words, the flirtations of a powerful woman) was amplified by her use of direct eye contact. It was fascinating to see the reactions of audience members with whom Ms. Salyers made and held eye contact. Often she would smile at them, and at one point played a game of peek-a-boo by always finding the eyes of one audience member while spinning around. Some audience members reacted as though they'd been "caught" looking at Ms. Salyers, which is intriguing and led me to question what we are thinking of the people we see when we see a performance. Do we dehumanize performers so much that we fool ourselves into thinking that they don't know we are there?
Given the slow movement, the simplicity of the composition and the single-pointed focus of solo work, it may speak to the "powerful presence" of Ms. Salyers as a performer that no one's attention seemed to flag. I attribute this to something else (or rather, something additional); simplicity allows us to focus and humanity\meaning\consciousness intrigue us. How many dances have lost me because of too much movement? I have not known myself to ever complain because there was too little dancing in a dance.
Following Ms. Salyers up the spiral stairs of the Rabbit Hole, I was struck by the playfulness and kindness of her piece thus far. The last two sections of the work would prove to be no less intriguing, but, for me, more haunting, abstract and beautiful.
Part three of the performance was danced on a floor covered with rose petals. Given the themes of the piece throughout, the seductive nature of rose petals could not be ignored. The movement in this section demonstrated, more than any of those previous, Ms. Salyers' tremendous strength and technique as a dancer. However, her dance was much more than a display of virtuosity. Every movement of her hands, a foot, the top of the head was clearly intentional and meaningful. The repetition of a phrase which grew and crystallized with each repeat was so compelling that I didn't notice (but was informed by friends later) that the audience was once again, disconcertingly confronted with the objet d'art\flesh question. Flipping her body with power and strength, Ms. Salyers revealed her underwear, her thighs and the feminine nature of her body. Having danced in a work of hers in 2005 (Belief is a Persistent Angel), I couldn't help but see similarities. The primary dancer in the 2005 work has performed a similar solo in a similar costume with similar results.
The final section of the work at the Rabbit Hole consisted of a solo that I'd never seen, but had heard described. The fact that Ms. Salyers explores the underlying themes of her work over the course of years, is additional evidence of the intellectual prowess and attention to craft that she embodies. A worked and re-worked piece satisfies the audience with its completeness much more than the staged result of a stint at Jacob's Pillow, never mind the lights and set and flash. Familiarity with the work of a choreographer and their process is also satisfying, so my full disclosure clause applies here again.
During this last section a slide projector projects a single slide with the text, "My body lacks nothing.", while in one of the most beautiful pieces of dance I've seen (excepting perhaps a similar segment in the aforementioned Belief...), Ms. Salyers raises herself from the floor to standing with full understanding and experience of every movement. The most stunning moment, for this observer, occurred when, standing on one foot, she slid the other leg off the floor and slowly, reaching through the sole of her foot and toes (Ms. Salyers has some of the most articulate toes I've seen) she searches for and encounters the floor, feeling it fully before placing her weight on it. Once she was standing, she joined the audience (after smiling at us) and the projector clicked, "(except for you)".
To paraphrase Ms. Salyers, my inner world is a post "meaningless dance" society. She lives in that world with me.
Monday, September 14, 2009
Explorational Musings to Inspire Movement
I pulled these notes from my journal today to share with Steph to help us generate both movement ideas and larger, conceptual, project ideas:
9/5/09
Micro-dance:
Small space
Technology
New Hampshire
Sense of Place
Community (small scale)
Community (large scale)
Identity à personal style
Who am I as a mover?
Who am I in this place?
Who am I in relation to dance?
Who am I in relation to the other dancers in the space?
Community à Communication
Verbal, physical, touch, visual, via the internet
Act/react
Via the internet, information distributes itself in clusters which spread exponentially (I drew some diagrams\schematics)
9/12/09
“Dance is movement in space and time.”
Life is movement through “place” and time.
What is the significance of the place I live in, and my personal history? How does my relationship to dance change in this place as opposed to another?
9/5/09
Micro-dance:
Small space
Technology
New Hampshire
Sense of Place
Community (small scale)
Community (large scale)
Identity à personal style
Who am I as a mover?
Who am I in this place?
Who am I in relation to dance?
Who am I in relation to the other dancers in the space?
Community à Communication
Verbal, physical, touch, visual, via the internet
Act/react
Via the internet, information distributes itself in clusters which spread exponentially (I drew some diagrams\schematics)
9/12/09
“Dance is movement in space and time.”
Life is movement through “place” and time.
What is the significance of the place I live in, and my personal history? How does my relationship to dance change in this place as opposed to another?
Saturday, August 15, 2009
Tiny Dances
As my time in Baltimore grows short (sigh), I am brainstorming new and exciting projects to take with me to NH. Stephanie mentioned to me that her problem with dance, and many people must feel this, is that it is so ephemeral, so temporal and ungraspable. When dances are produced for the stage, there is so much build-up and then they pass before the eye and disappear.
While dance for the camera has developed into a major art form in its own right in the past few decades (thanks be to Merce Cunningham and Meredith Monk), the form is production heavy and intensive, and given the audience for it, almost as fleeting and ungraspable in the end.
Stephanie has mentioned a desire to create dance for the internet and of course she's not the first to think of it (browse youtube and see many dance films, most though are promo-reels and documentation of rehearsals or concerts). The internet in conjunction with film is a great way to collaborate with dancers and artists who are not in the studio with you, and the finished product can be watched again and again for cheap or free.
But one of the problems with the internet is that it can be difficult to spread your art---it's available to everyone, but how will they find out about it. I think that putting all of the internet dances--tiny, lo-production, fun dances that are as much or as little "art" as the collaborators\choreographers want-- into one place (how about a microdance.org ?) and then linking that site to all of our blogs and social networks and tweeting it and spreading it out in that way, is smarter than using facebook or YouTube itself to share the dances.
However, the magic of the internet is in the collaborative, interactivity of it, so creating a YouTube channel that is linked to the main site, and inviting subscribers and viewers to create their own videos in response (dance theater workshop does something similar using twitter: http://www.dancetheaterworkshop.org/blog/).
I'm still hashing out the details of what I'd like to do, but I'm excited to get to NH, and talk with Stephanie and possibly create something fun, kitschy and artsy and accessible that will spread the word of dance.
While dance for the camera has developed into a major art form in its own right in the past few decades (thanks be to Merce Cunningham and Meredith Monk), the form is production heavy and intensive, and given the audience for it, almost as fleeting and ungraspable in the end.
Stephanie has mentioned a desire to create dance for the internet and of course she's not the first to think of it (browse youtube and see many dance films, most though are promo-reels and documentation of rehearsals or concerts). The internet in conjunction with film is a great way to collaborate with dancers and artists who are not in the studio with you, and the finished product can be watched again and again for cheap or free.
But one of the problems with the internet is that it can be difficult to spread your art---it's available to everyone, but how will they find out about it. I think that putting all of the internet dances--tiny, lo-production, fun dances that are as much or as little "art" as the collaborators\choreographers want-- into one place (how about a microdance.org ?) and then linking that site to all of our blogs and social networks and tweeting it and spreading it out in that way, is smarter than using facebook or YouTube itself to share the dances.
However, the magic of the internet is in the collaborative, interactivity of it, so creating a YouTube channel that is linked to the main site, and inviting subscribers and viewers to create their own videos in response (dance theater workshop does something similar using twitter: http://www.dancetheaterworkshop.org/blog/).
I'm still hashing out the details of what I'd like to do, but I'm excited to get to NH, and talk with Stephanie and possibly create something fun, kitschy and artsy and accessible that will spread the word of dance.
Friday, August 7, 2009
I have decided
that I want to be a literature professor. Too bad this means that I would need to get another bachelor's degree, then a masters, then a doctorate...
But, how fun is it that I decided, on a whim to read Don Quixote and The Idiot at the same time, and I did not even realize that, not only are they parallel in subject matter, but The Idiot seems to be directly inspired by Don Quixote, and open about this within the text. In addition, who knew that Don Quixote was a shining example of meta-fiction, which I thought was a 20th century literary form (form isn't the right word...formlessness is better).
And, I don't get to have a captive audience to discuss this with.
Maybe I'll make a dance about it instead.
But, how fun is it that I decided, on a whim to read Don Quixote and The Idiot at the same time, and I did not even realize that, not only are they parallel in subject matter, but The Idiot seems to be directly inspired by Don Quixote, and open about this within the text. In addition, who knew that Don Quixote was a shining example of meta-fiction, which I thought was a 20th century literary form (form isn't the right word...formlessness is better).
And, I don't get to have a captive audience to discuss this with.
Maybe I'll make a dance about it instead.
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