playful performance

Vrijdagochtend 8.07. De zon komt op in Utrecht. In de kapel van de domtoren verzamelt een groep kunstenaars zich om nieuwe beelden te verzamelen van Utrecht. Tijdens het ontbijt worden beelden voorgeschoteld door een divers gezelschap van Utrechters. Het ontbijt is verzorgd door (eet)ontwerper Karlijn Souren en verbeeldt de schetsen van de Utrechters: een stevige boterham met kaas voor een gedicht over de grachten, een zoete amuse om te schenken bij een gedicht over het Zandpad, een yoghurtdrank met shotjes Turkse, Marokkaanse of Indiase cultuur bij een schets over het transculturele Utrecht van 2013.

Het Walter Maas Huis organiseert i.s.m Vrede van Utrecht en de kunstenaars van Nieuwe Grond Lab het kunstenaarssymposium Nieuwe Grond van vrijdag 20 t/m zondag 22 november 2009. Samen met kunsthistoricus en kunstsocioloog Rogier Brom woon ik Nieuwe Grond bij. We zullen na afloop een schriftelijke dialoog aangaan met het symposium als uitgangspunt.

Ontbijten en beelden verzamelen in de kapel
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Talking about dance and choreography and writing about the resulting discussion, is similar to dance itself: a continuous process.  This process-like quality of dance and theatre is what distinguishes it from other media and art forms that seem to be more ‘product’ orientated.  on the 4th and 5th of July danslab organized the third symposium for choreographers on choreographic research. danslab proposed the body as the subject for this symposium, or to be more precise: ‘Choreographic Bodies: Approaches and Potentials’. lectures by Rob van Kranenburg, Michael Kroes and the host Helena De Preester were scheduled, accompanied by ‘brainstorming’ sessions, which took on differing form. I took the idea of the ‘processing body’ and two questions concerning this idea as a starting point to write about the symposium, not to come up with an answer but to continue the discussion of the symposium:

1. Is a choreographic body a processing body?
2. Is the rol of the body in contemporary art process filled, or is the body merely a subject and thus a product?

My reflection can be read together with some considerations of dancer/researcher Joa Hug and dancer/choreographer and member of Danslab’s artistic team Jack Gallagher in the 7th newsletter of Danslab.

From November 10th untill December 20th I’ll be working with choreographer and dancer Jack Gallagher on his research at Danslab.

Jack Gallagher on the Danslab website:

In Danslab I aim to find some missing links between the communication rules we traditionally come to expect in public space and the language of dance. I will focus on the gap between dance practice and the expectations of an audience who are not immediately privileged to the dance culture. A new ground zero for the performative mover. I want to develop a new line from the Counter Technique, developed by Anouk van Dijk during the past 12 years when I was a main proponent, with expert contributions from linguistics/psychology/philosophy. I will draw a new map for my composing method using Performative Speech Act Theory, Peter Sloterdijk’s spatial modeling & Lacan’s logic of discourses. The main question from Performative Speech Act Theory is -What do we do by saying? I will turn this around- What do we say by doing dance? I’m looking to materialize my hunch about the dialectics of dance between body and meaning. Through Lacanian theory, I will tackle the issue of how dance often says too much!

Collaborators:
Matthew Kelly Roman (dancer)
Diane Elshout (research assistent)
Jochem Naafs (dramaturgy)
Derrick Brown (advisor)

More information will follow soon.