playful performance

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.

Binnenkort verschijnen drie artikelen over dans van mijn hand. Naar aanleiding van Frame 3: Choreographic bodies: Approaches and Potentials schreef ik The Processing Body. Dit artikel gaat in op de manier waarop het lichaam in dans omgaat met informatie en op de manier waarop dans tot stand komt. “Processing dance is [...] the act of processing the knowledge of movement with (through/via) the body [and] it is an infinite dance, perpetually changing; it is dance in process”.

In dit artikel ga ik in op de volgende vragen: “Is a choreographic body a processing body?” en “Is the role of the body in contemporary art process filled, or is the body merely a subject and thus a product?” Het zal in de volgende nieuwsbrief van Danslab verschijnen.

Voor de nieuw te ontwikkelen website van het tijdschrift Volume van theater Frascati heb ik een artikel geschreven naar aanleiding van vier solovoorstellingen die in april dit jaar in Frascati te zien waren. In Een solo voor twee handen en zijn schaduw ga ik in op de machtsverhoudingen tussen performer en publiek tijdens een solo. “Eerst moeten we samen zijn. Vervolgens kan één van ons uit de groep stappen en solist worden. Deze solist kan spelen met de macht die hij verkregen heeft, maar kan zich ook verloren voelen tegenover de groep”.

Springdance legt op dit moment de laatste hand aan een publicatie over Europe in Motion. “Een tweetalig boek met diverse verslagen, artikelen van journalisten Ingrid van Frankenhuyzen en Jochem Naafs, evaluaties en veel foto’s en reacties van deelnemers. In totaal 36 jonge choreografen namen in drie landen (Groot-Brittannië, Roemenië en Nederland) deel aan speciale Dialogue sessies; daarna presenteerden ze hun werk aan het publiek” (www.springdance.nl). In deze publicatie verschijnt mijn column The extra stranger.

On December 6 and 7 Danslab organised Frame, a two day gathering of choreographers on artistic research, or if you wish: artistic explorative processes. To discuss this topic Danslab proposed to take two (related) types of knowledge as a starting point: embodied knowledge and subjective knowledge. Danslab asked me and two other students in Theatre Studies to join this discussion and write a report. You can read a small teaser here:

Processing Dance
Thinking outside the Frame – Research on choreographic research
By Jochem Naafs

Who defines the product?
What defines the product?
What is the knowledge of dance?

Why would these questions come up if you put about 25 choreographers and dance scholars in one room? I am not sure. Maybe it is because dance is not in any way really tangible. Dance is temporarily. This article reports my thinking and feeling during and after Frame – Research on Choreographic Research. My thoughts have been leading me towards the question what a choreographic product and choreographic knowledge is and can be.

Download the full report (.pdf).

The reports of Nina Aalders and Anoek Nuyens are available on the website of Danslab.