Author: wasswasswass

Posted on

Another definition for Contact

Con –
1. a prefix meaning “with,” “together,” “in association”
2. a verb meaning “to commit to memory” or “to study or examine closely”
3. an adverb meaning “on the negative side” or “in opposition”

4. a verb meaning “swindle”, “manipulate”, “persuade”, or “cajole”

Tact –
1.a keen sense of what to say or do to avoid giving offense; skill in dealing with difficult or delicate situations.
2.a keen sense of what is appropriate, tasteful, or aesthetically pleasing; taste; discrimination.
3.touch or the sense of touch.


Posted on

CI is like Champagne

Only bubbly white wine
that comes from the region of 
Champagne, France 
is given the name 
champagne.

Contact Improvisation, some people maintain, is more than just a physical practice. It is a political movement, a way of life, a way to interact with our fellow humans and the world. Some might even go as far as to say CI is a social modality that can change the world.

Contact Improvisation was not created in a vacuum. It arose in the United States during a time of great flux and change. It was a time of great social and political upheaval. Therefore, the environment in which CI arose is inherent in the form.

If CI is a political/social/gender/economic etc. movement then to truly understand CI one has to come from the same soil that birthed CI.

Are, then, only denizens of the United States of America fully capable of understanding CI and manifesting true corporeal self-determination in the moment?

(it could also be that all the concomitant -isms that people attribute to the physical form of CI have nothing to with it, that it is purely the physical practice and form. Yes, CI can be a tool for creating those -isms, but it is not those -isms. A hammer can be used to build a house, but it is not a house.)

Posted on

A defintion

Improvisation: bodies manifesting and dissolving dynamic temporal-spatial structures according to aesthetic and physical potentialities and proclivities in a planar arena.

Posted on

Theater vs. Gallery or What vs. Where

If a dance piece is different in a theater than in a gallery, white box vs. black box, how would it change in a movie theater?
in an elementary school theater?
a high school theater?
a college theater?
the art gallery next to the black box theater at the college?
at a theater at a university, a university without a dance major?
in the theater of a university?
in the theater of a PAC 10 university?
in the foyer of that theater?
in the bathroom off the foyer of the theater of the PAC 10 university that doesn’t have a dance major?
in a bus stop near that university?
the bathroom at that bus stop?
the bus that just left the bus stop?
the bathroom on that bus?
the Wendy’s that bus stops at 3 hours later?
in the parking lot of the gas station?
next to pump number 3?
next to pump number 7 that Henry in a red and green plaid shirt is using to fill his Toyota Tundra’s tank?

OK, forget all that.  Let’s go back to a traditional performance space.

A sprung bamboo floor on a 15×10 meter rectangle of concrete with radiant heating.  The concrete is 20 cm thick.  Surrounding the dance floor is gravel.  This floor is in a room that has 5 other such floors and each one is surrounded similarly by gravel.  This room has windows on the north and south sides and has an arched roof. The walls are white; the gravel grey; the ceiling silver.  The east and west sides have brown sliding door 4 meters long and 2 meters tall.  Each door has a cement landing and benches.

Maybe this isn’t a traditional performance space, but my dream studio.

OK, back to this piece…hmm…how about this – We, in the performance world, shall never make a new piece ever again, but agree upon 1 piece that we will all repeat in different contexts.  Never again will we have to worry about what we will do.  The only question is where we will do it.

P.S.
There are an infinite number of contexts (as there are pieces).
I’d rather make the pieces than the contexts.

Posted on

The Essay That Describes Itself

This is the first sentence.  This is the second sentence.  This is the third sentence.  This is the fourth sentence.  This is the fifth sentence.  This is the sixth sentence.  This is the seventh sentence.  This is the eighth sentence.
This is the ninth sentence.  This is the tenth sentence.  This is the eleventh sentence.  This is the twelfth sentence.  This is the thirteenth sentence.  This is the fourteenth sentence.  This is the fifteenth sentence.  This is the sixteenth sentence.
This is the seventeenth sentence.  This is the eighteenth sentence.  This is the nineteenth sentence.  This is the twentieth sentence.  This is the twenty-first sentence.  This is the twenty-second sentence.  This is the twenty-third sentence.  This is the twenty-fourth sentence.
This is the twenty-fifth sentence and the first one of this paragraph.  This is the twenty-sixth sentence.  This is the twenty-seventh sentence.  This is the twenty-eighth sentence.  This is the twenty-ninth sentence.  This is the thirtieth sentence.  This is the thirty-first sentence.  This is the thirty-second sentence.
This is the thirty-third sentence and the first one of this, the fifth paragraph.  This is the thirty-fourth sentence.  This is the thirty-fifth sentence.  This is the thirty-sixth sentence.  This is the thirty-seventh sentence.  This is the thirty-eighth sentence.  This is the thirty-ninth sentence.  This is the fortieth sentence.
This is the forty-first sentence.  This is the forty-second sentence.  This is the forty-third sentence and contains the largest prime number yet in this essay.  This is the forty-fourth sentence.  This is the forty-fifth sentence.  This is the forty-sixth sentence.  This is the forty-seventh sentence.  This is the forty-eighth sentence.
This is the forty-ninth sentence.  This is the fiftieth sentence.  This is the fifty-first sentence.  This is the fifty-second sentence.  This is the fifty-third sentence.  This is the fifty-fourth sentence.  This is the fifty-fifth sentence.  This, the eight and final sentence of this paragraph, is the fifty-sixth sentence.
This is the fifty-seventh sentence.  This is the fifty-eighth sentence.  This is the fifty-ninth sentence.  This is the sixtieth sentence.  This is the sixty-first sentence.  This is the sixty-second sentence.  This is the sixty-third sentence.  This is the sixty-fourth sentence.
This is the sixty-fifth sentence.  This is the sixty-sixth sentence and the second of this paragraph.  This is the sixty-seventh sentence.  This is the sixty-ninth sentence.  This is the seventieth sentence.  This is the seventy-first sentence.  This is the seventy-second sentence and the final one of this paragraph.
This is the seventy-third sentence.  This is the seventy-fourth sentence.  This is the seventy-fifth sentence.  This is the seventy sixth sentence.  This is the seventy-eighth sentence.  This is the seventy-ninth sentence, which will be followed by the eightieth sentence.  This is the eightieth sentence.
This is the first sentence of the eleventh paragraph.  This is the second sentence of the eleventh paragraph.  This is the third sentence of the eleventh paragraph.  This is the fourth sentence of the eleventh paragraph.  This is the fifth sentence of the eleventh paragraph.  This is the sixth sentence of the eleventh paragraph.  This is the seventh sentence of the eleventh paragraph.  This is the eighth sentence of the eleventh paragraph and therefore the eighty eighth sentence.
This is the eighty-ninth sentence.  This is the ninetieth sentence.  This is the ninety first sentence.  This is the ninety-second sentence.  This is the ninety-third sentence.  This is the ninety-fourth sentence.  This is the ninety-fifth sentence.  This is the ninety-sixth sentence and if the author were to use the classic two thirds one third ratio point to have the climax, it would be here.
This is the ninety-seventh sentence.  This is the ninety-eighth sentence.  This is the ninety-ninth sentence.  This is the one-hundredth sentence.  This is the first sentence when proper grammar dictates that numerals can be used according to the Chicago Manual of Style and therefore the 101th sentence.  This is the 102th sentence.  This is the 103rd sentence.  This is the 104th sentence.
This is the 105thsentence.  This is the 106thsentence. This is the 107th sentence. This is the 108thsentence. This is the 109th sentence. This is the 110thsentence. This is the 111th sentence. This is the eighth sentence of this paragraph, the 112th sentence, and if you have been paying attention you would know that each paragraph so far has had eight sentences and therefore this paragraph is the 14th paragraph.
This is the 15thparagraph.  This is the 15thparagraph.  This is the 15thparagraph. 
This is the 15thparagraph.  This is the 15thparagraph.  This is the 15thparagraph. 
This is the 15thparagraph.  This is still the 15thparagraph.
This, however, is the 16th paragraph.  This is the second sentence of the 16th paragraph.  This is still the 16thparagraph.  This sentence, too, is part of the 16th paragraph.  As is this one.  And this one, too.  This sentence, also, has the pleasure of being part of the 16th paragraph.  This sentence is also part of the 16th paragraph.  As is this one, the final sentence of the 16thparagraph.
This is the first sentence of this paragraph.  This is the 130th sentence of this essay.  This is the third sentence of the 17th paragraph of this essay. Numerically, this sentence marks the halfway point of this paragraph.  This is the fifth sentence of this paragraph.  This sentence marks three quarters of the way through this paragraph.  This is the seventh sentence of this, the 17th paragraph.  This is the last sentence of this paragraph.
This is the antepreantepenultimate sentence of this paragraph.  This is the preantepenultimate sentence of this paragraph.  This is the antepenultimate sentence of this paragraph.  This is the penultimate sentence of this paragraph. This is the ultimate sentence of this paragraph which is the final paragraph of this essay, the Essay on Nothing.

Posted on

Personnel vs. Content

I was just at the Texas Dance Improvisation Festival this past weekend.  Thoroughly enjoyed myself.

Sitting in on a class taught by a friend and fellow Lower Lefter, Leslie Scates, I listened to the discussion at the end of class.  One of the participants brought up the question of personnel vs. idea during the exercise of Number Score.

Usually, during Number Score, the content happening in the work/performance space changes when the personnel/dancers change.

This need not be.

How to train Number Score to focus on shifting personnel but maintaining the content?

Does Number Score inadvertently simultaneously train Jump Cuts?

How to train Number Score and not drop material?

Maybe beforehand determine what the material/content will be…

must investigate (though, I have always had trouble with Number Score.  Not that I think it is a pointless exercise.  I see its value, but I have (almost) never enjoyed it)

Posted on

European English

Due to whatever reasons (that I do not wish to go into), English is the dominant language of communication within the arts in Europe.  Maybe this is only true for dance and performance.  I have more exposure to that world than the worlds of painting, sculpture, etc. (I do not want to say visual art as dance, too, is a visual art).

The English used in the dance art world is slowly evolving to become another dialect.  It is neither the bastard English of the United States or the proper Queen’s English of the United Kingdom.  It is becoming its own thing developed by the collective use of non-native speakers and ex-pats.

I became aware, or perhaps more aware, of European English after seeing a performance at HAU 3 in Berlin this past May.  The piece was Pulling Strings by Eva Meyer-Keller.  It is quite an intricate piece, a feat of organization.  Quotidian objects are raised, lowered, and activated, sometimes to comical effects.  My favorite moment was the spinning push-broom.  But I digress.

What caught my mind(eye) was the title – Pulling Strings.  Yes, that is literally what she and her collaborator did.  They pulled strings to activate the objects.  But the phrase pulling strings has a nefarious, manipulative aspect to it.  The phrase conjures up back room political machinations.  I did not see how the piece connected to such an idea.  The description on her website gave no indication that the piece was related to the manipulative meaning of the phrase.  As far as I could tell, Keller was not dealing with that meaning of the phrase, just the literal one.

The use of the phrase pulling strings, in a way, has become pure meaning, a literal phrase.  Does this mean, then, that people who do know that meaning or use of the phrase are saddled with extra context, context or meaning that has nothing to do with the piece?

Another student, who is French, in the SODA program did a piece in which she used several phrases with the word white and several kinds of animals – white rabbit, white horse.  I can’t think of other ones at the moment.  She was unaware of the white rabbit of Alice in Wonderland or in the Jefferson Airplane song(also the same rabbit), White Rabbit.  Whenever I hear the phrase white horse I think of that great song by Laid Back, White Horse.  They’re Danish, by the way.

My larger question is when a language is used by a non-native speaker how aware of the idioms and cultural context of that language should s/he be?  Can the artist ignore all that and use the language as a context-free tool for expression?  I would think that in a scene that is obsessed with context and dramaturgy, artists would have a greater concern for the use of language.

Or has all context been removed from English in continental Europe?