Tag: context

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A bunch of blind spiders creeping around

Having a diverse cohort has its advantages and disadvantages. An advantage is that people from different backgrounds can see my work in a new light from a different perspective and offer me feedback from that perspective. A disadvantage is that they do not know as much as I do about my tools/genre, as I know little about theirs.

By having such surface knowledge about their media, I am not able to push them more in their direction. Yes, I can offer “lay” opinions in their work and shift their progress(maybe) but if we all are continually helping shift each other, will we be able to get anywhere or will we just cover the same ground erratically?

A bunch of blind spiders creeping around the same dusty shoe box?  Milling about getting nowhere…

Does this continual redirection prevent us from progressing forward in relation to ourselves not just in relation to the opinion of an outsider?

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Assume Perfection

I would guess that every famous painter, dancer, author, i.e., artist was derided as terrible by some authority or the authorities of his or her time when s/he first came on the scene.  “Howl” by Ginsberg was thought to be horrible and people tried to have it banned.  Van Gogh never sold a painting in his lifetime. Elvis was hated by parents for his pelvis. The Rite of Spring caused a riot. 

But now all of those artists are famous, lauded, canonized.  The works haven’t changed.  The context changed.

Therefore, all work is worthy of praise and deserves to be canonized.

All that needs to be changed is the context.

Therefore, do whatever the %#!?+ you want and wait for everyone else to catch up.

And assume it’s perfect!

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Experimentationalistic Dance

Experimentation is the sending before the presenting. Pre…before, or occurring before in time…experimenting is the sending before the before sending…do a little algebra and sending equals sending. There proven, put a fork in it. We’re done here. Where is that avocado with the beer in it?!?

Experimentation is also the setting up, the creation of known conditions, knowing what elements you have in play and setting them free. Improvisation is experimentation, the only real form of experimental work. If someone has set/created/ossified something, they are not experimenting in their work. Unless of course they are forcing the experiment into/upon the viewer. Create something known, a choreography, for lack of a better word send it before an audience or present it to an audience, a somewhat known entity (No, you say…really…don’t you keep seeing the same people at shows and everyone is pretty much dressed alike…). The experiment is then what happens between those two entities. The problem with many choreographers who call their work experimental is that they don’t realize that their work isn’t, it’s just trendy and using the adjective du jour. It would actually be experimental if they were thinking of their relationship to the audience.

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The Need for Context

The need for contextualization exists because humans can not free themselves from the good-bad binary. That being said, contextualization is also needed because we are now in a post-disciplinary moment. How long that moment will last is another question.

Because we are in a post-disciplinary time and still are saddled with the evaluative binary, we need contextualization to help us determine where a given work of art/documentation/performance/representation lies on that spectrum. For better or worse, we are no longer saddled (not really but roll with it) with the evaluative binaries of disciplines, which are themselves shorthands for contextualization.