Improv Evolution vol. 1

On Sunday, November 9, 2008. Epiphany Dance Experiment presented Improv Evolution vol 1, a program which presented: Chicago Contact Improvisation Jam, Julia Mayer & Marc Riordan (drums); Julia Rae Antonick, Jonathan Mayer, and Joseph St. Charles (drums); Lisa Gonzales & Darrel Jones. The performance was organized and concluded with a post show dialogue prompted by the question below:

Dance improvisation exists as the tool for dance composition, practice and also pure dance performance form as itself. Dance Artists who present improvisation as their works rehearse and often work with music improvisors. Today, we have a chance to share not only how dance improvisation dan contact improvisation as a particular form are performed, but also how both are developing in dance improvisation history and functioning in works of dance choreography.

Dialogue moderated by Asimina Chremos and David Lakein

DAVID: So my name is David and this is...

ASIMINA: my name is Asimina

DAVID: Ayako, who organized this evening asked us to facilitate a little conversation and I just thought we could start by just a raise of hands, I know there are a lot of artists siotting in the circle already, but for those of you who are normal audience members, um, how many of you saw contact improvisation for the first time this evening?

No one. Okay. How many saw an improvisation performance for the first time this evening? So this is old school audience. Okay.

(To Asimina) so you want to start us off with a direction?

ASIMINA: Yeah, I actually have a question, um, which was, for people who were watching Julia's duet with Mark, how did you know it was over? Because it was completely improvised, right? And there was no like, “Da da, da daa, da, da, da DAA, BOOM!” Like there was no end, you know what I mean? So I'm just curious, for people who are watching, how do you know when it is over and it's time to go (claps), or whatever you want to do.

AUDIENCE #1: When somebody is clapping. When somebody else started clapping.

ASIMINA: Somebody else started clapping and that was, that was your cue. Any others?

AUDIENCE #2: There was a change in their, or I felt anyway, a change in their like, they were in a certain tone or mode.

ASIMINA: So what's performance mode? There's a tone, there's a mode. Does anybody

disagree?

AUDIENCE #3: yes. No I don't disagree.

ASIMINA: So what is that? I'm curious about this as a performer myself. When is it that you're like giving the energy of performing? And then when is it like, “Alright I'm done. You know. I'm having a strawberry now, whatever.” Especially in like your guys' duet, there was a lot of in and out and playing with that in umm, Darrell and Lisa's duet. They were dancing and then he was like, “can we go back to the beginning, please?” Do you know what I mean? So they were playing a lot with that mode or that tone or whatever that is. I don't know, does anybody want to say anything about that?

DARRELL: Something comes up for me as a performer about light and, and not necessarily having a lighting design but knowing that, 'oh, I can dim the lights on myself in a way.' I can turn my volume down in way that is almost like dimming the lights on the stage.

ASIMINA: I'm finding that point in a book, Technique of Self Lighting (laughter from the group).

LISA GONZALES: From the Inside. (laughter)

ASIMINA: What do you think that is? That light?

DARRELL: What do I think it is?

ASIMINA: Yeah

DARRELL: I think it's an awareness of being seen, uh, yeah I think it's something about being seen and knowing to pull back or to go out or to look directly at somebody in some other tone.

LISA: I think it's about recognizing those different energies in the body, like I know what my body feels like when I am not. Like I know if my body posturing, you know as a different state, a conversational state, and I know it when I'm extending a certain energy and so a little bit sometimes it's like how much I'm able to pay attention to at any one moment.

ASIMINA: Right

LISA: And what I'm paying attention to, so if I'm dropping into a more pedestrian mode or something, I think it has to do with what I'm paying attention to. It's not necessarily that I'm paying less attention than I might be paying in order to access that or something. I might need to say, “oh yeah, that's whe

n my shoulders drop, that's when my hip goes out, that's when my throat feels this way.”

ASIMINA: But I also feel. Oh, I'm sorry

AUDIENCE #4: But this is from the perspective of the performer and not necessarily the audience. You always want the perspective of the audience.

DAVID: In terms of your experience this evening, did you have moments where you sensed people sort of going in and out, to use his metaphor, the lights sort of going up or dimming down in terms of your vantage point, your experience? And this is a question for all of you.

AUDIENCE #4: Yeah, I relate to what he said and how, his performance turned it on not off. For me tonight was the most vocals... which I found really more engaging.

DAVID: You wanted to say something?

AUDIENCE #5: Oh, I was just going to say, going off what she saying, I also feel like you can. Well, okay I'm a dancer so I've improvised before, but you can be in a piece or perform where you're like, relaxed. Like I feel like it doesn't have to be like, “Oh, I have to perform now!” I feel like there's a sense of both but there's still, regardless of whether the performance is about being like, (sits back with arms folded) whatever, or being (sits up straight with arms out) “Ahh” there's still like a shift. If that answers the question, I still feel like there's a shift that if your engaged, or if you're dancing and you're engaging yourself in performance, I feel like an audience member can see a shift and that's how I felt like I knew it was over. So even if they were performing like this, (sits forward, legs crossed resting chin on her hand), when there was a shift in something else, and I guess if it doesn't, how can I say? If it doesn't appear like it's a shift onward, if it's a shift outward...

AUDIENCE #6: Would you say the last thing you said again? The door slammed.

AUDIENCE #5: Oh, if I don't feel like there's a shift forward with the piece, if the shift is like out of the piece, then I feel like that's how I know that it's over. When it's improvisation I mean. Unless the performance is like (sits up with arms spread) “Ahh ta-da, I'm dancing,” (slouches in seat) then it's like, “I'm not dancing.” But if it's harder to tell when the performance is like (slouches back in seat). Because you can be in a piece when you're doing whatever, you know what I mean, and that's your persona, that's who you are in the piece and so if you're continuing to be like this then you don't know it's over but there's still some kind of shift I think.

DAVID: One of the things I was curious about watching and looking at the different pieces is, you know, the spectrum of improvisation. If you say one end, or rather the fence, is set, set, set, set, set and the other is improv, improv, improv, improv even though you know that it's physical space and you probably know the time period. Even if you go over and maybe someone is kind enough to remind you that you should have ended. So this is sort of our spectrum. We had several pieces that were in different places in the spectrum. Playing with somehow, structures or set material and then things that were more and more unstructured. In terms of what we're talking about now and your experience as an audience, how are you noticing things, how is your curiosity peaked more, less, differently? When you feel like, “Oh this looks like maybe the performers know what they're doing, even if they're discovering it in the moment, this is more set.” And other moments when you feel like, “Oh, I'm really seeing them do something they've never done in the space here right now.” Do you sense a difference for yourselves, here, watching tonight? What did you discover? What questions arose? What observations did you have? Different moments of one piece or different pieces?

AUDIENCE # 7: Well, for me as an audience member, I've seen a lot of dance, I am getting to the point where, if the whole thing is a performance, if the whole thing is in “performance mode,” I lose interest. Like if I am not having a sense that the performers are figuring something out, or negotiating something or having some sort of journey in their process in front of me then I just drop out. I start thinking of other things, I start thinking about what I would do with the piece if it were mine. (laughter) And so like for me, I really appreciate, and if the whole thing...There has to be some “performance mode” there has to be, for me, some like of that heightened awareness of, this way of relating with space, this way of relating with the body. Or else then, it's like what I am watching for? So, for me, it's very important to have the whole like in and out and give and take and like uh, that sort of um, negotiating the landscape of the piece or the maze, finding your way through. Or like, something about like, it is a process that I'm seeing. It's not this thing.

JONATHAN:

Do you feel like you only get that sense when there is some amount of improv in the work?

AUDIENCE # 7: That's a funny question because it assumes that there is work in which there is no amount of improv.

JONATHAN: Well it sounds to me like you are saying that like you don't get that feeling if everything is more or less set. But I'm.

LISA: well I...go ahead sorry. (laughter)

JONATHAN: Well maybe I misunderstood.

MARGARET: What were you going to say? (laughter)

LISA: Oh, I was going to say that I didn't understand that from what she said. Like I was feeling, I don't know, but you can answer that question.

MARGARET: Well it depends, it depends because there can be pieces in which everything is set but still the performers are having an experience within what is set and finding what it is today and right now. You know, an I appreciate that. But sometimes it's not like that and

AUDIENCE #8: Sometimes it's not like that in improv.

LISA: When I feel like the structure is a safety net, you know like I still don't have to put myself on the line, I still don't have to find a point that makes me vulnerable, like pushing up to my edge in performance, then I feel like no matter if it's improvised or completely set then, yeah, it loses, it loses something. But, so I understand that I think it can be totally set but as performers still pushing that edge of how far do I have to go in order to be vulnerable, then you're opening up that process of discovery inside of it.

ASIMINA: I think that's a really, a really interesting dichotomy, well I created a dichotomy in my mind with what you said, which is a dichotomy between vulnerability and mastery. And I feel like one of the reasons that Ayako curated this event and put this together is because she wanted to explore the ongoing struggle of improvisation as a performance form to find legitimacy. There are a lot of issues that come up for me thinking about professionalism in the field, uh mastery, and then control, power, the ability to get paid, uh you know talent, entertainment, these kinds of things. And then something that Lisa, that you're touching on, vulnerability, human development, openness, open-heartedness. Getting away from personas and masks and being very authentic and real. I feel that what is authenticity, who are we really? Asking who are we, why are we here (laughs) instead of like, I know who I am, I know why I'm here. There are some kind of pulls there that I feel like are um, this question of choreographically set work which is, set is kind of dance lingo for composed, and improvised which is, you know, sort of composed in the moment. So I just raise those several cans of worms and invite you.

DAVID: We can hear from some new people.

AUDIENCE #9: There's something between that cause you are talking about over explaining things, right?. Either it's set or it's improvised which is done in the moment. But I suspect in fact, and I would like to hear from the dancers, there may be cases where you talk about improvisation, in part. They recall certain structures that are already developed you know in rehearsals or whatever, beforehand which is a way to actually get some security. Some security on where you are and avoidance of balance, being there, avoid times where there is nothing happening. You know a lot of things are taken away just by having some amount of structure when one can rely on at times. So I think, and I would like to hear from the dancers, if I'm right, maybe there is something in between and one can play with different modes in the same piece.

DAVID: Before we answer that, and that's a great question, just to get a broader cross-section from some more audience people, what is your...I think we're raising questions and I think this is anyway a quite short conversation so it is less about finding answers and more just about throwing, yes please

AUDIENCE #10: This is a little bit both about what you guys both just brought up and um, I've worked a lot in improv and I'm also really interested in watching it and I've seen a lot of set pieces and had that same question that you talk about Asimina, is like, what is the value of improvisation? And obviously there is something that I keep coming back to and there's something that I've seen in it that I've been really drawn to and often for me, however, I feel the line is, I don't know line, but what I want to see in a performance is somebody pushing through the walls that come up. And, so when you bump into something as a performer and you don't know what to do with it or where it might take you, it can go anyway into it. You can step into it and I think the thing that is typical with improvisation is there's this level of insecurity because you don't have that security blanket or whatever of your choreography. Um, and so that moment can be really confusing and like it's possible to like not even be able to see that it's, that you're there in that place. Um, but the thing about choreographing something is that you can meet it in the studio and then come back to it and come back to it again and like realize, oh I'm, discover that you're hitting this wall and you're hitting something. And, so, I think that

there's potential to go through with that in improvisation but I think that, oh, it's just that more demanding or something, um...

ASIMINA: Well you're doing it in front of people instead of in your own time.

AUDIENCE #10: Right.

ASIMINA: That's pretty demanding.

AUDIENCE #10: I don't know but for me the whole thing of like, improvisation, we don't know

what's going to happen, the performer doesn't know what's going to happen, oh they're so naked because of that. For me, that's not enough, that's interesting only if they really pursue that, uh, to the end and I don't know. I'm kind of touching on it but skirting around what I am trying to say a little bit so…

ASIMINA: I think these are all things that are hard to articulate verbally and that's why it's good to have these kinds of conversations. So yeah, if there's anything other people want to say, especially if you haven't spoken yet.

AUDIENCE #11: Uh, I think, I've been noticing as I watch like dance I know is improvised and dance I know is set to some extent but usually I don't know to what extent, I'm noticing like, in some ways watching the set pieces like, there's more often sort of a narrative, it's a little bit easier to follow and keep my attention there but I only really understand improvised dance. In like my thought process somehow that's the only dance I think, the only dance I do feel like I understand and so sometimes I forget a set piece is set until someone does something that is clearly set. Two people are doing the exact same thing at the exact same time for way too long and then that's so jarring somehow I do lose my suspension of disbelief that like I have to get all back into it again. It was just interesting to me.

AUDIENCE #12: I was curious about performing in the space with, one, projection of text, I was wondering how performers felt since it's so large and such high ceilings, like how did you change your performance if you were speaking, and/or did you? And did you care if we heard the text?

LISA: I did the best I could. (laughter)

AUDIENCE #12: Do you think you changed, do you think you projected louder?

LISA: I tried to, I tried to but I also, but I didn't really know, not having done it in the space before, how it was going to read or be perceived. But I definitely did try to project differently.

AUDIENCE #12: You see for me I could hear your stories easier than I could hear the contact improv. A lot of the contact improv stories I couldn't hear, nor did I think it was as important. I thought your text for me was more important to hear it.

LISA: Well we made a decision ahead of time that if we spoke we wanted it to be heard.

DARRELL: And some of the things I say I think are for you (points to Lisa) they're to affect you and so it is personal and sometimes I'm not as concerned about what's heard but what's seen in relationship to what I said and her response.

LISA: But you make a choice.

DARRELL: Yeah

ASIMINA: Does anyone who was in the contact jam with talk want to talk about their moment of talking?

SARA: I really liked, and this is totally personal and just for today, this isn't like a broad opinion, I really like this idea of like having conversations on stage and wanting the audience to hear them but having to be quiet enough that they are kind of private that I knew that probably you couldn't hear them. So, but just having the sense of, “here, we're having a conversation.” and it's a real conversation, it's not like we're making something up. Like I actually want to say this thing to you right now and you're going to respond but just to give the essence of like, remember we are actual people. Just remember. And if you can hear me great and if you can't, I was just talking about cats, who cares. I like that.

ASIMINA: If you weren't actual people what would you be? (laughter) Well I'm serious because there are these, you know, ghostly constructs that we put on the situation when we're “in a performance” and so I'm seriously really curious.

PERSON: Well yeah, when people are performing very set pieces I feel like there's this distance, that they're this supernatural being. Um, there's a sense that they are somehow superior and I'm just down here, so that's the feeling I get of not feeling human or related.

ASIMINA: Well I think that's very interesting because I think it relates to the very first use of performance, where human beings may have been using dance and performance to contact other beings and channel their energy and shamanistic energies. I do feel like in the 20^thcentury, in the 21^st century, since god is dead and all that stuff that people believe, (laughter).

AUDIENCE MEMBER: Nice entrance

REV. MEIGAN CAMERON: (sits down beside Asimina) (laughter) I picked the right moment.

ASIMINA: You did, I felt you coming too and I feel the power of this space very strongly. That we, that contact improvisation and a lot of these improvisational forms which came out of, you know, late or early 60's cultural practices in the United States, um you know there are these more existential questions about what our relationship is to supernatural beings and this idea of pedestrian just being a person you know or being connected to other things, these are, I think these are questions in performance that are really big and kind of old maybe to.

JULIA MAYER: Well and the space, this space has many layers of ghostly presences and interpretations. So I found myself in performance, in the moment, realizing that something like this (drops to hands and knees) just registers in the space to me differently than it would elsewhere.

ASIMINA: right.

JULIA MAYER: prostrating myself on the floor is different in the space.

ASIMINA: Or this (stands and faces the alter with arms spread to side and head titled back).

JULIA MAYER: right, exactly. Or the feeling, I've never danced under a ceiling this high so I just was like reveling in it but like look at this (gestures to the ceiling with head back) there's just a whole other, many other histories and interpretations that the space imposes, you know, in a lovely way.

AUDIENCE #9: You know it's interesting we talk about this. There was a time, where precisely, the dancer was the person. Think about Isadora Duncan, we didn't think about a choreographer setting her work, right? She was it, and so maybe that's what we're talking about, choreographers. I'm sorry, the pieces that were improvised you're looking at the dancer. It isn't who the choreographer is and so and so it's who the dancer is. It's a change of the perspective, the focus, right?

DAVID: I'm having a moment. Something, without going into faith too much, but something within faith about confronting to the unknown connects for me with, I don't know your name in the back, something you were talking about. You, for me, so far got really close to articulating one of the reasons why improvisation as a performance form is struggling to gain more broader general recognition. Why is it that moments of uncertainty are read as less worthy of being watched? Or less interesting or less...

I don't think uncertainty but what the person, what the performer does with those moments.

DAVID: No I'm going beyond, I'm raising that question because one of the main reasons why improvisation as a contemporary performance form is not getting the same recognition and people are not getting paid as much all.

(VIDEO RECORDING THE DIALOGUE CUTS OUT FOR A MOMENT.)

DAVID: And this woman who seems to have a comment. (Asimina is raising her hand, people are laughing).

ASIMINA: I actually had a big insight about this in a workshop I hosted the other day in my studio the other day which is that our culture is really a lot about like winning like seeing the winning, like fight, the game who wins, but what we really, really love is witnessing transformation. And that’s the different thing. It’s not about winning. You know it’s about changing. You know transforming seeing the lead turning into gold metaphorically speaking. I do think that’s vulnerability.

DAVID: And…I think that in order to witness the transformation, one needs to be able to really enter into transformation process by himself. So that’s where in a sense that improvisation, or let’s say the improvisational state of mind that happens in moments improvisation, because we know all that those improvisation performances where people are, just as you I feel again articulate, are just reproducing known movement vocabularies they have known even if it’s there then, or here and now, so when audience and performer both enter into moments of intimacy and vulnerability, and we’re able to share that. And welcoming that perhaps allows the moment of transformation. Do you agree or disagree?

GILL: That's a big risk in the audience actually. Because I want to go to…I want to spend two hours of recital of two hours…I don’t know if I guess something that I really really like because improvisation touches me or if I'm not. There is the truth for anything, truth for Broadways, too.

DAVID: When you go to Broadway, you are more likely to know what you are getting into.

GILL: Yeah. More of the chance. For me it’s an obvious choice.

AUDIENCE: It’s like a chain restaurants. Like my burrito is gonna be the same because they've quantified how much re-fried beans go in.

AUDIENCE: Yeah. I guess the performance that is sort of the traditional and has been the same years upon years. But like with experimental, more experimental performance and I mean even like a traditional play I think one night to the next. I think you're right though when you say you do get the same thing when you go to see any show whether set or not. I mean I don’t know. I don’t think that’s the issue whether or not it’s interesting because you don’t know what the performer's gonna find. I think it’s about the talent of that performer on any given night to work it out and honestly there's going to be augmenting because there are many performers but for the most part I think, I don't think...Maybe other people think that don't see a lot of improvisation, “I don't know, who knows if it’s gonna be good or not.

DAVID: But are people here, either your experience this evening as audience members or if you recall other experiences you had, when you see moments that are unsuccessful, moments when you feel like things didn't quite work out or wasn't quite what maybe building up? Are those moments that you feel down or those moments that you actually treasure because it reveals something of the performer or that performer's humanity or her or his belief? What is it about, what you are saying, living in a dominant culture with winning and it's about being successful and if we brought it beyond the American context, people who are from Europe may feel similar you know. What is about failure, what is about witnessing failure ?

MARGARET: OK, so the thing of it is that, if we were watching people who are doing set work or we were watching people who are improvising or some combination there of, just on a practical level, and I know that being good at what you do is this subjective, but at the same time, like I want to see who is good. Like whether they are improviser or they are you know a ballerina, or both or whatever. I want to them to be really great at what they do. And so if that means that you know it’s about if you are asking about the moment of failure, yeah, it can be really amazing to see, if it’s really clear because they have been so great at mastering their vulnerability throughout the show so that I know, I know because I am with them because they brought me along that this failed. Then, yeah, it’s great!

DAVID: Hallelujah !

MARGARET: But thing about this is that with improvisation as opposed to other dance forms, there is not as much, like you can study like there are so many places to go to work and study ballet or West African dance or South African dance, or release technique or this or that and there's always teachers like you can get good at it. It’s a lot easier I think in the United States to master a dance form than it is get to master improvisation. And people wanna pay to go to see people who are masters of what they do. There are more masters of other forms than the art of improvisation. And there are more people who know that there are more masters of other forms than the masters of improvisation, so of course there' going to be less people who are interested in going to see improvisation, because they don’t even know anybody. Most of the general public doesn’t know, have a concept of like somebody who is a master of improvisation and what it means. And if they did, they are doing more of an audience for it.

DAVID: Do you agree?

LISA: Well I think that, I don’t know, but the word of improvisation is so huge, there is so much value in the many different kinds of improvisation that people practice. I do think that when you bring improvisation into performance, the rigor of attending to that kind of stereotype that, 'oh improvisation is just getting to do whatever you want to.' That kind of thing, doesn’t have a really a place, in my opinion, well I don't want to see it, in performance. But one of the ways I think about if I'm gonna perform, and I think about it philosophically just in terms of why I like to practice improvisation and why it’s a life practice for me, is that I do feel like in the way, in terms of, I don't think about it in terms of mastery, but attending to the unknown in that something thrown out. And I think it does. I practice for my life and I practice improvisation, I feel better about it in the studio than I do in my life, but if something is thrown at me, whatever is there, then I feel it’s my responsibility to turn it into something I can believe in or something I can stand behind. And that is my responsibility to be responsive and to actively work with it and not to disengage from it and so I think it's that process of staying engaged in the face of the unknown and the failing moments. The scariest moments, the failing moments, where you are falling flat on your face. And turning, I don't know, the challenge is turning those into moments that I can stand behind. I don't know, it's a paradox.

ASIMINA: And staying present maybe?

LISA: Absolutely, and taking responsibility for my role.

ASIMINA: yeah, I think that's a great place to, or we should take one more?

DAVID: yeah, I think it would be great to end with the audience.

AUDIENCE #12: When people are talking about improv and people not being responsive to it, we're in Chicago which has Second City, which people are thriving off of watching theatrical improv, people are thriving off watching jazz improvs so I think it's, specifically the problem is movement improv not improv.

JULIA RAE ANTONICK: There are other forms of movement improvs that are more popular, it might just be our context like contemporary art.

DAVID: So maybe next time you have the opportunity to go improv performance, whether it is here as part of the series, or another venue, maybe bring someone along who hasn't had. You don’t have to proselytize them but you can certainly invite them. Thank you.

Dictation by Suzy Grant

*If you recognize your line as an audience member and would like to break anonymity please contact: furyuayajp(at)gmail.com

photo (above right) courtesy of Lisa Gonzales

photo (middle right) courtesy of Julia Rae Antonick and Jonathan Meyer, photo by Virginia Montgomery

photo (bottom left) courtesy of Julia Mayer, photo by Nadia Oussenko

Dance & Performance Art

On Sunday, July 12th, 2009, EDE presented Dance & Performance Art, a program which presented four current works of artists from both fields: JulieAnn Graham, Rachel Thorne Germond, Britt Posmer, Marrisa Perel. The performance concluded with a post show talk prompted by the question below:

Dance & Performance Art: Many ways of exchanges are happening between performance art and dance. It seems like the boundary between the two is getting dimmer. Yet, originally, where are they from and why those two are somehow getting closer? EDE started to investigate why both seem to be related and the differences between the two, if we distinguish them clearly.

Dialogue Moderated by Joseph Ravens

JOSEPH RAVENS: Thank you everyone. Of course I want to thank Ayako for having me here and the church for putting on this event which I thought was amazing. This is the first time I have been to this series and I'm blown away. And thank you of course to the artists for presenting their work. My name is Joseph Ravens and I am a performance artist, or I identify as one I should say and I'm really glad to be here tonight because I think that I am constantly questioning the relationship between the established disciplines of not only dance, but dance, theater and visual arts and how they relate to performance art. Um, let;s introduce ourselves, or the artists introduce themselves, not everyone. For the first piece...

JULIE ANN: I'm Julie Ann Graham.

JOSEPH RAVENS: And I know your bio is basically in the program, uh, I'm curious actually if you wouldn't mind, starting with you, how, just a little bit, maybe just an overview of how you see the relationship between dance and performance art or how you fit into that relationship.

JULIE ANN: I feel personally I fit into it as an artist, as an improviser. Um, I'm starting to work at bringing in text and sound into my improvisation along with movement. So I feel like I'm sort of stepping over that present, being unclear of what I am doing and just being an improviser and that's what I did, the score I did tonight was open to sound and speaking which we sometimes did and we sometimes didn't so it just depended on the score.

JOSEPH: Great, and second piece over here.

BRIT POSMER: I'm Brit Posmer. I have a long history of dance work and... (Recording is inaudible for a moment) an opportunity to re-integrate the voice and the body in a way and to use some other forms of text and visual images, and pictures, and sculptures that use a breath and depth of expression that isn't available in dance when it is framed as just this very...movement.

JOSEPH: The third work.

RACHEL THORNE-GERMOND: Rachel Thorne-Germond. Let's see, I really identify as a choreographer, I do. People are always saying my work is theatrical or performance arty or, but really, I see movement as the engine of the work and then all this other stuff is just part of who I am. I have a background in visual arts, my parents are both painters, I have an MFA and a BFA in art. But I really identify, I don't see huge differences in dance or performance art that much.

JOSEPH: Okay

RACHEL: That's my perspective.

JOSEPH: and then, last.

MARISSA PEREL: Marissa, and I have always, I worked in New York for awhile as many different things at one time and I'm just now formally studying art at the Art Institute, getting my MFA. But I identify as a performance artist and a lot of the time I am working with a vocabulary that really does come from that history which is narrow in way, or it's not that it's narrow in a way. It's all encompassing but it's marginalized and often times it's disguised or seen as dance. I've been called a choreographer but I don't identify as one at all because I almost feel it is disrespectful to walk in and say that.

PART OF DISCUSSION IS CUT OFF

AUDIENCE #1: and I think that's kind of a way, there's this deflection of -isms that we use, current in the combination of dance and performance art. where we are seeing like the inability to

especially with pedestrians coming into modernity like, yeah all of

MARISSA: I just wanted to say one thing though, cause that went into a certain direction too that I worry about that. There's something about being, about making work from the body that brings these things together. Where if you're approaching something with technique or rigor, you're just, you're not gonna lose what grounds you in your body you know? And , yes if you've been a ballerina for fifteen years you don't get up and just start doing something else with your body when it's time for you to do that. Like you can't lose that. Like there's this, I mean that's really important about having a generosity about discussing making work from the body or something like that. Like it's valid to make a different kind of dance from the dance you know, and it's still a dance. It's valid to make, um a different kind of body thrashing if you're a performance artist who thrashes her body a lot., like some of us, and there's a practice there, there's a technique that you are trying to subvert progressively that just happens when you're a practicing artist for a long time or something like that. And then for me the question is like, well, uh you're not gonna lose this thing you've got, you have to keep on making it work. Whether it looks great or doesn't look great, whether it makes something great or something shitty. So how do you keep on making that engine go? And when does it subvert that thing or not and hey I just want to dance... or something like that.

AYAKO: Joseph, also ask the audience.

JOSEPH: Thoughts, observations about any of the things we've talked about?

ZAC WHITTENBERG: Well to a a lot of points I think what you guys have been saying earlier about semantics, is kind of at the crux of it for me anyway because as the genre distinctions disappear they're not reformed, right? You know, you don't have, I mean like you have sushi now and add from mashed potatoes to salsa. Like they're hard generalizations that once they go away they aren't usually re-inserted, or they are they aren't generally productive. You put the wall back up, so that to me is tied to semantics. So that, for me, is why it's important for somebody to say, I'm a choreographer, I'm a sound artist, or I'm doing this and this is... Because that remains as the only frame left and it tells you when you're seeing the work, when you're about to see the work, what am I about to look at? What is this person focusing on, you know, right? If I go to see somebody perform as a sound artist, then how they're walking through the space may not necessarily be germane to the work, that's not what I'm supposed to be looking at. Whereas if somebody is like, “Oh I'm doing a performance,” or like, “What I'm doing is performance art,” then like when they enter the space there could be, like you're saying Rachel, that there could be information embedded in the movement, whereas you know, a painter is not, the movement is making the art happen but it's not the quality of the movement or the information embedded in the movement not what happening.

MARISSA: It's so interesting because they do cross streams so much. People, most times need something to reference for their own comfort because it is really difficult for most people to enter into an unknown no matter what their experience. So even when you're talking about the painter, that painter may have been taking dance classes but never labeled himself a dancer and then suddenly, like their arm moves in a totally different way because of that brush. It's curious because it's a funny thing about labels even, I would be willing to bet if any of us were doing the work that we were doing. Like in one performance put one label and in another performance put another depending on the focus of that experience.

JOSEPH: But as a viewer I would view your work and possibly assess it based on that label you chose and I made a note for the very same thing today. Even when people are looking at my work, when theater critic review my work, I get horrible reviews, Oh, he didn't follow through with character arc and blah, blah, blah, blah, blah and all this crap that doesn't matter to me. Like I never tried to have a character arc, I don't care. So it's the same, I think that's are a really good point because um, yeah I like to be a little bit prepared for what I am going to see and what I should look for and look at and yeah, I think that's really important.

AUDIENCE #1: I think the character part, being careful with the semantics you're presenting through , your experience the way you set it up. Realize who you are performing for and the terms in which they're going to address it, in your experience, based on that. Who you're presenting for, in what situation under what terms

JOSEPH: I think it can only help the arts, like you guys putting on or performing or setting the stage for your work for us as an audience. Maybe think of something, this is open to everyone, how do you think venue affects the relationship between dance and performance art? Venue or environment, context? How do you think it affects that? I see a strong sort of thing (laughs) based on time primarily and the whole idea of a beginning and an end and this I find limiting. If you think of someone like uh, I murder his name, Tehching Hsieh and Linda Montano tied themselves together for a year or whatever, like you know, if you're in an environment where there's a viewer, someone mentioned generosity or something like that. If you know there's a viewer and you're performing for that viewer and the lights come up and you make an entrance and then it begins and they know when you're done and they clap and then leave. These are all things that all are very, to me they're important things, brackets or bookends to time-based creations and I find that limiting personally and I was wondering if anyone else had thought or observations on context of venue.

MARISSA: I was terrified to do this piece and it took me along time to figure out what it was that was going to happen because I really, I really like to have my work be the process of the work. So if I was going to be in here for eight hours and you came in here on the fourth hour, and you saw where I had gotten to, I'd feel like, Ah, you saw my work. But if you're seeing something I'm doing in fifteen or twenty minutes, you're seeing something but that's not really my preferred way of inhabiting the space or embodying a discipline or material. And it's a struggle for me because I started to make work in the context of dance where you do have fifteen minutes and it's at Judson Church and you know where the pews are and what the thing is, and if you're going to go up on the alter that's subversive and whatever you do. And for me right now, it's difficult to work with time that way. Uh, it's a type of performance that I don't necessarily identify with, however, you know I'm trying to understand how to work with that in the context of cliché and maybe my feeling of being cliché to do it as if a person can really be seen in that time.

JOSEPH: Anyone else on that idea? Let me see what my notes say.

RACHEL: I just feel like you have to be adaptable, I perform in all different kinds of situations. Nightclubs, burlesque clubs, churches, small downtown venues, large auditorium theaters, proscenium stages, we have to think about all of it. But I definitely think about what piece I'm showing in and what context it's in. On some level you can't just think about, Oh I'm just going to perform in churches, I guess you could (Laughter).

JOSEPH: No, but in a general way I know that when I'm at a venue, regardless of what it is I always have to think about the beginning and the end, how I'm going to make the entrance, how is the audience going to know when I am finished.

RACHEL: Definitely

JOSEPH: And personally, dealing with time, that is so frustrating.

RACHEL: You kind of got to set up camp

JOSEPH: If I had my way I would be like there long before, and I do in some performances, I'm there long before inhabiting the space. And similar to what you said, people come in and witness it and then go and I'm still there. But then that brings up a question of duration and punishment or flagellation or something, and the practicality of that.

AUDIENCE #2: Can I say something? I think performance art is more mobile because in some ways one if it's original intentions was about lack of artifice and so I think when you do a theater piece you have a structure of scenery or curtains and sort of prompts are given to the audience. So when you make a forest in a theater production, it's a full forest. So I think with performance art, it's identity is sort of about breaking that down. And saying I'm going to put a dowel rod in the middle of the room and now we're in a forest. So I think it's more mobile because a lot of it's original intentions were about breaking down this surface as well as making it accessible to more people. So I think we have symptomatic of people performing in more churches, burlesque venues, in bars and on the street because just what this medium is that you're working with lends itself to that in a certain way because of its roots.

JOSEPH: Lack of artifice, by the way. Is a perfect way to encapsulate the whole spiel I did about context I just picked up that. Exactly, yeah and there's a whole school of performance art too that would automatically, would sort of shun anyone who has some sort of artifice or polish. There are festivals or whole genres that are, if you even had a smacking of a costume or something they would be like

AUDIENCE #2: But then there are people like Matthew Barney and if you look into any sort of performance art collective, or encyclopedia you would see Matthew Barney there and his work is beyond gallant, it's beyond spectacle, it's a whole other thing.

AUDIENCE #3: And also video which is bringing in a whole different audience as well and I don't know. I feel like performance art, and I don't know if anyone else feels this way, like I really try to focus on this idea of giving a gift, even if it has a plot but giving a gift and provoking their thoughts.

JOSEPH: Yes, provocative elements are an important part of performance art as well and you remind me also of structure, um. Or I'm reminded of structure, as we talk about task and ritual and dance has maybe more of a reliance on structure. I made notes and just words. Metaphor, it's relationship to performance art and dance, the presence of metaphor. Semantics, uh... I think performance is more encompassing of more, a bunch of mediums. Oh, this was a thought I had, the struggle or the quest for the new. You were reminding me of this a little bit but I think this was one of the things that is sort of making the boundaries between mediums fall apart. Quest for the new in art and I think this is true for every area of life. But you talked about making it, even for yourself, as an artist, how can I make this fresh and what's different or new about it? I think that's one area where dancers are thinking how can I make this fresh or interesting. Any thoughts about the quest for the new? Sometimes I feel like I'm answering my own questions, I'm sorry (laughs).

BRIT: One thing I can say, well a couple different things which have been talked about is when we talk about integrity or earnestness in the work. Another is when we talk about the stripping of artifice apparently makes something more real, which I, for me, I begin to question seeing this constant rejection of any kind of technical history, or structure or practice, uh and its assumption that inherently makes it more authentic. I think it's sometimes one's way of deluding oneself as an artist, and a way of creating yet another practice to hide in, you know, my practice now is not to have a practice. You're in the same trap, so I think, and also this idea of constantly striving to new or to make something new, then as an artist, you're always striving to the new. Is that new, is it challenging, is it pushing your work to different places? Is it stretching you, stretching your boundaries of the form, is it providing a different experience for the audience or is it just what you hit on, it's the next new thing, it's the next new thing, which is really symptomatic of our culture in a lot of ways and so it's interesting because I, for me, sort of blurring the different expressions for me is interesting and not so much, what is the next new thing but the fact that the new can actually be inhabiting something familiar. It can be inhabiting a space, a technique, a way of working, but inhabiting it so fully with the totality of oneself, that it becomes as though you're experiencing it for the first time, and in that sense, a technique that is hundreds of years old can be instantly new, can be instantly fresh, can be instantly engaging. Whereas something you chase after, looking for the novelty become dead and banal and just repetitive.

JOSEPH: I agree, I think those are all excellent points and and I hope that all of us are sort of presenting our work, am I saying this right, qualitatively because I have a lot of personal opinions definitely about how polished a work is, how refined, a sense of discipline and how it relates to my craft and the quest for something new. You know I think a lot of our practice and development as an artist is going through possible phases and now a little later in my life I'm thinking about who I am making art and hopefully those of us who are making art are asking these questions and where an impulse comes from and what we are doing with it. Um, I'm personally finding lately that I'm happiest with a piece when I just have an impulse and then make it and I try not to think of, yeah is this new? And is this fresh? Will the uh, Art Institute folks, will they like it? Will the theater critics like it, will whoever like it? You know because I think you're hitting on a very good point, it has to come down to you as an artist and your relationship to the thing that you're making.

AUDIENCE #4: I had a comment to what you said, I think each practice and discipline has it's own stake, like comparing to music...And when it comes to contemporary time, the question is why is there a need for it? I think the contemporary artist it comes down to very personal perspectives, like, I'm from a different country, like very different background so why I am present here? Why am I doing this, what is, I think for each one, what is the meaning for me to do this? From my perspective I think it comes down to very personal boundaries, um because it is a time when we can use different disciplines, are open to different mediums, different technologies, and I think it comes to what we're trying to show the audience. Or again, in that sense, who I would like to invite as audience. That's what I think.

JOSEPH: I can't tell you how thrilled I am with all of you and on the topic of new, I think new to a dancer, as a performance artist I see a lot of stuff and what a theater person thinks is crazy and wacky, I think, my god I saw that in a 4-D class years ago so the new isn't always but I think this quest for new is expanding so much that just the pre-established disciplines are starting to accommodate technology and movement and things in all these different ways and I think there can be good things coming from that.

AUDIENCE #5: I just wanted to add two things and one of the things I'm noticing it's so amazing to hear everyone talking, I'm a dance artist but um, one thing I'm noticing is everything seems to be in terms of Western and it's very interesting to me because I don't primarily work out of Western forms first so I think like a lot of the juxtaposition between performance art and dance is an American conception. It's not even necessarily European so I think the way that we juxtapose that in the United States is way different and I think just to contextualize that within our current moment, you know, what Judson came out of, what was happening in Europe at the same time is useful I think in answering these questions and adding to the discussion.

JOSEPH: Yeah, we've added a lot to the discussion depending on where we are in the world.

AUDIENCE #5: Yeah and I think one of the comments that Peggy Phelon, I don't know if any of you have heard of her work, her new corpus is on all these questions, what's the difference between dance and performance art and what are these boundaries? And she's kind of trying to trouble all of them in terms of, what is presence, what is absence, what/when is the creation of the new? How is stillness used and what is the potential. She is looking mostly at the Judson work and seeing how each artist was challenging different boundaries and how they went off into different trajectories. So it's really, I don't know if it's been published yet but it's really interesting.

JOSEPH: Yeah. Well I think we're all warm and sort of going in circles. So thank you all so much.

Dictation by Suzy Grant

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photo Britt Posmer by Christine Tenneholtz