Energy is real.
Energy is language.
“Asking Motion” “Thinking Motion”
How can we re-illuminate the real –ness of energy in dance? How can we recognize physical intention or physical actions with the same level of clarity that we recognize choreographic steps?
(In Dance)
What we see is not so much the physical steps and sequences of steps, as building blocks that exist separate from the body – instead we see the human being as their true selves, in ‘thought motion’. The bodies movements can be seen as residual effects of choice making and intention. The body becomes a medium to the content – similar to how linseed oil carries the raw pigment for a painting.
Rather than objectify dance as something that is outside the human being which must be mastered, we instead witness the state of a human being living within the moments of the dance context. In this sense, dance becomes the record of the human experience. We become the vessels, to and for, our own expression.
(For Performance)
We practice physical and mental skills that enable us to negotiate the variables of an ever shifting circumstance. We work with an expressed intention of articulating our experience that is only relative to our capacity to perceive through our senses. We work with developing our awareness of inner perception, such as being conscious of our ever shifting impulses to move, and practice exercising free will to either respond or not respond to these impulses. We are also working with perceiving the immediate external environment that we choose to perform within, as well as any conceptual -criteria that we deem to work with.
The performer is applying all that is perceived from their life and history, their desires, prejudices, fears, tastes, intentions, aesthetics and abilities - smacked up against the moment of the now. Also, taking into account the responsibility of the performer toward their audience. With a greater range of freedom of expression, comes greater responsibility to be sensitive to the use of that freedom. Remembering always about being a host to your guests – assuming that there is a conscious desire to communicate and not abuse.
If a performer is interested in connecting to their audience, the audience needs to know what the parameters are and what is expected of them. This is basic psychology, if you want somebody to trust you and follow you, you have to make the feel comfortable. This has nothing to do with content, but everything to do with communication. Otherwise you end up with a passive audience feeling bewildered, objectifying the performers in a state of confusion and distrust. Which unfortunately is an all to common experience in dance today.
How do we continue to further this language of communication within the performance environment – human to human in real time and in real space.
