I have been cherishing these longer days. Daylight trails on till about 7PM now, and for the first time this year (That I can recall) the morning sky at 5:40 am was active-blue this morning. There is only a window of a few weeks, I think, that the sky is active blue at that time in the morning. I could be making this whole bit of bullshit up, but I swear I saw and felt it today. There is something about the shade of blue that has momentum, wild depth, and clarity. I've never seen an ocean besides the Atlantic, but I swear, this blue of the sky is the straight up copyrighted blue hue that the marketers of resorts in The Bahamas and the Caribbean use to represent the Pacific on their brochures and commercials. Whether its true or not...I don't know. But this sky is incredible. There are no clouds and the blue is like something you could send up your open hand surging into and pull out your hand with a fistful of diamonds and treasure. This sky is still by faith because there is not a cloud in it that can act as a true indicator of whether the sky is actually moving, creeping along at its usual pace, or not. The sky is in endless motion by faith as well. The fact that it is clear with no clouds or blemishes, again makes it impossible to reference its movement against anything else, but the color of the sky alone assures you that it is moving...surrounding you, stretching out, coiling back, exponentially expanding.
The ant on the sidewalk stops looking in front of him for one second and lifts the "head" part of his segmented body to peer up at you. He sees you: the bottoms of your earlobes, the black caverns of your nostrils, the feathery jutting out of your eyelashes...BUT all these shapes and forms are in counterpoint with the background...the active blue sky. For one second the ant wishes his body alignment were so that he could always peer upwards seeing figures in relief, enveloped by the blue sky. Just kidding...the ant doesn't wish that at all cause ant's can't wish things. Plus, the ant went to Art School and has a bookshelf full of the works of Romantic Poets: Blake, Shelley, Thoreau and can get his fill of lovely images whenever he wants to. The ant knows rivers, trees, leaves, nature...The ant looks forward to Spring. The coming of Spring and the active blue sky cause him to scurry across the sidewalk a bit more quickly than normal. He dodges crumbs and shards of glass and wads of chewing gum. He's not sure where he is going, but he moves with a quickness.
Monday, April 13, 2009
Monday, April 6, 2009
Headlong/ Tere O'Connor Workshop
Tere O'Connor has been working with Headlong Dance Theater for the past year or so. Tere is a choreographer in NYC. I have taken a week workshop a few summers ago with him, but have sadly not seen any of his works. He has very thought-out views/theories/ideas about what dancing is and what choreography is. Headlong shared some of these working theories with us in this weekend's workshop. This is my attempt to make some sense of it all for myself as I reiterate what I think I may have learned/become interested in on Saturday.
Choreography is like science in that we use something/anything as a starting point. Then we do research on it. We ask questions that have yet to be asked, or that we think have yet to be asked, or that have been asked already but we hope that they will manifest new truths or untruths or truth-looking things that as a culture and as a generation we can put some faith into and believe in.
Choreographers, like scientists, should be honest in their researching process. Tere seems to be saying that maybe we don't need preconcieved notions of dances or concepts for dances or themes for dances...that all of these things are better left unknown and un-worried about at the begining of a dance making process. We shouldn't worry about what is good, or what people will get or not get, or what is strong or what works. We should simply worry about asking questions to delve deeper into what interests us. Our explorations of those questions doesn't have to be good or interesting or ground-breaking either; it just has to be curious and real. Through this we can figure out what the "it-ness" of what we are making is and ask more questions to explore that It-ness. He calls these repeated bouts of research "it-erations".
With all this said: this is not the be all and end all of the choreographic process. It is one tool that can be used very strictly or could work to simply get a choreographer on a certain track with the creation of movement and to help him/her resist imposing qualitative judgment on his/her process and to resist his/her urge to "make a dance" instead of simply being curious enough to let the dance "make itself".
I want to use these ideas to keep going with Ashley and my duet, SomeAnyOverItch. It actually relates quite nicely to my original concept of adding layers to Nothing. There again though, notice that I actually did go into the dance with a "concept" that ended up censoring/influencing/pressuring the movement that emerged as the duet. There was always the question of "How does this movement or this section relate to my concept???" But why am I so precious about my concept anyway? I am not in sales or marketing or advertising...I am not selling chocolate ice cream cones to lactose intolerant kids! I am not selling anything because believe me...if I was, I wouldn't be sitting at the gym at work right now, I'd be home counting my millions of dollars (all in 20's) (packed neatly into 3 black briefcases). So why do I cling onto a concept? Probably because I don't trust that at the "end" of the process, I will know what the heck is going on if I don't have some kind of starting point. Ash and I have many starting points though. We have been playing since september with contact and giving and taking impulses, and improvising, and being sincere in a performance, and creating imagined space, and charging fictitious imaginations.
I'd like to think of an assignment for rehearsal tonight...something to slow us down and make us take the time to do some research. Maybe do a strict it-eration thing individually like we did in the workshop but then add something. We have so much duet/contact stuff to play with. Maybe we start with that and one person does research on a sliver of some aspect that interests them. The other person's score is simply to react. The researcher can give the reactor some physical or verbal cues. If they use verbal it must be loud, resolute, and brief. something like "Press into me harder" "Keep pressing" "STOP" "DO THAT AGAIN".
Or maybe we should do the strict iteration thing and see ..."hey what is leading us into contact anyway? Maybe there is nothing there...maybe that is forced. Hmm...I guess we will have to wait and see!
Choreography is like science in that we use something/anything as a starting point. Then we do research on it. We ask questions that have yet to be asked, or that we think have yet to be asked, or that have been asked already but we hope that they will manifest new truths or untruths or truth-looking things that as a culture and as a generation we can put some faith into and believe in.
Choreographers, like scientists, should be honest in their researching process. Tere seems to be saying that maybe we don't need preconcieved notions of dances or concepts for dances or themes for dances...that all of these things are better left unknown and un-worried about at the begining of a dance making process. We shouldn't worry about what is good, or what people will get or not get, or what is strong or what works. We should simply worry about asking questions to delve deeper into what interests us. Our explorations of those questions doesn't have to be good or interesting or ground-breaking either; it just has to be curious and real. Through this we can figure out what the "it-ness" of what we are making is and ask more questions to explore that It-ness. He calls these repeated bouts of research "it-erations".
With all this said: this is not the be all and end all of the choreographic process. It is one tool that can be used very strictly or could work to simply get a choreographer on a certain track with the creation of movement and to help him/her resist imposing qualitative judgment on his/her process and to resist his/her urge to "make a dance" instead of simply being curious enough to let the dance "make itself".
I want to use these ideas to keep going with Ashley and my duet, SomeAnyOverItch. It actually relates quite nicely to my original concept of adding layers to Nothing. There again though, notice that I actually did go into the dance with a "concept" that ended up censoring/influencing/pressuring the movement that emerged as the duet. There was always the question of "How does this movement or this section relate to my concept???" But why am I so precious about my concept anyway? I am not in sales or marketing or advertising...I am not selling chocolate ice cream cones to lactose intolerant kids! I am not selling anything because believe me...if I was, I wouldn't be sitting at the gym at work right now, I'd be home counting my millions of dollars (all in 20's) (packed neatly into 3 black briefcases). So why do I cling onto a concept? Probably because I don't trust that at the "end" of the process, I will know what the heck is going on if I don't have some kind of starting point. Ash and I have many starting points though. We have been playing since september with contact and giving and taking impulses, and improvising, and being sincere in a performance, and creating imagined space, and charging fictitious imaginations.
I'd like to think of an assignment for rehearsal tonight...something to slow us down and make us take the time to do some research. Maybe do a strict it-eration thing individually like we did in the workshop but then add something. We have so much duet/contact stuff to play with. Maybe we start with that and one person does research on a sliver of some aspect that interests them. The other person's score is simply to react. The researcher can give the reactor some physical or verbal cues. If they use verbal it must be loud, resolute, and brief. something like "Press into me harder" "Keep pressing" "STOP" "DO THAT AGAIN".
Or maybe we should do the strict iteration thing and see ..."hey what is leading us into contact anyway? Maybe there is nothing there...maybe that is forced. Hmm...I guess we will have to wait and see!
Monday, March 30, 2009
OH BALLS
If you wikipedia "Ball Pit" this is what they tell you...
A ball pit, also known as a ball pond or ball pool, is a pit, usually rectangular and padded, filled with small hollow plastic, multi-colored balls. It is typically employed as a recreation or exercise for small children. Some ball pits are shallow and only suitable for "wading", while others are deeper and may be used for "swimming".
Ballpits are often found in nurseries, carnivals, fun centers, amusement parks, fast food restaurants, and large video arcades. Chuck E. Cheese removed their ballpits due to safety concerns and becuase the pits were a drain on resources, since children would often steal individual balls till the pits were far below capacity, and thus, unuseable.
While ballpits are commonly thought of as a child's play-thing, there are some that can accommodate adults. Many ball pits have been removed because they are thought of as unsanitary because it is hard to clean each individual ball and because unsafe objects can collect at the bottom of the pit. Beginning in the late 1990's, many urban legends have surfaced saying that kids have died or been critically injured due to poisonous snakes and hypodermic needles at the bottom of the ballpit. China Meiville's short story, The Ball Room, is a horror story centered around a ballpit in an Ikea-like furniture store.
Wow! I love it. I think it was at the last Mascher meeting I attended, when someone mentioned having a room full of balls for a fundraiser party event and the whole thing got me remembering the loveliness of ballpits. I used to love swimming around in those sweaty awesome balls. It was extra fun in those swishy jogging suits I used to wear when I was 5. I'd have a tummy full of Chicken McNuggets, milk, and Animal Crakers. I loved those moments where your feet clearly touched the bottom and then you would try to walk and do one of those trip-steps and sink shoulder or neck deep in that crazy pit of goodness. I can remember ignoring my mom as she stood at the netting surrounding the pit telling me it was time to leave. I remember thinking that the likeliness of her coming in to get me was slim to none so...whatever. Then I thought about how awful the car ride home would be so I waded/swam on out.
The hypodermic needle thing cracks me up because just last night, PHA was rehearsing at Mascher and we heard the icecream truck outside at 9PM. We were all like, "who buys ice cream this late at night?...until we were enlightened by Laura that the truck sells both ice cream and drugs...woa! And the fact that someone wrote a horror story about a ballpit is pretty great too. It makes me think, How great would it be to do a Fringe piece in a moon bounce? and the moon bounce would maybe deflate as the piece went on. Or in inflatable swimming pools and the pools deflate as the piece goes on. The audience sits in baby swimming pools. Or inflatable rafts or innertubes that deflate as the piece goes on. You'd hear that"pssssttttttttt" of the air coming out the whole time. It'd be like one long infinitely lasting, yet controlled, fart that is made collectively by the whole audience. And I, for one, could perform much better if I knew that the whole audience was farting throughout the whole performance. (You know how they say, to cure stage fright you should picture the audience naked or taking a dump??? well this is a new and better twist on it).
So balls and farting...Happy Monday kids!
A ball pit, also known as a ball pond or ball pool, is a pit, usually rectangular and padded, filled with small hollow plastic, multi-colored balls. It is typically employed as a recreation or exercise for small children. Some ball pits are shallow and only suitable for "wading", while others are deeper and may be used for "swimming".
Ballpits are often found in nurseries, carnivals, fun centers, amusement parks, fast food restaurants, and large video arcades. Chuck E. Cheese removed their ballpits due to safety concerns and becuase the pits were a drain on resources, since children would often steal individual balls till the pits were far below capacity, and thus, unuseable.
While ballpits are commonly thought of as a child's play-thing, there are some that can accommodate adults. Many ball pits have been removed because they are thought of as unsanitary because it is hard to clean each individual ball and because unsafe objects can collect at the bottom of the pit. Beginning in the late 1990's, many urban legends have surfaced saying that kids have died or been critically injured due to poisonous snakes and hypodermic needles at the bottom of the ballpit. China Meiville's short story, The Ball Room, is a horror story centered around a ballpit in an Ikea-like furniture store.
Wow! I love it. I think it was at the last Mascher meeting I attended, when someone mentioned having a room full of balls for a fundraiser party event and the whole thing got me remembering the loveliness of ballpits. I used to love swimming around in those sweaty awesome balls. It was extra fun in those swishy jogging suits I used to wear when I was 5. I'd have a tummy full of Chicken McNuggets, milk, and Animal Crakers. I loved those moments where your feet clearly touched the bottom and then you would try to walk and do one of those trip-steps and sink shoulder or neck deep in that crazy pit of goodness. I can remember ignoring my mom as she stood at the netting surrounding the pit telling me it was time to leave. I remember thinking that the likeliness of her coming in to get me was slim to none so...whatever. Then I thought about how awful the car ride home would be so I waded/swam on out.
The hypodermic needle thing cracks me up because just last night, PHA was rehearsing at Mascher and we heard the icecream truck outside at 9PM. We were all like, "who buys ice cream this late at night?...until we were enlightened by Laura that the truck sells both ice cream and drugs...woa! And the fact that someone wrote a horror story about a ballpit is pretty great too. It makes me think, How great would it be to do a Fringe piece in a moon bounce? and the moon bounce would maybe deflate as the piece went on. Or in inflatable swimming pools and the pools deflate as the piece goes on. The audience sits in baby swimming pools. Or inflatable rafts or innertubes that deflate as the piece goes on. You'd hear that"pssssttttttttt" of the air coming out the whole time. It'd be like one long infinitely lasting, yet controlled, fart that is made collectively by the whole audience. And I, for one, could perform much better if I knew that the whole audience was farting throughout the whole performance. (You know how they say, to cure stage fright you should picture the audience naked or taking a dump??? well this is a new and better twist on it).
So balls and farting...Happy Monday kids!
Monday, March 23, 2009
my mind is completely ADHD right now
Well I worked at the gym for 9.5 hours today...plus I worked out for an extra hour. 10.5 hours in the same place (other than places such as: my bed, a hot tub full of floating candles and rose petals, an all-you-can-eat free brunch buffet with free endless Bloody Mary's and Mimosas, or a tropical beach or oasis) is WAY too long to spend in one place. My brain feels a bit rotted from sitting in that office doing...um...nothing. Pure nothing! I love how I justify it to myself by thinking, "In this economy, you know you really need to work every single job opportunity that comes your way!!! Make that money Christina".
I don't always think like this, but lately I've had a lot of unpredictable expenses: my AFFA Group Fitness certification (yes... come take my Jane Fonda tribute spandex aerobics class when I start teaching classes..kidding), the money to pay the 1st and last month rent and security deposit of the new place that Vince and I will find and move into as of August, and the price of any Summer travels, dance workshops, or time off work that I look forward to taking. ( I may do a dance workshop in NYC and in nowheresville New England at EarthDance.) But anyway, I don't know if this is an economic phenomenon that I am discovering ( i'm sure its not) but I find myself thinking about penny-pinching way more lately and pretending to take measures to be cheaper and more frugal than I already was, but I think in reality I am just squandering my money at the same rate that I did before. I am putting more of my paychecks in the bank...way more, but then by the end of the week, I find myself going to an ATM, getting some money out, drinking PBR out or wine at home, satisfying my cravings with Taco Riendo (which is not super cheap...its just in a neighborhood that makes it seem like it should be super cheap). This could also be due to the fact that in the past weekend I have been trying to get my mind off certain amounts of shit...and by shit I mean thoughts about where my life is going and what my future holds and why all men should be shot (k...that is me exaggerating and being overdramatic). But I don't understand men at all: the one's that aren't awkward are either taken, platonically interested and nothing more, or fall under one of the nine-million types of guys that cause me to run in the other direction. Or they aren't any of these things, but they treat my like crap at times and are flaky. Anyway...that was my complaining for the day, and now I am going to bed!
Wednesday, March 18, 2009
thank you sun!
Well today is gorgeous. I can feel Spring.
Waking up and getting my lazy ass to the gym at 5:45 every morning just got exponentially easier (if the weather stays like this).
This weather makes me want to sit outside and drink coffee. It makes me want to skip down the street west side story-style. It makes me want to play my music REALLY LOUD. It makes me want to go in the park and pretend to read a book while actually people-watching and trying not to judge the other folks that are out enjoying this fine day. Like the hipster bike messenger kids all lined up on the cement barriers in Rittenhouse...they always have their big shoulder bags. I assume they are just big enough to hold a vegan sandwich, two 40 oz.'s, and a kidnapped toddler. That is why they carry them around I truly believe. But it is a beautiful day, and I should not judge them. I should only feel slightly sorry for the kidnapped toddler who is crammed inside their bag and can't see the sunshine and is inhaling the moist sweaty and plasticy smelling air of the interior. He/she couldn't scream if he/she wanted to because the chilled 40oz.'s are crammed on either side of the child's face so his/her jaw is frozen shut. This ensures that the child won't be tempted to nibble on the vegan sandwich as well (ah...dual purpose...lovely).
Where are these children's parents? Why aren't they storming the Oprah show...tissues in hands and tears on cheeks...why? Why aren't they calling the cops and screaming into the receiver..."But its URGENT!!!!!! My Little Johnny/Sally went missing on his/her way to school this morning. He/she is NOWHERE TO BE FOUND! HE/SHE NEVER CAME HOME! PLEASE. OH GOD PLEASE HELP!"
No.
The moms are at their daily yoga. They focus on their inhales that tickle the small hair follicles in their nasal passages. They say things like "ummmmm" and "shivasanasana". They twist themselves in positions named after pooping and screwing animals. They work hard to twist into these positions. They notice stretch marks on their stomachs when their lycra-cotton blend yoga tops ride up as they twist into "squatting tarantula". Towards the end of their class they do poses called "Child's Pose" and "Happy Baby". They think to themselves..."inhale ah how profound to be like a posing child exhale ah and how satisfying to lay supine like a very very happy baby." They think back to when they were babies and when they were children. They remember suckling on bottles and being cradled in their housekeepers' arms. They remember posing for family photos, but never quite posing long enough for the photographer to actually snap the picture or even for their mothers and fathers to find their rightful places in the family portrait tableau. Yes, the moms think of all these lovely things during their daily yoga practice, and the whole thing culminates in them nodding prayerfully and saying, "Namamaste". They say it and think, "oh how clever...we spend time stretching like babies and then say Na-MAMA-ste" at the end of class...We thank our earth mother...Mother Nature! Yes...thank you mother nature on this beauteous day. Thank you mother nature for the sunshine. Thank you mother nature for your blessings!"
The moms jet out of their yoga studio. They flag a cab to Trader Joes. The exit the cab upon arrival, tip the cabby 10 dollars, and shut the cab door while simultaneously taking a full wiff of the sweet smelling Spring city air. They rush into Trader Joes, maneuver their high heels down the aisles, and throw all of their Johnny's/Sally's favorite snacks into their cart. Like on autopilot they grab for peanut butter, macaroni and cheese, tortilla chips, baby carrots, and chocolate soy milk. They think about food pyramids and recipes that they plan to steal from Rachel Ray and her 30 minute meals. These moms are thinking about so many things all at once. They hear their cellphones beep, fresh with new text messages, but they don't have time to check them. The 20 year old nannies who watch their children after school are always texting them nervously saying things like, "Is Johnny allowed to have three Oreos for snack today? He says you always let him do that. lol." or "Sally has a really runny nose today. Can I use toilet paper to wipe it cause I think you guys are out of tissues. lol". The moms roll their eyes when they hear their phones beep and continue shopping. They think about what a calming effect their yoga practice has had on them. They think about the fact that there is no emergency that can't wait until they get home around 7:30 PM. It will be just like every other day. Little Johnny and Sally will be just fine.
Holy crap...I have no idea why this beautiful day inspired this super dark bit of fiction, but it did. Woa...sorry for the spontaneous and morbid story that I just pulled out of my ass.
Tuesday, March 3, 2009
Sue me...I'm on a poem kick.
Last night, 3/2/09, Pink Hair Affair did a few improv score thingys at National Mechanics for a fundraiser cabaret for Mascher Space. Clear packaging tape came to my artistic rescue for probably about the 20th time. We handed out bar napkins with haikus taped on them. The haikus were amazingly fun to write, and I think that some dreary day in winter should be made National Haiku Day. Everyone would have to wear clothing with his/her own personalized haikus, they would also have to change their facebook status to a haiku...and write haikus on napkins, they would even have to speak in haikus (within reason...we wouldn't want anyone geeking out too much!) But it wouldn't hurt anyone to pass the Mcdonalds worker a post-it saying:
I'd like a burger
with pickles, ketchup, onions
and that special sauce!
We handed out some blank napkins and pens and egged people in the bar on to write their own haikus. We took three home. I kind of like them. They are all semi-related to the events of the cabaret and the night in general!
Lazy transvestite
Wearing a blond wig poorly
Maybe dress like Cher?
Why the pink hair, babes?
Do the curtains match the drapes?
No worry, I'm gay.
I escape through you
Like open French breeze-way doors.
Its drafty in here.
Here is my final haiku response to the ones that we got:
The drag queen was bad.
Like watching a trainwreck. No?
But who is to judge?
Pink wigs make us fun.
Its a gimmick we can comb,
exploit, then remove.
Don't catch pneumonia.
And don't catch an S.T.D!
Asshole, it just snowed!
I'd like a burger
with pickles, ketchup, onions
and that special sauce!
We handed out some blank napkins and pens and egged people in the bar on to write their own haikus. We took three home. I kind of like them. They are all semi-related to the events of the cabaret and the night in general!
Lazy transvestite
Wearing a blond wig poorly
Maybe dress like Cher?
Why the pink hair, babes?
Do the curtains match the drapes?
No worry, I'm gay.
I escape through you
Like open French breeze-way doors.
Its drafty in here.
Here is my final haiku response to the ones that we got:
The drag queen was bad.
Like watching a trainwreck. No?
But who is to judge?
Pink wigs make us fun.
Its a gimmick we can comb,
exploit, then remove.
Don't catch pneumonia.
And don't catch an S.T.D!
Asshole, it just snowed!
Thursday, February 26, 2009
SomeAnyOverItch
"SomeAnyOverItch" is a duet for Ashley Wood and myself that we are showing for the first time at Studio 34 on Saturday, Feb. 28th @ Current Series. The show starts at 8 and is $5. There are lots of great dance shows that night, so be sure to make it to at least one of them...otherwise the dance fairy of bad karma will be out to get you.
Here is a poem/text that I like to think of as holding hands with the duet. They go together, but are hopefully not dependent on each other. Any feedback on the text or the piece would be amazing. (gesualdic@gmail.com)
This stage is nothing.
Imagine this stage as nothing.
Something is just Nothing playing dress up:
glitzy baubles dangling from Nothing's earlobes
a gaudy shawl draped round Nothing's neck.
Nothing.
So bare, so rare, so very hard to come by.
The words "so" and "very" for example
are two shiny beads on the necklace in Nothing's dress up bin.
We have tendencies to dress up the page, dress up the stage, the space
We dress up the space: so pure, so empty.
(ah see how I use two adjectives when one would do)
We tend to make somethings, add layers.
We use repetition over over over over over over over over over over over over over over over over over writing it so many times over and over till the word "over" looks like it is spelled wrong: so foreign, so queer.
And then there are those layers we add: those layers of controversy, of political incorrectness
Those layers we construct and have no chance of backing away from,
no chance of them not itching like an Irish wool sweater up against a bare breast.
Even in the icy winter,
even then you'd itch and itch and itch itch itch itch itch itch itch itch itch itch itch itch and itch and itch your bare breast so many times that you'd lose confidence in the English language and the way it spells its four letter, queer little words and the way the violent actions they denote leave your breast red and raw.
So Nothing plays dress up quite often
tries desperately in hopes of becoming something, anything, overthing, itchthing.
It layers itself, plays at being so absurd, so bizarre.
Nothing squeezes its feet into paten leather, 6 inch pumps, walks over a sewer grate, gets its heel stuck...
The heel breaks.
Nothing falls, exposing, OH GOD, exposing its somethings, anythings, overthings, itchthings.
No one sees Nothing fall.
No one is around.
No one hears it.
No one cares.
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