dance journal/hk Feb 2015 issue
https://thestandnews.com/art/dance-democratization/
“Democracy” is Hong Kong’s keyword of the
year 2014. “Democracy” is a fragile word because it dies with attempts on its
own definition. It is also a slippery word because it invites imagination and
interpretation of all sorts. To me, one can almost place “democracy” and
“dance” in the same cognitive bucket, the former being an idea and the latter
being its expression. If democracy absolves standard of practice from one
single source of authority, if it requires courage to openness and admission of
differences to propagate, I propose that “dance democratization” has been
diligently put into action in two works shown during i-Dance (HK) 2014 in
December.
Who makes dance? What qualifies a
dance-maker? CURE by Irish dance
artist Fearghus Ó Conchúir is an one-hour performance made
up of six parts, each created by an individual who may possess dance
background, or may not. Ó Conchúir stitches these
parts together – seamlessly, without sacrificing any trace of the creator’s
distinctive touch. One can easily tell one part from another because they are
so different, yet they exist peacefully alongside one another like fetuses sharing
the womb. If choreography is about the placement of the
body in the space and each of us manifests our existence through this vessel
named “body”, it is just natural that everyone has his version of choreography.
If dance-making is about epitomizing the body as a medium of communication, this
is what the performance is about.
“What does it take to recover” is the
question behind the CURE concept. The
dance-makers investigated the emotions they went through when they fell, and
how they picked themselves up. Ó Conchúir, the interpreter
of these emotions, demonstrates his powerful expressiveness with his intense
concentration. He thinks before he moves, he moves what he thinks. The “dance” is Ó Conchúir’s
meticulous control of his muscles and joints. The
“movements” are everything that proves his presence, from his breathing to his jetés.
The contemplation and the honesty are what
draw the audiences to him. In the first part of the performance, Ó Conchúir
moves around in a square box of light by the left side of the stage. His manner
is carefree, his shifts jumpy. It is a sad view to watch him swing his long
limbs in his grey tracksuit: it is as if you see a child playing happily inside
a cell, not knowing he has been deprived of a world much bigger than this. In
another part, Ó Conchúir sits on the floor at the center of a circle of chairs.
He slowly pushes the chairs away from him with his legs. The noise of the legs
of the chairs scratching the floor is the muted scream of Ó Conchúir’s, whose
over-stretched chin muscles fail to make any sound. In yet another part, the
naked Ó Conchúir kneels on a piece of silky fabric. With ritual-like dedication
he flexes and relaxes his muscles, sweat rolls down as he breathes in and out
to fuel his seemingly subtle movements. Finally, he lays face-down on the
fabric, allowing the sweat to stain the piece, leaving marks of his existence.
If democracy is about the
respect for participation, Tian Gebing’s first-ever choreography, Non-Fat-Thug-Waste, is a nice experiment of the cross-breeding of a dancer-maker. Tian is
the founder of Zhi Laohu (The Paper Tiger), a
theatre group based in Beijing known for its subversiveness. Trained as a stage
director, Tian just knows enough about stage performance for him to denounce
the reliance on the script, or verbal delivery. His choreography is to place
two powerful bodies, those of Gong Zhonghui’s and Wang Yanan’s, into the space
and interact with time, that is, to move, either in connection to or against
the verbal instructions given by Tian. Both Gong and Wang are seasoned dancers,
but in very different ways. Throughout the performance, the skinny Gong repeatedly
throws herself to the floor or dashes from one end of the stage to the other,
hardly catching her breath. Wang, plump and sexy as a Dunhuang dancer,
elegantly moves her wrists and fingers and head, making a step only once in a
while. The “dance” actually takes place on her face: her facial expression
changes from a smile to a frown then to a sob then to a scream while her
fingers twist and her wrist joints rotate. She makes up her share of the
“moves” towards the end of the performance when she ties the end of her braid
to a wire hanging from the roof. Then she slowly walks away from the wire until
it pulls her braid so hard that you can see her hair standing on ends on her
scalp. She talks, she laughs, she cries while she walks, in silence. When she cannot
go any further without tearing a piece off her scalp, she all of a sudden regains
her composure, releases her braid and stands still.
To me Tian has no doubt
made a dance. He has demonstrated his ability to identify the power in two
bodies and through them deliver his contemplation on the nature of performance:
What is it? Who decides what happens on the stage? What makes an audience
listen? He doesn’t design movements, he probably cannot. But he respects
movements and the bodies that make them, and more importantly, he believes in
the instantaneous expression by the powerful bodies he has identified. He
creates the space for honesty to flow, from the performers to the audiences.
Postmodern dance-makers have been expanding
the possibility of stage representations by working with artists across of art
forms and applying multi-media elements such installations, sound, video,
computer applications, and other you-name-it. In these two performances we see
“multi-media” being an adjective of the dancer-makers’ background instead of
the accumulation of stage techniques that take attention away from the body. If
democratization embraces openness, it invites challenges and new ways of doing.
The aesthetic lies in the forte of one’s urge to communicate, in how the
dance-makers and their interpreters together devote their utmost attention and
“training” to the body as the ultimate medium of manifestation.
In 2014 we practiced the choreography of
placing our bodies where they should be for causes we believe in. We witnessed the
power of the body’s presence in the space. We saw actions growing into movements.
We saw dance.
In review
are:
CURE in the i-Dance 2014 “Solo &
Improvisation” series, Dec 12, 2014 at the Studio Theatre, Hong Kong Cultural
Center; Non-Fat-Thug-Waste in the i-Dance 2014 “New Dance
Platform” series, Dec 19, 2014 at the Black Box Theatre, Kwai Tsing Theatre.
