INTRODUCTION: The following script/score was produced between 2011 and 2013 while creating the performance, NEW. A process that started as a conversation among the three of us -Irina MĂźller, Felix Marchand and Ayara HernĂĄndez Holz- about what we remembered from dance and theatre performances that we had seen in the past, and the traces that those performances had left in our bodies.
The text is a collection of fragments of memories from performances that have printed a journey in our life as spectators and choreographers. It is an archive created from shows that we saw mainly in Berlin, the city we have been living in for the last decade. NEW is a journey that blends a collective history of the spectator’s gaze with a personal archive of body memories, and the struggle of the creation process. In this work we deal with the act of remembering and the lack of being accurate in what we remember - a process of constant re invention and imagination.
We have collected several memories of fragments of performances and rewritten these memories into tasks. None of the tasks that you will find here are directly connected to the original work, but rather to what we imagine the author or the performers were dealing with, and to how we specifically remember those moments. We allow ourselves to embody these fragments and to translate them into new movements, texts or images.
NEW could be rewritten every time it is performed or every time this text is read, because our memories are constantly changing, reforming, being forgotten and being remembered anew.
Verwobene Verweise Susanne Foellmer Die Situation erinnert an die Anfangsphase im Proberaum. Idee und Konzept stehen, nun gilt es, das Vorgedachte, Überlegte, Inspirierte in darstellende Bewegungen zu übertragen. Da wir uns im zeitgenössischen Tanz befinden, können die Referenzen, die begleitenden, gewussten, erinnerten Ästhetiken, die typischen Bewegungspattern, klassisch gewordenen choreographischen Sequenzen und mitunter ikonischen Szenen, die das eigene Tun umgeben, nicht ausgeblendet werden. Wir sind im Netz des zeitgenössischen Tanzes verflochten: Diskurse verpflichten und wiederholen ist verboten. Gilt es doch, ‚Innovatives‘ zu schaffen, eigene Ansätze durchzusetzen, am Bühnenreigen der Veranstalter/innen und Produktionsorte teil zu haben.
Boris Groys bemerkt, dass das Neue in der Postmoderne eine Transformation erfahren habe. Durchweg Projekt einer vergangenen Moderne, gehe es nun nicht mehr um das Schaffen von Originalen, sondern um Originalität. Neu ist, was in der Zusammenschau des zuvor Gewussten und bereits Vorhandenen so noch nicht gezeigt worden ist. Kombinatorik und Sampling sind Ausdrucksformen des postmodernen Performativen und Gedächtniskonserve zugleich. Wie geht nun der tanzästhetische und besonders von Produzent/ innen beförderte Wunsch nach Originalität im Sinne eines sonoch-nicht-Dagewesenen, eines sich-immer-neu-Entwerfens mit der Ökonomie einer Unmöglichkeit des Neuen zusammen?
New stellt sich diesem Paradox, indem es sich dem Innovationsbedürfnis schlicht verweigert und ein Szenario der Selbstzensur entwirft: Ein ungebetener Gast, der bisweilen schon da ist, wenn das kreative Tun sich gerade erst entfaltet. Die vorgeschlagenen Szenenentwürfe, Auftrittsoptionen, Bewegungsansätze und -muster werden, kaum angedeutet, im Keim erstickt: Nichts Neues in der Arena der choreographischen Experimente und damit nicht präsentationswürdig. Das Erkennen und sofortige Denunzieren einer angeblich neuen Idee gerät bald zu einem Spiel der Selbstüberbietung im Wettbewerb um das meist Gesehene und provoziert auch die Seherfahrungen des Publikums: Ein bauchpinselndes Erlebnis, wenn man sich dabei ertappt, was man alles wiedererkennt oder wiederzuerkennen glaubt.
In diesem zitathaften Geflecht der Bezüge und Assoziationen transformiert sich das Geschehen auf der Bühne jedoch allmählich: Das Wandern durch die erinnerten Stückfragmente wird zu einem Museumsbesuch der eigenen Rezeptionserfahrung der Performer/innen und entfaltet ein geradezu historiographisches Gewebe der jüngsten, oft Berliner Tanz‚geschichte‘. Ein verkörpertes choreographisches Gedächtnis, das in der Kopräsenz der Aufführung, im Andeuten und nachvollziehenden Imaginieren ein performatives Archiv bildet, das Darstellende und Zuschauende gemeinsam hervorbringen und für die Dauer eines Tanzabends miteinander teilen.
An invitation: We invite you to read this text as a script, a story, a written performance or as a score. If you would like to perform it as a score, it might be useful to know that the text is divided between actions, dialogues and instructions. The purpose of the instructions is to generate new material through personal tasks. You could also rewrite the archive with your own memories of performances. The main words that cross and uncross this performance and text are: remember, forget, imagine... say no if it has been done say or if it has been done say yes if it has been done
CREDITS: Concept: Ayara Hernández Holz & Felix Marchand. Creation of the text and the performance: Ayara Hernández Holz, Felix Marchand & Irina Müller. Light design: Benjamin Schälike. Video: Arístides Job García Hernández. Special guests for the NEW read through/ eine szenische Lesung on 25. April 2013: Hermann Heisig, Andreas Müller und Jessy Tuddenham. English Advise: Jessy Tuddenham. Press: björn & björn. Graphic design: Venado (www.venadoweb.com) A production by: LUPITA PULPO Funded by: the Governing Mayor of Berlin – Senat Chancellery – Cultural Affairs.
THANKS: To all the artists who inspired us and left their trace on us. THANKS: To the artists who are named here, and those who are to be named! THANKS: To our colleagues who wrote us beautiful sentences about the future back in 2011: Pablo Albertoni, Carolina Besuievsky, Tamara Cubas, Catalina Chouhy, Samuel Dellicour, Igor Dobricic, Juan Dominguez, Jared Gradinger, Diego Gil, Hermann Heisig, Arauco Hernández, Patricia Mallarini, Florencia Martinelli, Therese Markhus, Andreas Müller, Sybille Müller, Martin Nachbar, Lucía Naser, Margrét Sara Guðjónsdóttir, Angela Schubot, Leticia Skrycky, Carolina Silveira and Lucía Russo. THANKS: To Tanzfabrik Berlin and L’animal a l’esquena for their support during the creation of the performance NEW. www.lupitapulpo.org
The stage is dark and empty.
A conversation between 3 people plays over loudspeakers. They are talking about their memories of contemporary dance and theater performances from the 90’s. They laugh and eat while talking, and they constantly fail to remember the shows properly. Nobody can describe very well what they have seen.
Very slowly the stage lights come up, reveling an empty stage with a black floor and semi-open black curtains - nothing else.
PERFORMERS #1, #2 and #3 enter the stage from a side door.
LIGHT CUE: FADE IN (1 MINUTE) FROM BLACK OUT TO GENERAL LIGHT: 24 PAR LIGHTS FROM FRONT + SIDE + BACK.
PERFORMER #1 (interrupting the action) Let’s come in one by one.
The three performers go back to where they came from and close the door.
Immediately they re-enter one by one and stand randomly in the middle of the stage looking around at the audience and the space. After a minute, it seems something is wrong.
PERFORMER #2 (walking towards the door with the green exit light on top) Let’s use the exit for our entrance instead. PERFORMER #1 follows PERFORMER #2. PERFORMER #3 (walks in the opposite direction and goes behind one of the curtains) Or we could enter from here. PERFORMER #1 Do you mean, from the side wing? PERFORMER #3 Yes. PERFORMER #1: This has been done.
PAUSE.
Based on the video”Everything has been done”(2003) by AZORRO group
An awkward silence colors the atmosphere between the three performers, they appear to be uncomfortable with the situation.
PERFORMER #3 (walks towards another curtain) We could close all the other curtains and we start in total darkness. PERFORMER #1 This has been done. PERFORMER #2 Let’s start the piece with just a play of lights only. Nobody reacts to the proposal of PERFORMER #2. PERFORMER #1 (runs excitedly to turn a piece of the black floor to the other side) Instead of black, we do everything on white! PERFORMER #2: It has been done. PERFORMER #2 (brings out a piece of curtain that was hidden somewhere in the theater) or let’s have a total black space, we could close all the curtains and have a curtain covering the whole floor...
From a memory of the performance “Gustavia”(2008) by La Ribot and Mathilde Monnier
Performer #2 attempts unsuccessfully to cover the whole space with the curtain. PERFORMER #3 It has been done. PERFORMER #1 (enthusiastically holds the white side of the dance floor up) Or how about using this as a screen? PERFORMER #3 (walks to the dance floor that PERFORMER #1 just held up) This has been done, but we could all climb under the floor, so no one sees us at the beginning of the show. PERFORMER #3 hides under the floor and stays still for the next few minutes, making a small hill on the floor. PERFORMER #2 It has been done. (walks to the audience and stands as close as possible to them) What if we leave the audience light on, so we break the fourth wall and we all share the same space.
From a memory of the performance “Jailbreak Mind�(2009) by Fabien Prioville
PERFORMER #1 It has been done, but how about instead of using the theater lights... (turns the working light on) We use the working lights! LIGHT CUE: SWITCH ON (0 SECOND) WORKING LIGHTS OF THE THEATRE, GENERAL LIGHT STAYS.
PERFORMER #2 Done! LIGHT CUE: SWITCH OFF (0 SEC.) WORKING LIGHTS OF THE THEATRE, GENERAL LIGHT STAYS.
PERFORMER #1 But what if instead of erasing the fourth wall we make it real by hanging a big piece of material from the ceiling in front of the audience... PERFORMER #2 (looking at the ceiling) Do you mean from there? (pointing to the ceiling) PERFORMER #1 Yes! and it’s heavy and you can open and close it. PERFORMER #2 From side to side?
PERFORMER #1 (excited) Yes! and the color is dark, but its not black... it’s red! PERFORMER #2 What kind of red, Do you mean red red, or more dark red, or more like wine color? PERFORMER #1 Yes, darker is more dramatic! and we open it at the beginning of the show and we close it at the end, so people know that the show is over.... PERFORMER #2 (interrupts) This has been done! but what if we are hiding in the set! (she places herself between a half open curtain and the wall. She alternates her movements between showing her back and showing the front of her body) on my back a print of the curtain, on my front a print of the wall: curtain, wall, curtain, wall, curtain, wall, curtain, wall... PERFORMER #3 Done, done, done. (appears again and wraps the floor around her body, like a big wedding dress)
From a memory of the performance “L’affair Martin!”(2006) by René Pollesch
But we could use this as a material for our costumes. PERFORMER #1 It has been done. PERFORMER #2: OK, let’s bring more objects into the space. The three performers exit and re-enter, bringing random objects, that they find off-stage; a chair, microphones, a broom, clothes, a trash can, a mirror, a half empty bottle of water from the day before, another chair, a mask, a green high heel shoe, a tripod, a pencil, a paper, a ball, etc. Eventually they stop and look at the stage filled with the random objects. Unsatisfied, they bring even more stuff in. After a while PERFORMER #2 starts to organize the objects as if a conference will take place.
PERFORMER #3 This has been done. Without any hesitation they take all the objects off- stage again. PERFORMER #1 (leaves the theater while continuing to talk) or what if we start outside, we gather all the energy from outside and... One can hear PERFORMER #1 outside of theater, running, jumping, screaming and talking. But no one can really understand what he is doing or saying. PERFORMER #2 (giving up on PERFORMER #1’s proposal) This has been done. LIGHT CUE: CHANGE (2 SEC.) FROM GENERAL LIGHT TO PINK. LIGHT CUE: CHANGE (1 MIN.) FROM PINK FADE INTO GENERAL LIGHT.
From a memory of the performance “Frank” by Nigel Charnock.
PERFORMER #3 (stands in the middle of the stage pretending she is holding something in her hands) Or we cover the floor with carnations (flower petals) and I stand in the middle, naked, playing an accordion. PERFORMER #1 & PERFORMER #2 (coming closer together) This sounds familiar... PERFORMER #1: What about rain! A constant rain... PERFORMER #2 (interrupts) or snow, that is falling during the whole show, till we have a half meter of snow covering the whole floor... PERFORMER #3 Yes! the whole floor is covered by a hairy surface, like the skin of a huge animal... PERFORMER #1 Done! But we could fill the room with furniture... PERFORMER #3: or we could have a whole flat inside of the theater...
Task: remember the emblematic picture of:“Nelken�(1982) by Pina Bausch.
PERFORMER #2: This has been done. PERFORMER #3: Just a kitchen, where we cook and the audience can smell the food and... PERFORMER #1 & PERFORMER #2 (interrupts) Done. PERFORMER #3 OK, then it is just a living room with a sofa and a TV... PERFORMER #1 (interrupts) I saw that. PERFORMER #3 OK, we are in the TV, I mean, in a set of a TV program, with a green screen... PERFORMER #1 & PERFORMER #2 Done! done! PERFORMER #3 Or, a room in a wheel, and the wheel is turning and the performers are falling...
PERFORMER #1 I saw it! PERFORMER #2 A little room in a tunnel... PERFORMER #1 I saw it in a magazine. PERFORMER #3 The floor is the wall and the wall is the floor and the performers are standing like this... (bends sideways) PERFORMER #1 I saw this too! PERFORMER #2 A whole wall of ship containers. PERFORMER #3 (makes a gesture and holds it for a while) A boat on stage. PERFORMER #2 I saw it. PERFORMER #1 (makes a gesture and holds it for a while) or two cars crashing into each other?
PERFORMER #2 Or we enter driving a car? PERFORMER #1 What if a huge tank is falling from the ceiling? PERFORMER #3 a truck? PERFORMER #2 a trunk? PERFORMER #3 a tree-trunk? PERFORMER #1 I have the impression I saw that. PERFORMER #2 but trees, a whole forest on stage... PERFORMER #3 Done!
From memories of set-designs in performances by: Meg Stuart/ Damaged Goods, Gisèle Vienne, Lucia Russo & Marcela Levi, Needcompany, Superamas, Alain Platel, Metter Ingvartsen, Anat Eisenberg, Gustavo Lesgart & Inés Sanguinetti, Sasha Waltz & Guests, VA Wölfl/ NEUER TANZ, etc.
PERFORMER #1 What if we imagine a forest or a jungle...
Task: see a jungle in front of you and move through this invisible, imagined landscape - From the memory of the performance “Already played tomorrow”(2006) by Carlos Pez
PERFORMER #3 Or we could be the forest! (makes a gesture with her body) I am a tree.
Task: Make a single gesture that represent a word or object. Say what you are before or after the gesture, always starting the sentence with, “I am …” - from a memory of the performance “The match”(2011) by Begüm Erciyas
PERFORMER #1 leaves the group and moves forward on a diagonal.
PERFORMER #2 (makes a gesture with her body) I am a palm tree. Ah! no! I am a dry bush. (makes another gesture) PERFORMER #1 (gets on all four) I am... ah no, I saw this 2 years ago. PERFORMER #2 But we could imagine the objects. (makes different gestures following the words she says)
plant, plant, plant, plant, plant, plant, plant, table, table, table, table, table, table, chair, chair, chair, chair, chair, chair, chair, lamp, lamp, lamp, lamp, lamp, lamp, lamp, lamp, lamp, light, light, light, light, light, glass, glass, glass, glass, glass, glass, glass, (stumbles over an imaginary table) bump, bump, bump, bump, bump, bump...
Task: Describe, and trace with gestures, imaginary objects in a room - name each object as you trace it - Repeat each name 8 times - From the memory of “Black”(2011) by Mette Edvardsen.
PERFORMER #3 (continuing from the proposal of Performer #2)
Catch, catch, catch, catch, catch, catch, catch, catch, the glass, glass, glass, glass, glass and balancing it on my body! PERFORMER #2 (interrupts her) I’ve seen it... PERFORMER #3 (insistent, she pretends she is holding something on her ear) but imagine I have a glass of water ... and through the whole performance I rename the glass: This is a glass, or a river, or petrol running, or the flow in the stock market, or the capitalistic system, but then the glass falls and... Anarchy! PERFORMER #1 (stands up) Somebody has already thought of that. PERFORMER #2 OK It’s not just us on stage but also puppets... The three performers behave like human puppets on stage and make different poses.
Task: Balance a glass of water somewhere on your body, if you don’t have a glass of water, imagine it. Don’t let it fall. Rename this object constantly. Be social, political or philosophical with your associations - From the memory of the performance “Allege”(2010) by Clément Layes
PERFORMER #2 So in the beginning the audience doesn’t see who is a real person and who is a puppet... (continues) ...and then we start to move. At one point we have this violent scene where we are moving and kicking the puppets.
Task: Imagine someone moves you and you are reacting passively as if you were a puppet. At one point it becomes violent as if you as the puppet are thrown and kicked around - from the memory of the performance”Kindertotenlie der”(2007) by Gisèle Vienne
PERFORMER #1 (interrupts her) This is pretty done. PERFORMER #2 keeps on moving, while PERFORMER #3 continues being a puppet for the next few minutes. PERFORMER #1 (continues) But lets use text, I mean text text... PERFORMER #1 talks nonsense for a while to the audience and to the other two performers. PERFORMER #2 This sounds very familiar. PERFORMER #1 or...
Task: Create a German text about what is going on in your mind right now - from the memory of the performance “Perfekt gewessen”(2009) by TWO FISH
PERFORMER #1 moves along the space while describing a landscape and a performance that relates to what he is doing... In his story there are three performers, one of them is hiding in a bunker.
PERFORMER #3 (coming out of stillness, interrupts him, angrily) She is not hiding! The performer is not hiding, I remember everything that she did! The two performers start arguing about whether she was hiding or not.
Task: Run back and forth in a line. Start on all fours and move up to standing. Transform your movement through an evolution from animal to human - from the memory of the performance “Forgeries, Love and Other Matters�(2004) by Meg Stuart & Benoit Lachambre
PERFORMER #2 (interrupts them) Anyway this has been done. But we can do something on the green grass...we are very tall and...
Task: Move as if restrained by very tight clothing. Imagine you have very long arms and legs - from the memory of the performance “In this beautiful countryside” (2004) by Hermann Heisig
PERFORMER #3 (imitating one of the gesture that PERFORMER #2 is doing) Or what if we “oscillate between intense, abstract physicality of movement and a parodic theatricality of empty gestures”.
Task: Do a dance that can “oscillate between intense, abstract physicality of movement and a parodic theatricality of empty gestures” while seducing the audience - from the memory and fragment of the program text of the performance “About falling”(2008) by Diego Gil and Igor Dobricic
PERFORMER #3 moves across the space towards the audience, doing a dance that follows the task she just said. PERFORMERS #2 and #1 affected by what they see start to move their hips.
PERFORMER #2 Let us all be standing on platforms, naked, with a hula hoop!
PERFORMER #1 (first mumbling, gradually turning into a normal voice) How about fluids? Fluids! Fluids! Yeah! Fluids “The fluids are the transportation system of the body. They underlie presence and transformation and play a major role in the overall counterbalancing of tension and relaxation, rest and action’.
The three performers move for a while doing their own interpretation of the task.
Task: Perform a circle dance with your hips - from the memory of the performance “Duchesses. Vehicle of the Universe”(2009) by Marie-Caroline Hominal & François Chaignaud Task: Explore the fluids of the body using the manual, Body Mind Centering, by Bonnie Bainbridge Cohen - from the memory of the performance “Musik (Praticable)”(2011) by Isabelle Schad
They cover the whole space with their movements. As the dancing continues they dive more intensively into their exploration. Until PERFORMER #3 starts to increase her physicality into an animalistic body. Suddenly PERFORMER #3 crashes against the wall.
LIGHT CUE: (0 SEC.) BLACK OUT.
Task: be a horse-man running wild through the space - from the memory of the performance “In Spite of Wishing and Wanting� (1999) by Wim Vandekeybus
LONG PAUSE.
PERFORMER #2 (after a long moment of silence) Let’s use the darkness... We tell a story in three parts: The first tale explores the bog, a rather sensitive habitat and ecosystem which stores organic deposits, from plants to human bodies(...) The second tale gives a glimpse into a world that humans have abandoned to their best friends—dogs(...) The third tale unfolds the world of substitution, in which sexual differences are replaced by the difference between the bodiless and those who still have bodies, who are “bodiful”. PERFORMER #1 We have lost our bodies, imagine one morning you wake up and you are thinner, another day you loose your organs, you only weigh 23 kilos and then you loose your body, but you are still there, you can just remember, what it was to feel pain or to have been touched. PERFORMER #2 (continues...) we tell a story of a world where “The only human organ left is the voice, but divorced from the bodies, an acousmatic voice whose power lies in demanding: listen to me”.
From a memory of the performance “Tales of the bodiless” (2011) by Eszter Salamon and the text “The making of the performance. Tales of the bodiless” by Bojana Cvejic
LIGHT CUE: FADE IN (1 MIN.) TO GENERAL LIGHT.
PERFORMER #2 and #1 hold a pose. PERFORMER #3 has a mask on her face, and she is very subtle flirting almost imperceptibly with the walls, touching different objects in the theater in a sexual manner.
Task: Imagine you are wearing a gorilla costume and you feel really sexy inside of it - from the memory of the performance “Bloody Mess”(2004) by Forced Entertainment
PERFORMER #1 (Breaking the stillness and taking his t-shirt off) What about this. PERFORMER #2 Done. PERFORMER #1 (posing with the t-shirt) Or this? PERFORMER #2 Done. PERFORMER #1 (doing another pose with the t-shirt) Or? PERFORMER #2 Seen it. Performer #1, holding his pose, moves towards Performer #2 until he bumps into her.
Task: remember and perform the emblematic picture of the performance“Self Unfinished”(1998) by Xavier Le Roy
PERFORMERS #1 and #2 start to do very strange partnering positions on the floor, as if they would fuck each other, but the positions are not erotic, however there is a certain reference to sex. PERFORMER #3 approaches them still walking like a weird animal. PERFORMER #3 (interrupts her own action) ...a sensual monologue! : me gustas, te gusto, nos gustamos. Me miras, te miro, nos miran, y nosotros nos miramos... y yo te toco, y tu me tocas y nos tocamos y a ti te gusta, y a mi me gusta y a ellos les gusta mirarnos y...
Task: Create a spanish text in which you are very, very horny for someone in the audience - from the memory of “Hermosura”(1999) by El Descueve
PERFORMER #1 & PERFORMER #2 (trying to speak in unison) What about a sensual, i-n-d-i-a-n, k-a-m-a-s-u-t-r-a s-l-o-w m-o-t-io-n p-o-s-i-t-i-o-n-s...
Task: Do a slow partner duet, moving through strange, twisted and “impossible” sex positions - from the memory of the performance “Reproduction”(2004) by Eszter Salamon
PERFORMER #3 joins the duet, making a threesome with various absurd positions - this goes on until PERFORMER #2 tries to fuck the leg of PERFORMER #3.
PERFORMER #2 (stepping out of the trio) or we move “creating a language that is completely empty of meaning but still makes sense”. PERFORMER #2 is doing the task with the curtains, the floor, a t-shirt. PERFORMER #1 & #3, inspired by the sexuality of PERFORMER #2, start to kiss each other, then freeze in a position. PERFORMER #2 Or lets do a sequence of movement by copying the sculptures of Rodin and we perform this in a art Museum. PERFORMER #3 (stops kissing) or what if we take this concept of being inside of each other and we do it without any sexual connotation. (she puts her fist inside of the mouth of PERFORMER #1) PERFORMER #1 (screaming with the fist still inside his mouth) Has been done! PERFORMER #1 keeps his mouth open for a while.
Task: create “a language that is completely empty of meaning but still makes sense”. Fuck everything that is around you getting hands on like a horny dog - from a fragment of the program and the memory of the performance “Blue” (2009) by Juan Dominguez Task: Lie down with someone and kiss - from a memory of “the kiss”(2007) by Tino Seghal) Task: Role from one twisted position to another one! Find new and exciting transitions - from the memory of “Retrospektive”(2009) by Tino Seghal Task: Try to be inside the body of someone else with any sexual connotations. Through this task, try to erase the idea of oneself, the “I” - from the memory of “is maybe” by Angela Schubot and Jared Gradinger
Task: what ever you do, keep your mouth open - from the memory of “Trip”(2008) by WHITE HORSE
PERFORMER #3 (walks and leans her arms on the wall) Or just sharing the air between us and breathing together... PERFORMER #2 Breathing! What if the space is breathing. We have a huge mattress on the floor, which is inflated and deflated...
Task: be a breathing reindeer hanging on the wall. Start to breath slowly and increase the breath bit by bit - from the memory of the performance “what they are instead of” by Angela Schubot and Jared Gradinger Task: Imagine the floor is constantly moving and you cannot stay still, your body is constantly falling. Wear a cowboy costume if you have one, otherwise imagine it - from the memory of the performance “The host”(2010) by Andros Zins- Browne
LIGHT CUE: CHANGE (2 SEC.) TO YELLOW SIDE LIGHT. PERFORMER #1 And we are on top of it! The three performers move through the space falling and catching themselves for few minutes. PERFORMER #3 (changes her movements) And we are all dressed as cowboys! PERFORMER #1 (interrupts) That has been over done! Aha, But folk dance!
Task: create a folk dance, that is either inspired by an existing national folk-dance (Russian, German, Italian....) or invent one of your own - from the memory of the performance “4 women” by Ante Pavic
LIGHT CUE: CROSS FADE (1 MIN.) FROM YELLOW SIDE LIGHT TO GENERAL LIGHT. PERFORMER #2 Folk dance, a Spanish dance:’Dancer A slowly raises arms like a magnificent spanish dancer and travels forward in time to Bob Dylan’s ‘In the early morning rain’ MUSIC. When dancer A touches up against the back of dancer B, Dancer B slowly raises arms like a magnificent spanish dancer and travels forward, touching up against the back of dancer C, etc. until they all reach the wall.’ The three performers execute the score, until they reach the wall and lean on it. END OF MUSIC.
PAUSE.
Follow the score “Spanish dance”(1973) by Trisha Brown
PERFORMER #1 (after a moment... starts to dance in a line along the front of the space) What if we do this as if in the late 70s: “a dance which has no story, no characters, no virtuoso divertissements, yet it drives forward like a spaceship skimming the horizon”. PERFORMER #2 (standing directly behind performer#1 and copying his movements) or we do this 30 years later and by now its a classic. Performer #2 evolves slowly into a ballet phrase
Task: Do a light airy dance from side to side. Dancing a phrase with a clear beginning and end from a memory and a fragment of the program text of the performance “Dance”(1977) by Lucinda Childs
PERFORMER #3 But what if we do another score. We take a book with pictures of dances from a very famous choreographer, and we invent the transitions from one picture to the next. PERFORMER #1 I like the copy idea. So what if we copy the style of different choreographers and let the audience place orders, like “I want a Mc Forsythe”
Task: Find pictures from Merce Cunningham dances and embody them. Invent transitions between the pictures - from the memory of the performance “50 years of dance”(2010) by Boris Charmatz Task: Copy the style of a famous choreographer/ perform it fully - from the memory of the performance “Because the size does matter” (2000) by Maria Clara Villa-Lobos
PERFORMER #2 ... or let’s not fix identities or hierarchies, no movement is more important than the last one.
Task: Create a movement sequence that has an equal pace. Each movement, tiny or big, has the same attention and duration in the sequence - from the memory of the performance “Horizon(s)”(2006) by Laurent Chétouane & Task: A sequence of singular movements. They are not bound together by flow, but performed one after the other in equal duration - from the memory of the performance “Haus”(2010) by Jana Unmüßig
The three performers do a choreography that juxtaposes different dance styles. Performer #3 fades out of her dance.
PERFORMER #3 (doing a ballet posture) Or we invite a ballerina to play her role on Swan Lake, she is part of the corps de ballet. We ask her to do what she normally does in the piece... Performer #1 stops dancing and listens to Performer #3, while Performer #2 faints onto the dance floor. LIGHT CUE: CHANGE (2 SEC.) TO OVER HEAD LIGHTS. (continues) but she is alone, on an empty stage without her tutu, the stage set or theatrical lights, just the music is playing. So we have time to see this immense empty stage, this “invisible nothingness”. We have time to look, and look, and look again.
Task: Take a position you remember from the corps de ballet Swan Lake and hold it for a while - from the memory of “Véronique Doisneau”(2004) by Jérôme Bel
A LONG SILENCE AND STILLNESS. LIGHT CUE: (1 MIN.) FADE TO GENERAL LIGHT
PERFORMER #3 (breaking the silence) Or we do a small dance... (pause) Or just being. PERFORMER #1 (repeats these words to himself, trying to understand the task) Just being? Just BEING? Being!... PERFORMER #2 (performing the task) This feels familiar. PERFORMER #1 (looking directly at the audience) but we could increase the tension between us (referring to the audience) and them. The three performers walk slowly down stage, trying in their own way to create tension with the public. PERFORMER #2 (approaching the first row of spectators) But I think for this we should have more people on this side, so maybe you from the first row come here...
Task: Stand and just observe what your body does without making a conscious decision, observe the movements that the body preforms to keep yourself standing - from a Steve Paxton’s practice: small dance
PERFORMER #3 (interrupts) No! this has been done! PERFORMER #2 (angry) but we could... PERFORMER #2 starts to make funny noises, as if she would be a HULK. She takes PERFORMER #3 in her arms and lifts her off the floor, proving that she is very strong. Then she goes to PERFORMER #1 and starts a fight with him. They throw themselves onto the floor several times.
Task: Be an angry, monstrous guy who wants to lift and throw himself and others around - from the memory of the performance “Still standing you”(2010) by Pieter Ampe & Guilherme Garrido
LIGHT CUE: CHANGE (2 SEC.) TO OVERHEAD LIGHT. PERFORMER #3 (angry) it has been done!, but we could take this emotion and create a dance with it. PERFORMER #1 (screaming) Done! PERFORMER #2 or for the last ten minutes we just grow a small movement very slowly from the inside...
Task: Create a gesture using tension in your fingers to represent a specific emotion - from the memory of the performance “Urheben Aufheben”(2008) by Martin Nachbar
LIGHT CUE: ADD (3 MIN.) HIGH-SIDE LIGHT. The three performers start to shake, doing almost the same movement. PERFORMER #1) Or we shake for the first 20 minutes with our backs to the audience. PERFORMER #3 Or we could have jam and we eat it while ... PERFORMER #1 we are wearing yellow rain coats ... PERFORMER #2 this piece will be about violence... PERFORMER #3 we are three woman on stage, and we are eating the jam... and the jam is spread all over the space, on our clothes, on the floor... and it looks like blood, and it is spooky. PERFORMER #2 A band is on stage, and we dance to the sound of the band... PERFORMER #1 a rock and roll band is between us and the audience...
PERFORMER #3 and we have cowboy boots on... and we get shot! PERFORMER #1 Yes! we get shot! The movements of the three performers start to morph into different styles, shapes and states... The excitement grows between them and they finally support each other suggestions without really listening to them. PERFORMER #2 we have wigs with long gray hair and we copy faces from film scenes by Hitchcock... PERFORMER #3 Yes! we have a wig on our face and we are naked and we have sport shoes on... PERFORMER #2 and we dance with our buttocks! PERFORMER #1 25 kids enter the stage!... PERFORMER #3 a clown! who talks about the beginning - or the end - of the world... an explosion!
Memories from performances of: Meg Stuart/ Damaged Goods, Mette Ingvartsen, Forced Entertainment, Therese Markhus, TWO FISH, WHITE HORSE, Hermann Heisig, Nuno Lucas, Irina Müller, Frédéric Gies, Jefta van Dinther, DD Dorvillier, etc.
PERFORMER #1 two technicians are dragging in a trampoline PERFORMER #3 yes! everything flies up in the air.., the 25 kids are in the air! PERFORMER #2 and the audience is on two sides of the trampoline and they see each other between the flying kids PERFORMER #1 the technicians... in the air! PERFORMER #2 buttocks in the air! For the next several minutes the performers continue throwing ideas into the air. Their movements and their voices overlap constantly. The audience can no longer follow what they say or do. When they reach the highest point of their enthusiasm, the crescendo they have been building for the last minutes, they stop talking. Each one of them starts to move strangely on their own, with what seems to be the traces of what they have done for the last hour.
No movement reaches its end, every movement is colored by a question. Their dance has an undefined, odd, uncanny quality, and yet nothing of what they do is new.
PERFORMER #2 finds the black curtain from the beginning of the show and gets underneath it, hiding her entire body. She crosses the stage like a ghost with the curtain covering her. The other two performers eventually join her under the curtain, so their bodies are no longer visible to the audience. The performers become a black monster moving around lost in space.
LIGHT CUE: FADE OUT (3 MIN.) TO BLACK.
After a while, the following sentences are projected on the monster’s body
the future will be curved the future will be curious the future will be asymmetric the future will be amorphous the future will be tropical the future will be hot the future will be so subjective
the future is around the corner the future is arriving the future is close the future is never there the future is fear to overcome
(the sentences are projected between the wall and the black monster, the words become bigger and bigger) the future is a ghost the future is a stalker (the words begin to change more quickly) the future is yellow the future is an idea the future is a mistake the future is not this the future will talk the future is a kiss the future is a horny subject the future is an excuse the future is between my body and my brain the future has no bodies the future runs infinitely the future as further as lighter the future is now the future is behind you there is no time the future has no future when you die the future arrives Die Zukunft kommt gleich!
future didn’t come future wasn’t here future will never happen future is tired of promises future is a repetition future will be forgotten LIGHT CUE: FADE IN (45 SEC.) TO FULL LIGHT ON THE BACK WALL. tomorrow will be another day for the future
I’ll refuse to talk about future till there’s nothing left from present. Der letzte macht das Licht aus What are we eating tonight? something is in the air
Based on: texts written by colleagues about the future. A task inspired from: “Everything You Always Wanted to Know About Curating* But Were Afraid to Ask” by Hans Ulrich Obrist
The black monster slowly disappears from the eyes of the audience, camouflaging itself with one of the black curtains hanging from the ceiling. The light gets brighter and brighter until the words projected on the wall disappear as well.
LIGHT CUE: BLACK OUT.
APPLAUSE.