Back to the good stuff! This week was fabulous! It was the first real week of dancing and it started with Philippe Riera's research project on history and Violence. Also, I forgot I scheduled another class this week called Waacking with Archie Burnett! So I had that too. My day was mostly spent at Dance Arts from 10AM-4PM with Philippe Riera, then I walked to the Arsenal and had Waacking from 4:20PM-6:05PM. So my days were full this week.
Philippe's project was formatted loosely, and basically we were doing a lot of movement and dance research in the context of violence and how we create violence onstage without being literal necessarily. He gave us a lot of exercises in the form of an improvisation score that could lead us to honest and real reactions. At the beginning of the week these exercises gave us a lot to work with since improvised work is always different, especially with unfamiliar people. We soon had a conversation about how our honest reactions don't really tend to go in a violent direction. So we kept a lot of the exercises, but any decisions we made should have reference to a certain way of violence, create clashing concepts, or address touchy subjects such as politics, religion, sex, etc. This lead the project in a very personal direction where we could have pretty intense conversation about these touchy subjects we wanted the work to address. It ended abruptly and felt too short to really dive into some of the harshness and extremities that can occur in violent art. Otherwise, it was an excellent time and I really enjoyed working with a group of professionals with so much information behind them. It made the work very full and fulfilling, and I'm happy to have several new friends from many corners of the world!
Now onto something completely different! Waacking is a branch off of urban styles that comes from Hollywood. It is paired with disco music mostly and the movement is based on old movie stars and imitating some of there luxurious poses, while also incorporating a specific set of arm movements that look like your holding a whip and whacking your arms around. It is similar to Voguing, which is usually paired with house music and was primarily created by black, gay communities in NYC imitating models in fashion magazines. I had little knowledge of the technique before the workshop, but had seen it done before and learned a few moves. This workshop really allowed me to come by it honestly. I've never been one to admire glamorous movie stars, but the way Archie spoke about it and allowed for lots of individuality, it really start to make sense in my body. These techniques are also not choreography techniques. They have short movements that are part of the movement vocabulary, then you improvise within that structure and elaborate using your own flavour. What an excellent workshop.
So the Arsenal is the main building for the workshops, and the studios themselves are wildly huge... It's basically a massive warehouse that is converted into a few huge rooms with sound systems and dance floor laid out. One side of each studio is all windows too, so you get a fantastic sense of freedom inside these stage sized studios. But outside, wow. There is a small pool set up for dancer's use, a café with outdoor seating and pillows, a hangout where you can play foosball, and a bike shop for all the bicycles that are available through the festival. This is truly dancer's paradise.
This weekend I will be at the Arsenal for a Parkour intensive for 5 hrs/day... I will definitely abuse that pool. Next week I will also be at the Arsenal with 3 more workshops to talk about!
I also saw 2 more performances this week. The first, a solo by Saskia Holbling at Schauspielhaus. It was ok... There were several props onstage including a strange looking mummy/puppet. There was a lot for potential it to work, but I couldn't quite follow so it left me stale. The second was Serapions Ensemble at Odeon. It was too long, and too hot. The set was very interesting, and the performers were very talented, but it was too theatrical and overacted. There were many moments that lasted waaaaaaay too long and this lead to the show being almost 2hrs loooooooong... I have plenty of other shows to see so there will be many more chances to see spectacular work. Tonight I will be a party for the festival so I'll have a drink for all my Canadian favorites at home!
G
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