Soreness

The weekend was wild...


First it started with a party Friday night. It was a huge ImPulsTanz opening party at the Kasino at Schwarzenbergplatz with a live band show, lots of drinks, and so many people. I obviously got lost first and found a different casino that told me where the even was. So then I found my way and saw the big obvious lights that spelled out IMPULSTANZ on the building... duh. The night was amazing. I had a few drinks and finally found Syreeta, a fabulous and lovely dancer who was in the Toronto Dance Theatre company while I was in school there. We caught up a bit, lost each other a few times at the party, but found each other again. I found a few other friends I met at ImPulsTanz and we decided to go to this other party hosted by Archie Burnett, my Waacking teacher that week! So we found the bar called Roxy and found a group of amped up dancers having so much fun, so we danced forever... Well, until 4AM. And even then the party was still raging when we left!



The street on which I got lost



Then the next day at 12:15PM I had Parkour... Maybe partying so hard the night before was not the best thing before such an intense class, but the workout for sure helped my hangover. Leech was our instructor and he had a really great approach to teaching it and about the philosophy around Parkour. He spoke about it as though you speak about life. The choices you make in Parkour are the same as life in the sense of how you calculate risks in your head. In life when you think about achieving something, most of the time one would say that the risks are worth the outcome, so take the chance. In Parkour, if you feel like you are feeling afraid of doing something you have in your mind, as long as you trust your body enough, you should take those risks. The downside of Parkour is blisters... My hands hate me now, but it's okay because I really do feel like I have a better sense of my fear and when it makes sense and when I should let it go. All in all it was a great experience. My body is so sore going into this week. We were walking on railings, running up walls, in the playground being monkeys, just experimenting and playing around.

Sunday night I also saw a performance at MUMOK (contemporary art museum) by Ana Rita Teodoro called Gut's Dream. It was a very beautiful solo with paper bags that extended and came apart. However, it was only 30 minutes long so I felt there was more to be said, or something missing. It felt like only part of something, rather than something shown by itself. After that I got some delicious Froyo and went home.

I saw this guy on the way home in the subway

Today I started my weekday workshops. First I have Becoming Animal with Bruno Caverna, A Body In Question with Sybrig Dokter, and More Than Naked with Doris Uhlich.

Bruno's class was all about play fighting and feeing as though you are a young animal learning to fight with your brother. So the entire time you know you are safe, because you are still soft with each other, you are purely learning. Sybrig is exploring relating to identity and minorities and finding where your can fit into the equation. It's a softer class physically, but very nice to think about. Especially after having Pilippe Riera's project last week I feel very in the political space of the injustice towards minorities. Then finally Doris' class is, yes, you guessed it, all about nudity! We were very well introduced to the aspect of getting naked as a group and dancing without worry of jiggling, in fact embracing the jiggles! It was a fantastic dance party and we all were very naked and sweaty, but happy and immersed in the infectious music and beat. I'm very excited for what is to come.

I will have it all in dirty details for you next week!

Happy Travels,

G

Waacking and History of Violence

Alright I'm noticing a trend... One where I'm not making my own deadlines. Therefore, I'm making the executive decision to cut it down to one post a week on Sundays or Mondays. It's a little difficult to maintain a constant flow of information whilst in the middle of a REALLY intense dance process.


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!

Happy Travels,

G

Preparations

Because I was a little late on the last post, this will be pretty short since not much happened since then.
 
I did get to go see another dance show on Friday night called Personal Symphonic Moment, a trio choreographed by Elina Pirinen. This piece was so wild and intense I could help but love it. The Odeon theatre was a beautiful facility where the sides of the stage were lined with massive pillars and the back wall had 3 arches, which gave the building a classic charm. The opening of the piece was in darkness with Shostakovich's Leningrad Symphony blasting in the theatre for 5-10 minutes. The lights slowly fade in and we first see the three dancers slowly walking forward. They stop, and from behind their backs pull a bag of paint that they pour over their faces. From there, it goes ape-shit. There were several rude gestures and nudity, but that was not even the most intense. There were numerous props including a bath of ice, marsh mellows, microphones, a remote control car, mouse traps, fake flowers, and more paint. I'll leave it to your imagination to figure out how they used them because I couldn't even know where to begin. No matter how crazy it got, I kept loving that work. It was physical and magically absurd.

At that show I found a friend I had made the night before at another dance show and met a few new people as well. 3 of us went for a beer around Schwedenplatz on the river. The river is lined with random bars and the one we went to had sand placed on the sides with lawn chairs you can chill in with a beer. So we grabbed a table, drank, then decided to go home. I have a feeling the parties will get a bit rowdier once the festival is really in full swing.

After a relaxing weekend of yoga in Turkenschanzpark and doing nothing but skyping JR, I'm feeling pretty anxious to get moving again. The first thing I do is one of my field projects with Philippe Riera from 10AM-4PM Mon-Fri this week. I'm feeling well fed and ready to get to work. More to report on Thursday; wish me luck!

Happy Travels,

G

Opening Performances

Sooooooooo I forgot to post yesterday... My bad. BUT here is the lowdown on ImPulsTanz thus far!


Tuesday was awesome because of the amazing performance Doris Uhlich and her dancers gave at the opening event of the festival. It was in the middle of Museums Quartier with a massive stage and people crowding everywhere just to get a good view of this show. It was truly incredible to see so many people out to support this strange and beautiful art. Doris Uhlich is a choreographer and a DJ, so she's pretty awesome. Starting her piece off with "Doing It Right" by Daft Punk was a solid intro for the piece we were about to see. Her dancers entered the stage at the beginning clothed, and exited at the end completely nude. In the middle there was a lot of stripping, bodies jiggling, running around, sweating, baby powder in the air, more jiggling, and eventually champagne showers. And to Doris' selection of music, it was epically enjoyable for everyone. It was a perfect beginning for me in particular because I needed to see that empowerment the dancers had.

Wednesday I decided to take out a city bike and go for a ride along the Donaukanal. The weather had cooled down to a normal temperature so it was comfortable and enjoyable.

Yesterday was busier than normal. I decided to go get my workshop pass from the workshop office, which I read was in Museums Quartier. So I went there and found an ImPulsTanz office, only to find out the place to get my passes had moved from that spot and it was a good distance away where most of the classes actually take place. So I went there and found the office, got my pass, and also looked into the studios... Holy lord they are massive and amazing and I cannot wait to get in there and start moving. It was unlike any other studio I've ever been in and I feel so lucky to experience that.

That evening was also the first of the [8:TENSION] series performances. This series showcases upcoming artists and some of their experimental work. The first was by Maarten Seghers. In my humble opinion it was more performance art than dance, but it was a strange and funny performance that I still enjoyed. He spent a good portion of the show talking about horseradish and trying to get the audience to cheer "horseradish", and it was a great example of how you can harp on something and eventually get people on board with you.


Another great part of the night was actually making friends! Feeling lonely sucks, so I met these people doing the ATLAS program in the festival where you get to have a mentor and create something during the month here. Felt very grateful to finally know some people before going into the classes.

And that all takes us to today, which started off lame because as I was going to get groceries, I was J walking and tripped and wiped out on the road... I scrambled to get up and still went to get groceries, but I tore up my knee pretty nicely. So now my next trip is to the drug store...


Happy Travels,
G