Brittle Difference

We are finally reaching the end of the semester and I can't believe how much has happened in this short amount of time. From introductory choreographic studies to our final piece that was showcased in the Jr. Choreographer's Concert, I have learned so much about myself as a dancer, mover, choreographer, and person. From working individually, to working in pairs, small groups, then finally being in charge of my very own piece of work has been quite the journey, and it definitely came with some ups and downs along the way. We learned and experimented with several choreographic ideas and choices during our in-class studies, and I believe that without all of those options, I would not have been as prepared to work on my final piece as I was. The book Dance and the Lived Body by Sandra Horton Fraleigh that we read as a class provided very beneficial information that guided me into finding out who I am as a choreographer and mover and helped me to find my own personal aesthetic in my movement. Although I had these resources before I began working on my final study, I still came across some very difficult issues that I struggled with during my creative process. Over these last few weeks of working with my dancers on my piece, I learned a lot about what approaches work for me.


At the beginning of the creative process for our final study, we were to have a clear intent of what we wanted our piece to be about. This was my first struggle in the process because I am so indecisive and could not narrow anything options down. When I thought hard about it, I came up with a concept that I was set on, however, after consulting with my professor, realized it was a very difficult topic. My original idea for the intent for my piece was about one-sided effort in relationships. I thought about when people are in a relationship, whether it’s with their friends, siblings, parents, partners, or others, how sometimes it can feel imbalanced with how much energy one puts in the relationship. In some relationships that I’ve observed, one can put so much of their time and energy into that relationship, while the other isn’t giving as much and the result of this one-sidedness turns out to be a negative impact. In other cases, I’ve noticed how one doesn’t have to force a lot of energy into a relationship, but in the end, they have a positive and balanced relationship. So after discussing this with my professor, she immediately told me that there is too much of a narrative going on, and that it might be too difficult, when coming up with movement to support this intent. She then suggested that I go with the energy part of my original intent, and how low-energy vs. high-energy movement can cause different reactions and results.

Once I had my intent set in stone, my next task in this process was to create movement to support the intent. There were a couple of phrases from my in-class studies that I knew I wanted to bring back to this final study. I knew that they could work well with this intent because one phrase was slow, and light while the other was much faster and weighted. I thought that these could work for my two main low-energy and high-energy phrases and that from there, I would be able to come up with some simpler movement based on these two main phrases. I enjoyed this particular approach to the choreography because I wasn’t trying to throw a lot of random movement together that didn’t support or suffocate the intent. Instead, I could create smooth transitions, and bring parts of the phrases back to add repetition, and to give the piece a feeling of unity.

The greatest challenge of this process was finding the right music to support the piece and its intent. I struggled with exploring through the right genre of music and ended up working with a few different songs that were duds. As we got closer to show week, I still wasn’t happy with the music and due to all the of stress with this piece and the nerves for the performances in the Faculty Dance Concert, I finally just broke down… Luckily, my friend and peer Alek Trail came to the rescue and suggested I talk with her friend, who is a music major at UNT about some music. He happened to have an original song that worked perfectly with my movement, and supported it beautifully! I was so happy and relieved to have found a song that wasn’t mainstream, and that that fit the piece.

We ended up finishing the piece just days away from the show and had to clean it up quickly. I was fortunate enough to work with dancers who were very cooperative and willing to do the movement over and over and over again until it was right. The day of the show arrived and I was so nervous about my piece opening up the show! I knew that this was the final stage of my choreographic process: having an audience witness my work. I was very pleased with the performance and though it was a nice way to open up the concert. The piece was about 5 and a half minutes, but it seemed like it was over so quickly. It was a bittersweet moment when my piece ended. I thought of all the hard work I put into this process and all the hard work my dancers put into the rehearsals. Looking back through this semester, I feel like I have come along way since my solo study, to this final piece “Brittle Difference”. I’m really looking forward to choreographing for my Sr. project in the fall, and will definitely look back to everything I have learned from these studies and my professor to create an aesthetically pleasing piece.

Video from Rehearsal 4/27/11

These aren't all of the final costumes but it is the jist. They will all be wearing a dark gray dress or long shirt that comes up right about their mid-thigh. Christina and Monica don't have on what they will be wearing in this video. As far as hair goes, I'm going to have them braid the top of their hair and wear it down. When we run this again before the show and their hair seems to be getting in the way, I will have them wear a low pony tail. The ending is still rough, I was doing some last minute changes.

Final Project Blog #8 - Week 4 of Rehearsals

Final Project Blog #7

April 14, 2011

The third week of rehearsals for my piece has flown by and I can’t believe how close we are to the show. At this point of the process, the piece is still divided into sections, with no fluid transitions to connect them together. The piece does not yet have unity, and this is something that I really need to focus on. I’m also lacking a climax and a clear relationship between my dancers, as well as the dancer’s intent. Last week’s reading helped me to understand how knowing what my aesthetic in my movement was would help me to better connect to my dancers’ understanding of the movement. I had discovered knew ideas on how to use my time wisely during my rehearsals, as well as working with a knowledgeable awareness of my aesthetic. This opened my mind up to thinking about different aspects of my piece other than the structure.

The reading for this week was over two chapters in Part II of Dance and the Lived Body.  Fraleigh discusses the role of tension as it relates to existential phenomenology as well as dance in Chapter 5 called “Dance Tension.” A focus that stood out to me which I could relate to my creative process was Martin Heidegger’s view of art as poetry.  The chapter states that “any action which is the cause of a thing emerging from non-existence into existence might be called poetry, and all the processes in all the crafts are kinds of poetry, and all those who are engaged in them poets” (84).  I instantly related this statement to my connection with my creative process and my dancers. Through this thought, I can consider myself and my dancers as poets working together from non-existing motion to existing motion, creating a piece of poetry, or art together. When I think of us working together in this way, I feel a sense of community and feel comfortable with my dancers about putting new material and ideas out on the table. It is important for me to feel comfortable through this process because I often second guess myself and my work, and can be extremely critical, which can disturb my creative process. 

Unity in my piece is something that needs much work and development. The sections that I have so far are coming along; however, nothing is bringing them all together. There’s something missing, whether it’s a connection between the dancer, my further exploration on the concept of energy, or both. In the chapter, Fraleigh writes, “no single movement means anything by itself; yet every movement contributes to the expressive tension and meaning of the whole.” (89).

Final Project Blog #6 Rehearsals Continue

April 7, 2011

As I continue my creative process for the final choreographic project, I have found many influencing factors presented in the book.  As a choreographer, it is my job to provide aesthetically pleasing choreography in my work.  I strive to create meaningful movement that touches the dancers as well as the audience.  Being new to choreography for dance as an art, I’ve learned many different ideas to experiment with during my creative process. It is important for me to understand how I want my dancers to perceive the movement and feeling of the movement, so that hopefully the audience will feel the aesthetic intent that I’m going for.  In order for my dancers to understand where I’m coming from or how I want them to do the movement, I have to be very clear in my body and explain the aesthetics.  I have found this step of the process to be more challenging than expected, but the reading has encouraged me to dig deeper into the true aesthetics that I want to show through my work.

The third chapter of Sondra Horton Fraleigh’s Dance and the Lived Body introduced ideas and concepts about the role of aesthetics in dance.  The author discusses that the purpose of dance is its aesthetic intent (Fraleigh 43).  If the dancers aren’t feeling the qualities of the aesthetics of the movement through their sentient life, chances are that the audience isn’t going to understand the aesthetics of the piece, which to the choreographer, results in failure.  Then author then makes a point that “the experience is valued when the aesthetic is realized” (Fraleigh 47).  A goal that I have for myself through this choreographic process is to experience the aesthetics when creating movement for the piece.  The following steps would then be to provide these qualities to my dancers so that they can hopefully complete this process by making these qualities clear to themselves and the audience. 

To prepare myself for this process, I’ve been getting to my rehearsals about an hour early to do some improvising in the space to the music I’ve selected to work with.  This brings my focus into myself and I concentrate on how I feel when my body is moving in certain ways.  Through this step of the process, I then feel mentally and physically ready to work with my dancers when they arrive to rehearsal.  This week I worked with two of my dancers, Sammi and Christina who I have doing a short duet in the piece.  After meeting with my professor and showing her some rough footage, she suggested that I go with a different connection between the dancers that I originally.  I changed up their intentions of effort, and it seems to be coming across as more aesthetically pleasing.  As I watched the two dancers rehearsing the movement, that their aesthetics appear to be different than how I feel them in my body, therefore it doesn’t look how I imagined it would.  To fix this, I need to find imagery that reflects what I’m feeling and give them the images to use when they move. Hopefully through imagery, I will see a difference in a positive way. 

I spent some time in the studio with my solo dancer, Sammi.  For her solo, I though it would be interesting to work together and see how she moves in a relating way to what I’m doing.  “Often the choreographer and the dancer are one in the same, or the choreographer may constitute the dance as he makes the dance for someone else” (Fraleigh 50).  As we were moving together in the space, I could feel that our energies were matching up and the aesthetics in each of our movements were connecting together on the same level.  I feel as though she took on the aesthetics that were coming across in my movement and felt them in her own movement.  I was very satisfied with this rehearsal time and know that with some cleaning and better imagery, the solo will provide the aesthetics I want the audience to feel. 

The reading has opened up my mind to many approaches in my creative process and is providing hope that I will end up with a satisfying product that is aesthetically pleasing to my dancers, the audience, and myself.

   

 

A Trip to the Modern

During Spring Break, I decided to take a trip to the the Fort Worth Museum of Modern Art. I haven't been to many museums, but I will say that The Modern is my absolute favorite out of the ones I have visited. The beautiful architecture of the museum itself takes my breath away every time I visit. After walking around and viewing all of the artwork, I decided to go outside and sit on the patio and just observe my surroundings. It was so peaceful to just sit by myself and take in everything I was seeing. I could've stayed their for a few more hours if I had the time.

My mission for visiting this museum was to select a painting or sculpture that was inspiring to me and to propose the idea of choreographing a piece based on the piece of art I selected. I saw so many beautiful pieces, that it was hard for me to select which one I'd want to choreograph to the most. One piece I imagined choreographing with was Slit, by Carl Andre.

 

The smoothness of the steel and copper gave me the idea to work with texture in my movement and to feel the material on against the bottoms of my feet to then inspire me to discover the texture of my own skin. I enjoyed the room and space this piece was displayed in, and it also appeared to look like a runway which also opened up more choreographic ideas of space. I could have some dancers start behind the white wall, while others were already in the open space. I would definitely want there to be an intereaction with the art and the dancers, and to not just dance around it. I imagined the audience viewing the piece in front on the floor, as well as upstairs looking down onto the lower level.

 As I continued to walk through the museum, I came across the next piece that inspired choreography, Aschenblume, by Anselm Kiefer. I was immediately drawn to this piece of art by its size and texture. For this piece, I would not want the dancer or dancers to make contact with the art, but to perform in front of it to create dimension and space through the room as well as the space that seems to be created in the art.

Once again, texture comes to mind when I think of how I would start to create the movement. There is a thick, bound, heavy quality in the art, so I would want to do some improvisational exercised to play with these dynamics. I could see much of the movement done on a low level, either lying down or on the knees, and focusing both out into the space as well as looking in and beyond the art to enhance to effect of the walls that appear to be in the art.

After viewing this piece for a few minutes, I turned around to then be stunned by the next beautiful sculpture by Kiefer, Book with Wings.

The circular that this piece was displayed in I though would be a very interesting stage space to perform in and have the audience view the piece. I would have them line up behind the white line on the floor and observe the dance. For this piece, I could see myself working with a narrative approach to my creative process. One narrative that came to mind is to have my dancers appear as angels, wearing white flowing dresses that hung all the way down to the floor. The book, in this case, would represent the Bible. I could see simple, light and free movement happening around the sculpture. I imagine beautiful moments of contact among the dancers and a caring, supportive relationship with one another. I can see gliding through the space, as well as lightly running with soft, graceful arms. I also would work with forming shapes in stillness to add onto the already beautiful picture of the sculpture in the space.

Once I walked through the entire museum, I went outside to just relax in the calming atmosphere and to think about my next choreographic project. Out of all the pieces I saw that day, Conjoined by Roxy Paine was the most inspiring of all.

Conjoined is a piece that, in my opinion, was made for choreography. The energy between both stainless steel forms is very captivating to observe, and I believe that having dancers in the atmosphere of this sculpture would attract a large, diverse audience to witness a very compelling performance. Given the opportunity from the administrators of the museum, I would greatly appreciate the experience of connecting movement to this sculpture that already has a feeling of movement within. I could see a very detailed and intricate interaction of the dancers by contact movement that would reflect the feel of the piece. Lifts taken into the air would add excitement and energy. An interesting idea that also comes to mind is having the dancers move in and out of the water to create depth and surprise to the piece. I would allow the audience to view this piece from across the water, from inside the windows, and even the back wall, to get an up close experience with the art.

Visiting the museum was such a great experience to help gain ideas for my creative process through choreography. I would love an opportunity to see a performance in a museum that is inspired by a piece of art and see how the choreographer intereacted and connected the two.  



Final Project Blog#5 - Rehearsals Begin

March 31, 2011

After finishing our in class composition studies, we have now begun our final project for the class.  We are each choreographing our own piece for the Jr. Choreography Concert and I’m very interested to see how this process will turn out.  From doing our previous studies I’ve learned how I go about rehearsing, choreographing, and researching for my work.  This has helped me to prepare for how I want to work on this final project and what I can do to make this process successful.  I’ve also taken into consideration the rehearsals that I’m currently in, and how my choreographer’s go about their own processes.

For my piece, I have a simple concept that I’m working with.  I’m interested in choreographing movement that contains different levels of energy.  Through the energy given, I want to explore the effects of the movement that is caused by different amount of energy being used.  Based on my previous studies, I know I want to play around with more stillness and simplicity, and I want to experiment with my use of space, facings, and levels on a deeper level. I have five dancers in my piece and one understudy.  My goal during my first few rehearsals is to play around with the idea of having either one main dancer that interacts with the four other dancers, or having multiple groupings within the piece. 

When I met with my professor for my first one on one meeting, I had not yet held a rehearsal with my cast.  I was able to show her two short phrases that I’m planning on expanding on and to gather some feedback and ideas that would help me as I begin my process.  She pointed out a couple of areas in my choreography that appeared random.  There wasn’t a clear initiation and impulse to get to these points in the movement, which caused an interruption to the flow.  Everything she suggested was very enlightening to my creative process and will definitely help me as I’m creating more movement for the piece. 

Our class began reading another book called Dance and the Lived Body by Sandra Horton Fraleigh to guide us through this process of choreography and creating a piece for an audience.  The first chapter of the book discusses existentialism into great detail.  As I was reading over this, I kept getting really lost in her writing.  It was hard for me to understand some of the concepts she went into detail about and I found myself getting frustrated in trying to relate this to my creative process.   Towards the end of the chapter, I was able to relate the concept of my piece to her words.  “Grace, freedom, and mastery appear as willfulness disappears and as effortless ease is achieved…movement may also be performed with effortless ease when such movement is intended and fulfilled with the right fit of effort – that is, effort in perfect proportion to intention” (Fraleigh 20).  As Fraleigh speaks of effort and ease in movement and how it relates to whether or not the dancer is moving freely, I was able to gather a connection of the writing and the concept that I’m working with.  I’m going to explore the relationship of effort I use in the movement to the effects of the different results I end up with.  I want to experience the different outcomes myself so that I can describe to my dancers the effort and energy I would like them to use in order to create the effect I’m looking for.  I hope to find myself using a process Fraleigh mentioned by “solving the problems of dance, learning its forms, and creating its feeling” (Fraleigh 21).

So far I’ve only had one rehearsal with my cast.  I was very nervous to see what all was going to happen during the time I had with them, and to see if any creative thoughts would come about.  I started the rehearsal off by going straight into teaching a phrase.  I wanted to see how they moved into comparison to how I move.  After going over the phrase a few times, I decided to watch them and then move them around in the space.  I was pleased with how fast they were able to pick up the choreography and how they were able to adapt to their surroundings when I changed some of their facings.  We learned another phrase then I played around with the spacing just as I did with the previous one.  As I watched them do the movement, I had an idea of a transition that I wanted to try.  It was right on the spot but I felt in my mind that it could work.  We tried a few different ways to get up off of the ground and I had two of my dancers initiating the movement of the other dancers.  After trying out a few ideas, I ended up deciding on one that I felt was pleasing to watch and kept the transition fluid, yet exciting.  This happens near the end of the video where the dancers are all on their right knee facing the stage left back corner with the left arm straight up in the air.  Everyone rolls back and two hold a position to then rock back up to standing, while three are rolling backwards over their shoulder. I had one dancer suspend that roll to create different timing.  Two dancers then walk in a direct pathway to initiate the other dancers’ handstands to then rock back and walk off the stage.  The dancer that suspended the roll then meets up with the other dancer that is running back the other direction to start a new section. I enjoyed everyone being pulled in different directions and it feels like a smooth entrance into the next part.

I surprisingly felt good about what had happened during the first rehearsal. My dancers were very cooperative and willing to try what I had for them.  I feel that I made a decent start and that I can now dig into how I want to clearly create the beginning, middle, and end.  I want to explore the different focuses that could be used, and what types of relationships I want my dancers to have with each other during the piece. “While a dance usually has an objective, repeatable structure, it is subject to individual interpretation and dependent upon the individual body aesthetic of the articular dancer” (Fraleigh 36).  I’m looking forward to seeing what each dancer brings to the piece and to work from their strengths as movers and performers.  What I did learn from the reading is that there are many approaches to finding a mind body connection when creating the intended movement I want to show, and that it is important to know myself as a choreographer, mover, and person and to let that out when putting the pieces together.

A Day in the Life

March 6, 2011

Assignment #4 Chance Dance

“A Day in the Life”

            There were many things to consider when creating this last study before our final project.  We had to compose a piece for five dancers with four different phrases using Laban dynamics, and incorporate ten random props all by chance.  We were to also think about using group facings and levels differently then before, and create a strong climax in the piece.  For the four phrases, we were to simply come up with movement for movement’s sake and not necessarily have a meaning behind it, just as Merce Cunningham composed his works.  I was looking forward to creating movement this way because I usually have a hard time coming up with concepts for my works, and then choreographing for that specific concept.  I also wanted to make sure that I wasn’t cheating this assignment, so I had my dancers help me randomly choose the orders of the phrases as well as the order of props.  This was also our first time to choreograph a study and not perform in it, and this experience I believe helped prepare myself for the final project.

            We briefly discussed the creative process of Abbs in class before working on our previous assignment, the trios.  Smith-Autard’s Section 4 The Creative Process of Dance goes into far more detail of the five steps and even provides a detailed description of Carly Annable’s personal experience working with this process during her choreographic study of Spaceometry.  For this assignment, I didn’t spend much time in phase 1: the impulse to create, unlike Annable, who did much research for her project beforehand.  She did, however, have a year to work on this study, and not just a week.  Instead, I found myself mostly working in phase 2: working with the medium, by coming up with movement and ideas for the piece.  Out of the eight Laban dynamics, I chose to work with Fast, Slow, Heavy, and Light.  It didn’t take me much time at all to create each phrase, and I knew that once I saw each one done by my dancers, that I would probably do some adjusting and even come up with new ideas. 

During my first rehearsal, I ripped up a piece of paper into small pieces with the four different phrases on each one.  I then put them in a bucket, and had one of my dancers, Jake, reach into the bucket and pick the order of the phrases for me.  I wanted this to be completely chance, so I wanted my dancers to be a part of the choosing process of this study.  The order that we ended up with was Heavy, Slow, Fast, and then Light.  We then did the same process of selecting the props from the bucket to see which prop I was going to use with each phrase.  I would have my dancers, Jessy and Yuki, select from the bucket one at a time, and I would go down the list of my phrases and put a prop with each one until they were all chosen.  Being as this was done by chance, I was very surprised at how everything worked out accordingly.  For the Heavy phrase, the props chosen were the pink bucket and the pink small dog.  For the Slow phrase, the props chosen were the candle, the flower candle holder, the flower, and the green snuggie.  For the Fast phrase, the props chosen were the coffee mug and the book.  For the last phrase, the Light one, the props chosen were the scarf and the winter hat.

I appreciated the way Annable collaborated with her dancers and gave them some artistic freedom when introducing new ideas of her study.  “She determined to experiment and explore her visualized images by setting the dancers tasks – some fairly closed and others more open – in order to generate movement ideas from five dancer-creators whilst she selected, amended, and refined their outcomes to fit in her own imagined motifs and phrases for the composition” (Smith –Autard 143).  Reading about this process that Annable used inspired me to also see what ideas I could grasp by setting movement on some of my dancers and giving the others improvisational freedom and to watch the turn out of this experiment.  I used this process when working with my Heavy and Slow phrases and was very pleased with the way things turned out in each of these sections. 

I really wanted to focus on different facings and levels for this study because feedback that I had received on previous studies was that I needed to explore these choreographic areas more.  A part of this study where I was really satisfied was the beginning of the slow phrase.  I had my dancers standing in a close formation, with two facing the back and the other three facing the front.  Then when they started to do the slow phrase and lunge out in different directions it added more depth and was more pleasing to view. 

I was disappointed in the outcome of phase 4: presentation and performance.  All of us had to concentrate on trying to remember each of the six studies and I think due to lack of rehearsal time, we had some memory issues.  I was very pleased with the performances from my dancers during each phrase, and all of them displayed each different dynamic very well.  However, if we had a chance to rehearse more with the props and music, I believe that the study would’ve been stronger to the audience, especially the end.  A couple of props were forgotten during the performance and I’m sure this cause some confusion to some audience members but I thought to myself that “each onlooker will perceive something different” (Smith-Autard 161).  Although I wasn’t completely satisfied with the outcome of my study, I did receive some constructive and positive feedback from my peers and professor that made me feel a little better.  I wasn’t frustrated with my dancers, but I was frustrated with myself for not spending the right amount of rehearsal time and know that it could’ve been a stronger performance.  I will definitely learn from the mistakes I made from this process and will remember this during my creating process during my final project. 

Reaching Resolution

February 22, 2011

Assignment #3 Trio

“Reaching Resolution”

For this assignment, we went from co-collaborating a duet with a partner, to choreographing a trio with three dancers.  The requirements of this assignment were to have mixed meter phrasing, body part initiation, and a breath phrase.  Although I was really looking forward to creating this trio, I was very nervous about completing the requirements asked.  In class, I learned that it is important to make sure the counts of the meter are fitting my movement, and that I shouldn’t try to come up with counts then force movement into the mixed meter.  I was worried that jumping around to different meters was going to make my movement less organic and I feel as though I was challenged with this part of the assignment. I

When I began working on my mixed meter, I simply wrote out my telephone number and visually saw what my mixed meter could very well look like.  It wasn’t until I began creating movement when I realized it this particular set of number was going to work.  I had to first decide was tempo was, and that usually is found out by the first weight shift.  I knew that I wanted to have some sort of running happening at the beginning of the piece, so I knew that I didn’t want the tempo to be very slow.  I had to keep in mind though that if I was going to start out at a brisker tempo, I was going to have to stay consistent with it throughout the piece. I had to decide if it was going to work out, and overall I think the tempo I chose to work with was pleasing.  To make a clear change between the mixed meters, we were to have the count one accented.  I could tell by the response from my peers after performing this trio, that the accents weren’t as clear as I thought I had made them.

Another important part of this assignment was to have body initiations throughout the entire piece.  In class, we did an improvisational exercise in where we were to work with different parts of our body to initiate movement that lead into unusual and interesting movement.  To feel that initiation, we were to imagine that a rope pulling through space.  After doing this exercise, I discovered that I enjoy initiating movement through parts of my body such as the head, the shoulders, the hips, and even the shoulder blades.  These felt the best in my body so I knew I wanted to make sure and incorporate each of them into the piece.   I found it interesting that I enjoyed initiating from my shoulders because I hold so much tension in them and didn’t think that would be a strong part of my body to initiate from.  Surprisingly though, I ended up using my shoulders as movement initiators the most.  With this task, I felt very restricted when creating movement.  I was worried about this part of this assignment because I couldn’t grasp the thought of the entire piece being done with just initiations, and I didn’t feel as though I was getting creative enough in the process.  It took me many tries and a long time in the studio to really get creative with movement flowing from a body initiation. 

In the piece, we were to break away from the mixed meter and have a breath phrase as our timing.  After having a hard time working with the mixed meter, I was looking forward to using our breath to move.  This part didn’t take me long to create, but after putting in on the other two dancers and in the piece, I ended up enjoying it the most.  Not only to do in my body, but to see from the video as well.  Using my breath helped me to tune into my body and feel the initiations rippling throughout and causing other movement to happen.  I decided to have each of us dance in a very tight triangle so that we could hear and feel each other’s breath and move very organically with each other.  Some feedback that I received from the class was that the tight triangular formation wasn’t visually pleasing to watch, and cause awkward moments to happen between the dancers.  Many parts of the piece were done in a flat on, triangle formation.  I think because we didn’t have that much time to prepare the piece, I didn’t pay as close attention to our relationship to each other in space as I should have.  During feedback, I learned from my peers and professor, that parts of the piece seemed flat, and that I should experiment with different facings.  I completely agree with this idea and will definitely put more thought into this element of construction on future pieces. 

The music I chose for this piece was an early 20^th century composer, Claude Debussy.  His piece had a strong, steady tempo to begin with, and was the closest match to how fast I had been counting my movement.  Although I had to have my mixed meter timing over his tempo, I felt that it still enhanced the piece.  I especially enjoyed the musical change that happened as we began our breath phrase.  It transitioned into a lighter, more flowing feel and helped me, and hopefully my other two dancers to really tune in to our breath and have it support the movement. 

One of the questions I asked the viewers was if they saw a climax in the piece, or if there were multiple parts of excitement.  My professor then informed me that a climax doesn’t necessarily have to be exciting, but that it should be a clear difference in the movement.  I believe that gathering in the clump for the breath phrase was our climactic part of the piece.  In the Table 4 of Methods of Construction 5 – Elements of Construction in Smith’s writing, it displayed different ways in which a climax can be achieved.  I believe that our climax fell under a change in quality, a change in our relationship with each other, our space, although that aspect didn’t seem to work, and even our action.  Smith discusses how the climax of the piece is just one part of eight elements that a piece should to properly create a dance piece.  All of them should unify the piece, which is overall the aim in any art (Smith 65).  Watching the video, I feel that I there were parts of the piece, that wish further rehearsing, I could enhance to create more unity.  There were spacing issues, several moments of unison, not enough variation and balance.  Be having these tools to follow from the book, and the choreographic tools I receive in class, I will be able to put my creative work to the test to hopefully create more unified pieces and fit that are visually pleasing.

Through It All

February 13, 2011

Assignment #2 Duet

"Through It All"

            For our second assignment in class, we were to co-choreograph a duet with a peer.  The guidelines for our duet consisted of symmetry in shape and space, asymmetry in shape and space, contact, focus, and simple transitions.  Although this may sound very simple, it was a bit of a challenge for my partner and me.  To help us understand symmetrical and asymmetrical forms visually, we brought in objects of nature from outside into the classroom and set them out on the floor in a pattern to observe.  We were to gather things that were symmetrical and things that were asymmetrical.  Some of the objects that were brought into class were leaves, branches, grass, berries, and more.  We made a line of all the symmetrical objects and a line of all the asymmetrical objects.  Once this was done, we rearranged them to create some unique and beautiful symmetrical and asymmetrical pairings.  When we were done with this, everyone took a few steps back and observed what we had created.  It was simply beautiful.  Within a matter of minutes, we, as a class, created this incredible piece of art.  From this in-class task, I learned that it doesn’t take a lot of time and over analyzing to create art with contrasting shapes.  As a choreographer, I tend to spend much more time that is needed to come up with material, because I’m always over thinking and analyzing my every move.  Working this way can be stressful, unproductive, and not get you very far in your ideas.  I was looking forward to working on simplifying my process of composition, and collaborating with a partner.

We drew names in class to see who we would be working with and I chose Christina.  I was looking forward to working with her because I thought that we would have similar ideas in choreographing.  Once we all had our partners, we did an in-class improvisation with them to get comfortable working and moving together.  Because I know Christina well, it didn’t take me long to get comfortable with her at all.  We first tuned into each other’s breath and then began moving slowly and first.  We stayed in contact for a while, discovering new ways to move together and create shapes.  We then shifted into focusing on each other, first, by making eye contact.  I’m not the best at keeping my composer when making eye contact with someone, so it took us a little time to get used to that feeling.  I then felt comfortable doing this, and we began moving in the space again, but keeping our eyes on each other.  Then we discovered different ways of focusing, for instance, focusing on parts of our own bodies and focusing on parts of each other’s bodies, and constantly switching from each option.  Once we finished moving, I felt a deeper connection to Christina.  We had connected to each other’s breath, bodies, and focus and I found it very comfortable doing so.  After discussing with her, we were exciting to begin choreographing together, now that we had these new ideas and tools to work with.   

For our music, we were to choose from a composer from the Classical period; Haydn, Mozart, Beethoven, and Schubert to name a few.  In the music analysis class I had taken a couple of years ago, I did a study on Schubert’s work.  Because I was comfortable with this composer, I knew that I most likely wanted to choose one of his works for our duet.  Christina and I browsed through all four of these composers’ works and both agreed to narrow our choices down to some of Schubert’s works.  We came across one and immediately fell in love with the idea of working with it.  The music selection we chose was performed by Vladimir Horowitz and was the collaboration and Liszt and Schubert titled “Soirees de Vienne: Valse-Caprice No. 6.” We enjoyed the dramatic tone of the piano and thought it would be an interested process to choreograph to this piece of music, so we went for it!

When Christina and I started our process of choreographing, we were over thinking and not coming up with a lot of material to work with.  We were frustrated with the guidelines, because we weren’t coming up with very creative ways to by symmetrical, and weren’t sure how to make the shapes appear organic instead of just thrown in the piece.  We worked in front of the mirror mostly to make sure the shapes that we did design looked aesthetically pleasing to us.  I read in our book Dance Composition that the “relationship of lines and shapes in space should make the dance a pleasure to view – an aesthetic experience. It is like standing back to view a beautiful cathedral” (Smith-Autard 54).  We asked our professor to watch our beginning to see if we were off to a good start, and she gave us some feedback as well as suggestions on how to make to more unique, and pleasing to watch.  Once we stopped questioning ourselves and just kept on throwing ideas out there, we began to get the hang of it and were working together greatly.  We decided to add eye focus to walks around each other throughout the piece to feel a connection with each other when we were dancing.  We were playing around with asymmetrical shapes and came up with some interesting counterbalances and shapes to work with.  We played off the music and planned on accenting different parts with our shapes. “The dancer’s feeling of shape through kinesthetic sensation of the movement is a very important aspect of presentation of the dance to an audience” (Smith-Autard 42).  We reworked some of the shapes and how we moved into them to make sure they had meaning and purpose.

 

Because our schedules were different, we didn’t have as much time as we would’ve liked to rehearse our duet.  On the day of showing, we were a little nervous as to how it was going to turn out when we performed it.  Although we had a few memory and timing issues when we were performing, we received some surprising feedback.  Some things that were said were that they really enjoyed the shapes we made, our relationship with each other, and our connection to the movement.  Although we were unsure of our piece, we seemed to have pleased our audience, which than pleased us! I really enjoyed collaborating with a partner and I look forward to working on duets in the future now that I’ve worked on my choreographic process in a different way.



Downside-Up

January 27, 2011

Assignment #1 Solo

“Downside-Up”

Our first assignment for this class was a solo study.  We were to create a dance that had “You movement” and “Unlike you movement” as well as incorporate our identity into the choreography.  I felt very overwhelmed about this assignment and knew this was going to be a hard challenge.  I’ve had experience choreographing in the past, but in a very different form and style. I was very interested in the creative process and what I was going to discover about myself along the way.

The visual image I chose to use to represent my creative process was very abstract.  When I came across this image, I immediately noticed the shape and colors.  In my opinion, the colorful figure in the image represented an upside-down body, with the legs extended upward, appearing to be in a handstand. The thicker, more colorful part of the figure towards the bottom of the image looked to me like a skirt or dress that is falling towards the upper body. I instantly connected to this image because I really enjoy upside down movement such as handstands, inversions, cartwheels, flips, and more.  The vibrant colors reminded me of energy, brightness, happiness, laughter, freedom, and excitement.  A dark and mysterious background, representing negativity and uncertainty in my life, surrounds the bright figure in the image.  I can relate to this image as a whole because I have so much brightness in my life, but I also experience negativity in areas of my life that can at times, obstruct the beautiful colors. This image is a strong representation of my identity, as well as the movement that I enjoy doing.

When I thought about the “You movement” for myself, I had an idea of what I thought I enjoyed doing. After an in-class exercise, however, I discovered new ideas about my movement that I would have never imagined.  When referring to the Laban Dynamics, I think of my movement as being heavy, bound, fast, and direct, but after I performed an authentic movement exercise, I learned differently.  My peer in class observed my improvisation of authentic movement that felt good to me.  She described the movement that she saw in my body, and noticed that the Laban dynamics that fit me were light, bound, slow, and direct.  This was eye opening to me because I always thought of myself to move more heavy and fast, rather than light and slow.  This created a sense of confusion and wonder as I then worked on creating my “You movement” phrase.  Some ways of moving that I really enjoy are using the space, jumping and leaping, core/distal, upside down, changing levels, and powerful.  After gathering information up about my “You movement”, I was anxious to see how I was going to incorporate everything into my own choreography and to have it flow organically.

Figuring out the “Unlike you movement” for the solo was very challenging.  Some ways of moving that I don’t enjoy doing are staying in place, flow, super slow, and stiff.  I tried movement that felt uncomfortable in my body or out of my element.  When relating my “You movement” to my “Unlike you movement”, I found myself in a very complex position to choreograph.  Listing all of these ideas about my movement was one step in the creative process.  However, when I found myself trying to create movement for a certain section, the two ideas began to crossover each other and I found myself in a stressful, uncertain mindset.  I confronted my professor for guidance in this problem and the advice really helped.  She made me realize that I was thinking too hard and over analyzing my every move and if I were to keep working that way, I would not be satisfied with my work. 

After observing my very “rough” draft of my solo, my professor pointed out ideas that could help enhance the choreography.  I realized that I wasn’t even thinking about my floor pattern, because I was moving around in a repetitive figure-8 floor pattern, that wasn’t aesthetically pleasing to watch.  She also brought to my attention to think about the way I use my extremities when I dance, and suggested going to the extreme points of opposition to show contrast between the two different parts of the solo.  I found that the reading assignment given for this study was very beneficial to this first study because it pointed out some basic information about composition.  “When we apprehend – perceive, and imagine things and enjoy them for their own sakes – for their form – the forms seem meaningful to us, and this is an aesthetic situation (Smith –Autard 4).  By better understanding how art appears aesthetic through a composition, it took my choreography to a deeper, more personal level.  

After performing my solo in class, I received feedback from my peers as well as my professor that was really helpful in understanding how to improve the way I choreograph.  A couple of comments that stood out to me from the feedback I received was that they appreciated the testing of my balance, how I played with the relationship of my arms to my body, and that my dynamics, emotions, and intent were all clear.  It felt good to hear these comments because I doubted my choreography and felt unsure about how the audience was going to observe and understand it.  I think the AB structure of the piece worked with my intent and was supported by the music selection of Vivaldi’s “Double Cello Concerto,” performed by Bobby McFerrin.  Something that I think I lacked within this assignment was really exposing my identity through the movement.  Although I did succeed at creating “You movement” and “Unlike you movement,” I didn’t feel that my identity was really pouring out of the movement.  One of the biggest challenges I hope to overcome through this composition class is to be true to my movement, my identity, and my choreography, and to build a strong connection to my work.