Is this what dancers do?

I've also been contemplating the question that someone asked after my piece on Tuesday:

"Is this what dancers do?"

Rather than attempting to answer the question, which I could never do completely, I wanted to share links to a few videos by my favorite choreographers:

Low, by Donna Uchizono
This tango-inspired piece was created while the company was in residency in Argentina. I saw it performed in Minneapolis and spoke with one of the dancers afterwards who had not been part of the original production. She said it had taken her two weeks to learn just a few minutes of the choreography because it was so intricate. This same laser-focus on small details was also part of Uchizono's recent piece In Thin Air which was presented at ODC Dance Center in SF this past Winter.

Wet Woman, by Mats Ek
This piece is performed by Sylvie Guillem, who is a superstar dancer with the Royal Ballet of London. Mats Ek's work could be described as classical ballet, slightly skewed.

I'll add more...

Whispering trees

The images from Robbyn's presentation on 3D/installation art have stayed in my brain since Tuesday. I'm really interested in the aspect that has to do with creating spaces that evoke a specific response. I loved the photos of the Cardburg event and Kurt Schwitters' Merzbau.

One memory of an installation art experience that is imprinted on my brain is from back in 1996 or 1997 at the Centre Pompidou in Paris. I don't know the artist's name, but someone had created a small forest in the stone courtyard in front of the museum, with row upon row of fir trees - not decorated, just plain. As you walked through the trees, there were voices whispering "Merry Christmas" in different languages, and you could smell the scent of pine. I remember it being quite magical. Not very universal from a cultural standpoint, but quite lovely.

A couple years ago I also heard someone describe an experience that sounded pretty intense: It was at a world's fair like event, somewhere in Europe - maybe Switzerland. They had created an installation in a huge square structure where a small bridge led out to a wooden boat in the middle of the space. The boat was surrounded by water and there was a constant thundering pour of rain. The intent was to simulate The Flood, as in biblical. The woman who described it said it left her speechless. I will try to see if I can get more info...

The ways that art stays with us

About eight years ago I saw a Wallace and Gromit film by the Aardman guys. Before the main feature they showed a couple short films, including this one, which features the song "My Baby Just Cares For Me," by Nina Simone.

There was something about this 5-minute film that delighted me. I don't know if it was the song, which I had never heard before, or the goofy little cat who falls in love with the sultry cabaret diva kitty. For some reason the film has stayed with me all these many years and I kept thinking I would so love to see it again.

This morning it dawned on me that that, as is true for so many things these days, someone, somewhere has probably posted the film on YouTube! And sure enough, there it was...

...watching it was an interesting experience. After eight or years or so of this piece living in my memory bank with fond associations, it was completely different than I remembered. Still cute, but with out the utter charm that I seemed to remember. Which makes me think of the legacy of art: sometimes it happens that we find a way to keep the piece alive in a way that is close to the original -- we play the same song over and over or have a print or a photograph that we can look at repeatedly. Sometimes, as with live performance, or an aesthetic experience of some kind that just "happened" and we were in the right place at the right time, all that remains is the impression that the experience made upon us. Perhaps in these types of experiences, we become artists, too: adding to the work by embellishing it with our own associations.

Maybe sometimes it's better not to watch something again...?

Hard day, but it's really nothing comparatively...

It has been an interesting couple of weeks here. Too much on the brain. But whenever I get in this space I think of Bill Shannon, aka CRUTCH. This guy is amazing. Truly amazing.

Seonna Hong

Today at the small library in Stinson Beach I found a pot of gold! People often drop off books to donate, and also sometimes stacks of magazines that people can take for free. In a cardboard box by the door was a stack of Artforum magazines, just quietly waiting for me to adopt them and mine them for all sorts of ideas.

I'm going through the first one page by page now, surgically removing images I'd like to use in my 2D self-portrait. I've also come across several intriguing artists, including Seonna Hong.

Her painting "Retreat" is pasted above.

Wanderlust

I'm still pondering the new video by Björk called "Wanderlust," created by the 3D animation folks at Encyclopedia Pictura in SF.

I dig her music, but I think I'm even more fascinated by her process. She has such a deep taproot into Icelandic culture, and through it draws up a sort of timeless, chthonic energy that gets blended with contemporary forms to produce work that's completely authentic but also (in my book) avant-garde. I also have serious respect for her originality - her faithfulness to her artistic vision is almost hermit-like, but then she ends up doing these amazing collaborations that pull out new facets of her music.