For June 11:
Building Home by Bob Leonard
For week of June 15:
Decolonizing Aesthetics
Creating Visceral Theatre
For week of June 22:
Aesthetics is a verb
(This link is to an excerpt, please review the full transcript as well)
Chrystal Channelle Truscott speaks specifically about certain artistic (aesthetic) choices made because of work that is to be of/speak of African American survival and endurance; e.g. a cappella, repetition. Based on what you have been seeing, creating and participating in -
What kinds of aesthetic choices are made to link to a particular rooting in values that are held to be true?
Are their contradictions at times?
What about in the creation and rehearsal of making work? What kinds of practices in the rehearsal room create their own aesthetic of social engagement? Democratic practice? Other?
Tip of the iceberg:
Read Eiko Otake's "An Artist as A Cultural Activist"
Read my Artist Statement
Read about El Teatro Campesino
Research others, from artists whose work falls into the realm of our research. Find company mission statements and artist statements.
Sort out community engagement and stage work - what are the connections?
Assignment: Reflect on your own developing sense of a personal aesthetic that considers these ideas.
In what you view, make, and how you create with others. For the stage, for engagement off stage - what are your thoughts?
Bring to share. By June 29 post these thoughts to the blog.
For weeks of July 5, July 12
- Read chapter 8, "The Hidden Authoritarian Roots in Western Concert Dance" in "Dance, Human Rights, Social Justice"
Consider the idea of "aesthetics of rehearsal process", or maybe "core values" in rehearsal processes. In observing Youth Creates, and reflecting on the two other experiences think about the methods, tools and strategies in use.
- Read chapter 8, "The Hidden Authoritarian Roots in Western Concert Dance" in "Dance, Human Rights, Social Justice"
Consider the idea of "aesthetics of rehearsal process", or maybe "core values" in rehearsal processes. In observing Youth Creates, and reflecting on the two other experiences think about the methods, tools and strategies in use.
Not for critical (as in judgmental)l purposes, but as a way to think on these ideas, isolate a tool, method or strategy that you have observed and reflect:
"When x happens, it implies "y".
Example: "When everyone goes around the circle and introduces themselves in a sequential order, it implies that every voice is valid and will be heard - from the shyest to the most outspoken."
- Read chapter 2, "Practical Imperative" and reflect on the question on page 18, "Is dance by its nature inevitably authoritarian? Can human rights coexist with the aims of dance, the art of the body? Or will dance be acutely bound to represent stifled individuals, their humiliation and their desire for freedom because it is so interlinked with suppression and violation of the human body itself? And what would a democratic or a rights-based dance look like? Can such a thing exist? Would this be the ultimate anti-art, so politically correct and unprovocative, that it becomes absurdly boring?" (Don't limit the ideas to just dance, theatre is also an embodied form.)
View work and listen or read interviews with Choreographers like Sean Dorsey, Bill T. Jones; and Directors/Playwrights who are creating work with a social justice agenda as well. How are they talking about, discussing, their rehearsal practices when they make work that has a social justice agenda?
Consider this quote from theatre director Ann Bogart:
"Onto the politics of rehearsal. We talked a little bit about the words you use. I would just say that the theatre is always about one thing, and it’s what distinguishes it from any other artform. The theatre is about social systems, meaning, how are we getting along? How are characters getting along? No other artform uses that as its essential material. Certainly not dance, certainly not visual art, but the theatre is always asking this question. So every play asks this question, how are we getting along? So Oedipus killed his mother, slept with his father, so there’s a problem. The play starts when something goes wrong, and the rest of the play is to see that social system or that family, which is a social system, try to regain balance from a state of imbalance. That’s what happens in a play. Now what I want to propose to you—hold onto your hats—is that when an audience sees a play, they actually are seeing two plays. They’re seeing the story of Oedipus meeting his fate, but they’re also seeing the story of the actors on the stage and how they’re getting along. You can’t really hide bad rehearsal process in a performance. You just can’t. So our job is to create the kind of rehearsal room in which a society that you can believe in can happen. Every time there’s the event of theatre, there are a number of things going on. There’s the play, there’s the story of the actors that the audience is getting in their minds. There’s also the question, how are the actors getting along? How is the audience getting along? How are the actors and the audience getting along? That’s in the room. That’s the subject of the theatre. That’s the stuff that we lose when we’re not in the theatre. That’s the stuff that has to be celebrated. - See more at: http://howlround.com/the-role-of-storytelling-in-the-theatre-of-the-twenty-first-century#sthash.fKhKClWh.dpuf"
"When x happens, it implies "y".
Example: "When everyone goes around the circle and introduces themselves in a sequential order, it implies that every voice is valid and will be heard - from the shyest to the most outspoken."
- Read chapter 2, "Practical Imperative" and reflect on the question on page 18, "Is dance by its nature inevitably authoritarian? Can human rights coexist with the aims of dance, the art of the body? Or will dance be acutely bound to represent stifled individuals, their humiliation and their desire for freedom because it is so interlinked with suppression and violation of the human body itself? And what would a democratic or a rights-based dance look like? Can such a thing exist? Would this be the ultimate anti-art, so politically correct and unprovocative, that it becomes absurdly boring?" (Don't limit the ideas to just dance, theatre is also an embodied form.)
View work and listen or read interviews with Choreographers like Sean Dorsey, Bill T. Jones; and Directors/Playwrights who are creating work with a social justice agenda as well. How are they talking about, discussing, their rehearsal practices when they make work that has a social justice agenda?
Consider this quote from theatre director Ann Bogart:
"Onto the politics of rehearsal. We talked a little bit about the words you use. I would just say that the theatre is always about one thing, and it’s what distinguishes it from any other artform. The theatre is about social systems, meaning, how are we getting along? How are characters getting along? No other artform uses that as its essential material. Certainly not dance, certainly not visual art, but the theatre is always asking this question. So every play asks this question, how are we getting along? So Oedipus killed his mother, slept with his father, so there’s a problem. The play starts when something goes wrong, and the rest of the play is to see that social system or that family, which is a social system, try to regain balance from a state of imbalance. That’s what happens in a play. Now what I want to propose to you—hold onto your hats—is that when an audience sees a play, they actually are seeing two plays. They’re seeing the story of Oedipus meeting his fate, but they’re also seeing the story of the actors on the stage and how they’re getting along. You can’t really hide bad rehearsal process in a performance. You just can’t. So our job is to create the kind of rehearsal room in which a society that you can believe in can happen. Every time there’s the event of theatre, there are a number of things going on. There’s the play, there’s the story of the actors that the audience is getting in their minds. There’s also the question, how are the actors getting along? How is the audience getting along? How are the actors and the audience getting along? That’s in the room. That’s the subject of the theatre. That’s the stuff that we lose when we’re not in the theatre. That’s the stuff that has to be celebrated. - See more at: http://howlround.com/the-role-of-storytelling-in-the-theatre-of-the-twenty-first-century#sthash.fKhKClWh.dpuf"
No comments:
Post a Comment