-pause-［中場］is done, bye bye KaoHsiung

The show, 中場, was pretty simple, a 30-minute showing of the work we've been doing for the last weeks, particularly the last two weeks here in the South: four dancers (two in black suits, two in white, long winter underwear), a beautifully blank, huge studio space, some talcum powder and a chair. Some music, and over 150 audience members filling the performing space pretty much to the brim. 

The process, these last two weeks in residency at WeiWuYing (衛武營) here in KaoHsiung, was anything but. It was full of doubts, uncertainties, troublesome thoughts, physical strain and pretty much all my fears, wrapped in one portable package, for me to enjoy.

It was tremendously exhausting, and most days of rehearsals were, for me, disappointing. And it was, it is all for the best. We didn't discover fire, nor revolutionize the world of dance with it, but, in small, very personal, very internal ways, I did.. something. I overcame. I think. I proved, to myself more than to anyone on the outside, that, well, it can be done. The "movement" can be learned. 

There's a lot more to this, but despite feeling that I have, somewhat embodiedly (is it even a word?), dealt with the conscious/subconscious fears that have kept me up late nights day after day, it's once again mighty late/early in the morning. And I need to rest.

So thank you. Thank you process. Thank you body. Thank you dance. Thank you fears. Thank you 驫.

and after the long, sleepless soliloquy, another more concise, more precise quote...

...from the same Anna Teresa De Keersmaeker's video.

"it was sort of teaching myself, searching and teaching myself how to make a dance, what were the things I liked."

This is what I am doing. Right now.

The teaching, and the searching, continues.  

(ps: I am so lucky.)

something heard/saw today, something remembered (finally!) yesterday (which will surely prompt a long-winded soliloquy)

"...it becomes very much about the amount of space you occupy in a certain amount of time. Precision becomes very crucial."
(Anna Teresa De Keersmaeker, speaking after a small show at NY's MoMA)

It's a good reminder. A good mantra to keep in mind. Something to DO, every moment, in the studio, and even outside of it. 

(The quote is from this, simple, very good video. The rest of it is from me, from us at Horse Dance Theatre, from the blessed studio.)

The struggle has continued, all through the silence of this "blog" (internet issues, couldn't get anything written/published, plus sheer exhaustion).

The struggle with the lack of focus, the lack of energy--no doubt the two are related (I feel like I am redundantly saying the obvious 90% of the time. Perhaps I should rename this experiment "Duh...")--has continued daily.

I've been too serious, and not in a positive, healthy way: just too darned serious to enjoy, to have a good time, to breathe. My body, muscles, joints, digestive system, has been in knots, and no wonder. I would have needed someone to gave me a good shaking, literally, and tell me: "loosen up, kid!".

Because this is, despite/because it's so important, supposed to be FUN. Yes, fun, FUN, capital F capital U capital N. Because otherwise it's just too much to deal with. It becomes too hard (instead of impossibly hard), and I/one just can't deal with that. One ends up developing, or dwelling more often/deeper, in neuroses and bad habits that do very little to help the work. 

And yesterday it finally (re)dawned on me: this is FUN. It's fun! It's a blessing. Sure, my body aches, my back is killing me, my belly is bloated, I am not sleeping well nor enough. But I get to do this, day in and day out. For a living. A very frugal living, but still.

It's a realization that will take some time to sink back in, to drill through the layers of stale BS I've been shrouding myself in for God/god/Goddess knows whatever reason. (It's fear. Plain and simple. Duh.)  But it's another good beginning. And through this process, in which all the bad, all the evil, all the ugly, all the lazy, all the complacent is made to surface, displayed, even paraded around, well, I will need a lot of beginnings. One for every bad habit and every fear I am trying to shed seems like an acceptable/necessary ratio. 

And so we continue. I continue. Two days until the showing. I am sleeping too little, still, but I feel my inner energy and strength resurfacing, somewhat. It's a good omen. And it's about fricking time it did, in all honesty...


Precision. Focus. Fun. Hard work. Laughter. Even a glass of red wine or two. They can all coexist, be part of the process. And they ought to.

this is what we live for

the real value

"the real value (of the exercises) lies in not being able to do them."
J. Grotowski


thank you for the reminder, maestro. 

homework for today, and for every day:

...is finding the focus I lost. 
Is giving myself the discipline I need.
I should be good at this, but, honestly, I am failing.
Beyond the difficulties of learning the dance, and learning to dance (a certain way), this is the struggle right now. 


From failure, they say, comes success. 


So here we go. 

catching up

first things first: 
I must catch up on sleep, then catch up with the connection between myself and the work. And only then, I think, I'll be able to catch up with what's been left silent in the last few weeks. 


I will explain, as/where necessary, what's been happening since the creative process began in mid-January.


For now, this update: 
we are in 高雄 (KaoHsiung), Southern Taiwan, in residency for two weeks at 衛武營藝術文化中心 (WeiWuYing Culture and Arts Center), rehearsing and showing a bit of (previous) work on March 13th, at the local Theatre Space 281. It's quite thrilling to be here, and have the space and time to breathe and focus. 

And focusing now requires that I, quite simply... sleep. Tomorrow we begin.  

好久不見~ it's been a while...

yes it has. 

Why? The simple answer is that I've been, and am, overwhelmed. 

By the task at hand. By its difficulty. And by those self-imposed limitations and fears that often creep up, threatening to trump creative acts.

I've spent the last few weeks utterly disappointed and mostly fearful (of not being good enough for this): looking for a breakthrough, I've instead managed to exhaust myself. 

I thought this writing process could be a simple companion, log of the creative process, an explanation of processes and techniques, rather than a very personal diary, a very intimate struggle. I was wrong. Because what I'm doing, I am realizing more and more, is working on myself, for myself and against my own blocks and bad habits, in order to allow the creative act to arise. 

This may sound obvious, but the writing I will be doing is going to be very personal. Perhaps uncomfortably so. Necessarily so. 

 

To paraphrase someone greater who's come before: -creativity- demands, first, the destruction of what's blocking the creativity from happening, the lying bare of the habits and the overcoming of them. 

Furthermore, I think it's time to make this diary "public", and not because throes of people out there are waiting to read it, but because doing so will help in keeping it even more honest, while ensuring, perhaps, a higher standard of composition. This is personal, but it's not going to be just an unabashed vomiting of words and feelings onto virtual paper.