Title: Elecrical Sharing
Performers: Zoi Tsalavarides, Eleni Pantazatou and Nefeli Ikonomou
Mentor: Ana Sanchez Coldberg
Music: Kiriakos Spirou
Venue: Kinitiras Residency Center, Athens
Premiere: 20th December 2011
Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cRqgbZaqOPA&list=PLJpNTFlVWARB2C
The idea of the project is to critically address observations from cybernetics and cognitive science in a choreographic constellation and it is oriented to this quote:
“The meaning that is “working”, is the meaning of the body, developed through various senses and dependent on the precise rhythm of the images, sounds, pauses, and intensifications that define what is inadequately known as the “flow” “( Aesthetic of human understanding, Mark Johnson)
The basic question of the project is how meaning is constructed in a multi-layered situation and how can two agents interact non- linearly in order to create a common shared “flow” that engages communication, co-operation and co-evolvement.
It is suggested that meaningful images are not representations in the classical sense, for they are not “about” some extra mental content that would constitute their meaning. Instead they are patterns by which the contours of our understanding take shape and undergo transformation. They do not picture or represent objects and events as they simply are the patterns of our experience of those objects and events.
This project investigates and reflects on these patterns and is trying to find strategies for “a choreography of meaning processes”.The dancers of the piece go through emotional and psychical landscapes and visit their multiple histories to create common grounds.
The Method and the process
The research lasted four months of preparation thought which documentation, research and presentation were parts of the daily practice.The two dancers are actively interacting with each other mentally were the third is only observing the other and is “documenting” the effects of their relationship in a bodily way.The two dancers are called to practice a certain methodology every day were the third has to comment and dance upon the mental constructs produced by the other dancers.
The methodology helps the investigation of the emerging questions about connections, relations and of how we produce meanings. The methodology for the two dancers is in three parts:
The first part is about making the dancers think and realize their autopoietic features-the things that they personally name that characterize them the most and bringing these elements into consciousness. Also the first part aims to connect the two dancers emotionally and make them interact in a more direct way.
The second part addresses issues of choice making and memories. As mentioned in relevant bibliography, we choose the things we want to remember and every time we revive them we deconstruct them-we “build” them again in a different way..but by this reconstruction many things emerge. Additionally in order for the experiment to evolve “uncontrolled” situation it had to engage in an active way a second agent. So when the dancer comments and interacts with the other dancer the past experience is deconstructed within the scope of another person and the memories change identity and they becomes something new. These mental constructs are their own space and they act as basis in which they start building their story.
The third part is about exploring the issue of how this shared construct can be developed by two agents…can they share it? Can they communicate it and live in presence together in order to create new “meaningful” memories together?
The writing tasks have to do with self-reflecting practices that change through daily repetition. They act as a framing in order to “de-frame”
Writing Tasks
Note: before the dancers start dancing they reflect on their self’s and the other by the following writing task:
Write 5 things that characterize were you stand as a person now
Write 5 things that you like about your activities
Write 5 things that you dislike about your activities
Write 5 things that you beleive are characteristic of the other dancer
Write 5 things that you like about the other dancer’s performance
Write 5 things that you dis-like about the other dancer performance
Notice: you only have 5 seconds for each question
INFLUENCE FROM THE PAST
Note: The dancers move in two stages-in the first only one of them moves and the other observes and in the second they both move but not together. They follow the below tasks:
Stage 1: to the dancer No1: Remember an important day of your life and re-vive actions connected to your memories in the physical space
to the dancer No2-: Observe her, remember all the important details and pay attention to everything that the other dancer is suggesting
Stage 2:
to dancer No1 : Listen and respond in a bodily way to the performance of the other dancer. Appropriate the physical actions presented by the other dancer in your own way.
to the dancer No2: Comment through a drawing on the physical actions of the other performer
Notice: when one moves the other doesn’t
ELECTRICAL SHARING
Note: in this part the two dancers work together
Support each other to activate memories in the space through physical actions. Do not agree on your actions verbally but work together the landscape of this experience.
Stop dancing
Write or draw about what you believe you did in the last part and about what you believe sharing, supporting and communicating is.
Notice: you only have 10 seconds to write
This methodology was followed every day by the two dancers .The third was observing and creating a solo piece from the prints of the other dancers.
Quotes during the months of the research
“it is like a third eye has been opened and it stared observing, realising, researching and collecting small pieces of information about me, about dance, about choreography…it was at the same time a raise of awareness but also a beginning of a journey…a journey with no end (until the last moment)…i can’t wait till I “meet” my task again….”
”somehow relevant to what existence is…the electricity flows around the space …it is this stream…this stream going around each part of your body…this hope that something will emerge, something will go higher than you…i can feel the moments i am open…open to the possibility of total loss, loss of myself, loss of control…these are the moments i feel electricity passing through my whole body…the moments i feel suspended, the moments i feel detached, shacked but sure, sure for just listening and participating to the stream…something that i cannot stop, control, question because in these moments I am BEING THERE…is like these moments because only then I feel like i am living in normal speed”