Programme
‘Potential; Darkness of the body’
(part 1)
By
Greta Jokubauskaite in collaboration with Ian Fisher and Tony Agar
Have you ever been frustrated? Have you ever
been lost? Have you ever been stuck?
This project is about finding a way to
venture beyond the obstacles and to find the potential within the body through
the darkness of the body, using the power of imagination. Refining the
imagination and having the ability to form a mental image of something that is
not perceived through the five senses, and considering the creative power of
imagination as an important role in the achievement of success in any field,
the image of the darkness of the body is chosen in order to make space within
the body and mind for potential to arrive - the darkness of the body, refined
as dimensionless, objectless, limitless and endless, clears out the mind and
becomes a space of potential.
The work is made collaborating with
musicians, incorporating dance and music, developing the idea these two
disciplines being completely dependent of each other.
The
power of imagination is more important than knowledge. A. Einshtein
The strongest influence on this work and the
main idea is taken from Antony Gormley,
the sculpture. His approach to ‘the darkness of the body’ was not only inspirational
in this work, but widely explored and developed. Pina Bausch’s work was also an influence in giving a desire to
concentrate on the emotional aspects, the expressiveness of the darkness of the
body, and also giving the desire to explore what moves the body. Miranda Tufnell’s and Chris Crickmay’s
ideas and scores for traveling through imagination were extremely useful and
made a massive difference in the process of work. Meredith Monk’s work served the project by inspiring the different
ways of making music, and involving music in the project in general. Her ways
of expressiveness, pushing the boundaries and variations in music and voice
gave different quality of music, inviting more openness to variations,
affecting the movement quality. And me, with a telling interest in
expressiveness of the emotions through the body, interest and experience in SRT
and desire to cross-discipline my artistic work as well as improve as a person.
Creative Process
The
work has been process-orientated. It began from an idea arising through a
interest in Antony Gormley’s work and the desire to explore it in a slightly
different way compared to previous explorations made during Performance
Projects. Then more research was made in relation to the idea, as well as performance
notion in general and somatic practices, mainly SRT. The following actions were
taken making and doing the scores relevant to the idea, including performing
scores with other people as well as my independent explorations. It also
involved drawing and the use of lighting, which detoured and disappeared along
the progression of process as a matter in performance, though remained as a way
of expressiveness whilst documenting the work and as an inspirational palpable
evidence of work. As more research was made, along research of Meredith Monk’s
work, music became increasingly integral to the project. The intensive
practical work with musicians took place using different scores, which
developed from independent explorations of the idea to responsiveness to each
other, and, finally, to absolute interflow and interaction of all the
participants. There was lots of reflecting, whether verbal or writing/drawing
based, evaluating and decision making towards the current rendition of the
piece, which helped to define the progression and make discoveries stay and be
transferred into a potential performance, as well as stimulate to further
development. It is important to mention, the work was process-orientated rather
than product-orientated, which was clearly stated and remained that way at all
times, even if found challenging. I constantly referred back to the original
idea and artists of interest remained during the whole process in order to stay
with the idea and notice the differences of perception. Daydreaming was also a
big part of the process as not only being reasonable for containing the
interest, but, most importantly, because of selecting essential material and
managing the process, as a number of ideas came up during the process that had
to be bypassed in order to achieve more depth and keep the most relevant material. The final
touch till the moment, was evaluating the whole work, and setting up some
material by making a score for performance and set the cues, as, even remaining
previous discoveries, the performance is improvised.
Enjoy
witnessing this part of the exploration, and finding the potential through
darkness of the body.
What
potential does the journey through darkness of the body bring to you?
I
would like to thank Amy Voris and Dance/Theatre students, for the support during
the whole process, and mostly, for Ian Fisher and Tony Agar, I would be nowhere
without them!
The sketch of this work can be seen at:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lZVJU728zGA
