Wednesday 23 December 2015

The projects with Kenyon College as part of the Global Connections partnerships came to a conclusion Thursday 17th December 2015.  In a two hour Skype encounter participants shared the outcomes of their projects, exchanging feedback as well as considering ideas for future developments.

The individual projects can be acccessed through the artists pages.

Enjoy! 

Thursday 10 December 2015

Projects continue...update 11th December 2015


The main page has gone quiet as most of the activity is now taking place within each artist's page, click the tabs to follow their progress!.  The page is both an archive of the projects as well as a means for the partnerships to communicate and exchange ideas across the Atlantic.  The final projects will be presented next Thursday 17th December 2015 in a skype group session Greece-Ohio!

More to come!

Wednesday 2 December 2015

Tuesday 24 November 2015

Thoughts from the studio floor- catching up 24.11.2015

Last week we completed our solo studies-  they should appear in the blog quite soon.  Today, in preparation for the collaboration with Kenyon College, we explored 'remote' dialogues/duets through a single (one-way) live link.  We considered the challenges that it presents as in many ways the space shared and created by the dancers across the three places of performance seems to require more attention that the detail of the movement material.  Scale and contrast are important.  Bodies becomes textures... not signs...

Wednesday 18 November 2015

Collaboration Studies

Hello again! Marc here. These are the results of our collaborative studies: a duet and a quartet. Initially in the process we worked silently - observing and building off of each others movement in quiet unison. This allowed us to achieve a happy medium between each dancers style, for each voice to be equally loud. In subsequent classes we met to refine each piece and create a sound score that involved non music based noise. Enjoy! We look forward to collaborating soon!

Alone Together - Maddie and Marc

Out Alone - Ian, Catie, Bridget and Laura

Tuesday 3 November 2015

Thoughts from the studio floor- 3.11.2015

More work on developing the material- we discussed that precise issue:  what does it mean to treat the material.  We propose it is not only about 'the movement material', but a larger issue of the 'materiality' of performance, its actuality, its 'sensorial' existence. its here-ness/there-ness.  How is that shaped and elaborated in what we call 'a work'? 

Tuesday 27 October 2015

Thoughts from the studio floor- 27.10.2015

The process we are now entering poses challenges- how does the intimate and very personal 'me studies' transform into a choreographic work that stands 'alone' so to speak.  Today's workshop draws its inspiration from a statement that Preston-Dunlop makes in  Looking at Dances (1988) with reference to 'kinetic content':  to work like a craftsman to refine;  being able to gain some distance from the material and see what it 'requires' in order to make choices that clarifies what will be offered to the audience.   We revisit choreographic devices as a tool box that allows us to act upon the material.  We go back to guided workshops: each dancer chooses three devices and either develops material from the existing or allows the device to generate new.... finding subtleties...

REPETITION
INSTRUMENTATION
RETROGRADING
TEMPO
EMBELLISHMENT
INVERSION
CHANGE OF LEVELS/PLANES




Thursday 22 October 2015

Thoughts from the studio floor- 22.10.2015

We take some time to see the 'strength studies' that our counterparts in Kenyon College have uploaded.  Great to see faces!

We continue to work on shaping the material into a 'solo', finding the next level of treatments through which the raw material of the 'me studies' becomes a self contained work.


Tuesday 20 October 2015

Strength Studies and first upload!

Hello! This is Marc posting - I've been having some trouble accessing and uploading to individual pages, so until that's all worked out I'll put our most recent work here. These are the final drafts for our strength studies. Enjoy!

Update - The videos required permission before. I have made them public, so now we can actually watch them!

Bridget

Marc

Ian

Maddie

Laura

It was decided that two of the pieces could work together well as a duet:

Bridget and Laura

Hopefully soon I will find out how to better navigate this blog. For now, enjoy these. We are very open to feedback!

-Marc

Thursday 8 October 2015

Thoughts from the studio floor - 8.10.2015


Watching....
Konstantinos dance.
He speaks of too much thinking, not connected to his body.  Yet somehow, this dichotomy brings an incredible focus and fluidity to his movement. Maybe the 'no thought' is a good condition... to experience movement as is...without referentiality... (by Ana)
 

Tuesday 6 October 2015

Thoughts from the studio floor: Today is-

bring it back day.  Last week was predominantly independent work.  Today, we reanimate the material, to share for feedback.

Watching her dance....

Helena (journeys): interesting how she puts her body in unnatural movements and positions which was inspired by the artist Heidi Latsky (by Nadja)

Ioanna (a load, to carry): I could see she had a load that would not let her move as she wanted, nor would it let her stand up. There were movements where I could see the 'tights' she referred to when she talked at the camera. (by Korina)

Erifili (smell): smell,, as an atrophied sense, becomes central even though it may cause moments of embarrassment! (by Ioanna).  Interesting use of space in piece, showed a very internal experience. (by Helena)



Last week- was LAB week

Dancers worked on their own, selecting, refining material from the process so far to find a possible seed towards a solo study.  I ask them to find an artist, their work, critical writings about their work, that may resonate with their own process so far...not to represent it, or mirror it, but to have an outside 'point of dialogue' to begin to finds links between practice and concepts....More to come...

Thursday 24 September 2015

Thoughts from the studio floor-Body archaeology

We decided to use that term to define today's work.  Following Foucault's idea of the 'archaeology' of knowledge'- the strata of knowledge in the vertical axis of the historical process- we allow the three layers we have worked so far - the 'original', the trace, the reflection of seeing another move through a task base on 'our' material, to be the terrain of today's investigation...




A poetic archaeology as the past may resurface, whilst the recent may dive to the depths, as if momentarily forgotten, perhaps to resurface again...later...Archaeology ...in Greek ' arxi' - origin ... the root of archive...

Tuesday 22 September 2015

Thoughts from the studio floor 22.9.2015

We begin today by 'remembering' Thursday's work.  Not a 'hard memory' but a soft active remembering of what remains, not worried about what is forgotten (this will be explored later).

Dancers are asked to think of ONE WORD and ONE WORD only that seems to arise as a result of the movement process.  We are not looking for an 'explanation' or a theme, but a thought that surfaces from the movement process.

That one work becomes the 'lens' through which the movement acquires another layer of specificity.

The word now becomes transformed into a TASK given to another dancer, trying not the reveal what actual word but a task (an open exploration) of the word, but not the word as a referent.



Monday 21 September 2015

WELCOME to the blog of the DA3257 Contemporary Choreography, Fall 2015 at DEREE- The American College of Greece.


The course introduces dancers to current approaches to choreography paying particular attention to two equally important processes:  the creation of movement material as well as the experience of moving.  The course focuses on solo and duet forms in order to consider the interrelated processes of making, performing and reception.  We explore a variety of stimuli and sources for choreography, but the emphasis is on the dancer/choreographer’s process as embodied subjects who are paradoxically also the tool and the material through which the dance forms is manifested and experienced. Dancers are encouraged to find an emerging ‘voice’ as creative dance artist through discovery and exploration.  They are exposed to various means to make and shape the experience of moving into shareable form. Emphasis is given to developing an understanding of the relationship between the evolution of a processes and the resulting form. 

Over the course of the coming weeks we will share with you ‘thoughts on the go’; reflections coming to you directly from the studio at the time of our process.  This will be complemented by the participants’ individual pages, which will offer you thoughts, archival material, and documentation of their individual process. 

This semester, we are happy to be involved in a collaboration with Kenyon College (Ohio) supported by the Global Course Connections.  Students in both institutions will be working ‘virtually’ in a choreographic project exploring Body-Place-Identity as a means to investigate the manner in which technology supports and expands on this. By pursuing the topic this way we aim to achieve a double-pronged objective - the exploration of technology as a tool for creative pedagogy, as well as technology as a very specific site in the body-space nexus central to choreographic investigation.

The final results of the virtual duets will be presented as a ‘live stream’ on December 17th 9.30 AM in USA/ 3.30 PM in GR .  JOIN US!