UoD/EMDAN Clowndance Intensive 2024
TUESDAY: Playing with the Audience
In a longer intensive I would separate out the two strands of encountering the audience and playing with solo performance, but in this shorter format they worked well entwined. We lost one of our number to a prior engagement in the later part of the day today, but her spirit remained very much with us!
I had asked everyone to come prepared with headphones and a favourite track today, and given that there is quite a bit of information here on the website now, I think some of the group knew what was coming! An ongoing tension with this work is how much to explain in advance; to find a happy balance between helping people feel fore-armed and comfortable, and keeping an element of surprise. The solution, I think, is to ask the group and not to make assumptions.
I had asked everyone to come prepared with headphones and a favourite track today, and given that there is quite a bit of information here on the website now, I think some of the group knew what was coming! An ongoing tension with this work is how much to explain in advance; to find a happy balance between helping people feel fore-armed and comfortable, and keeping an element of surprise. The solution, I think, is to ask the group and not to make assumptions.
Material Covered:
We started the day with Walking, evolving into:
From here we went into two games in which the performer and audience are in direct and potentially interactive contact:
We started the day with Walking, evolving into:
- The One Moving at a Time Game (Wright, 2006, p. 52). As I have done before, I extended John Wright’s version of the game to include other ways of moving beyond walking.
- Dance Like Everybody’s Watching, which has become a core Clowndance game since its first trial in the 2022 summer school (see TUESDAY)
From here we went into two games in which the performer and audience are in direct and potentially interactive contact:
- The Applause Game was familiar to the clowns in the space, but new to the dancers
- Saving the Show (adapted from Davison, 2015, p. 84) balanced improvised dancing and spontaneous audience interaction, giving different challenges to different performers.
Moment 1:
As none of the work is new to me now, the moments that stand out come most often from conversations, in hearing how the work is landing with a new group. In Dance Like Everybody’s Watching, the feedback phrases (I saw/heard/felt/enjoyed/hated) threw up some lovely, honest observations:
As none of the work is new to me now, the moments that stand out come most often from conversations, in hearing how the work is landing with a new group. In Dance Like Everybody’s Watching, the feedback phrases (I saw/heard/felt/enjoyed/hated) threw up some lovely, honest observations:
I saw internal joy and shared joy
I felt compelled to entertain- I felt less joy because I’m responsible for others’ enjoyment
I heard song envy- I wanted to be dancing to them all
I enjoyed people acknowledging tiredness
Journal notes: 21/05/24
I felt compelled to entertain- I felt less joy because I’m responsible for others’ enjoyment
I heard song envy- I wanted to be dancing to them all
I enjoyed people acknowledging tiredness
Journal notes: 21/05/24
Moment 2:
There was a tiny glimmering moment when Anemone was playing the Audience game. We wanted her to stand in first position, and it was taking a very long time to work out. She came and sat down close to the audience and held our gaze, while making subtle shifts of her foot positions. Each time she asked us ‘no?’ looked for our non-verbal response, then answered her own question ‘no.’ She had set up a very clear moment of Lecoq’s Via Negativa (Murray, 2003) approach for herself; holding with the game and waiting until the audience gave her the ‘yes’ she was looking for.
There was a tiny glimmering moment when Anemone was playing the Audience game. We wanted her to stand in first position, and it was taking a very long time to work out. She came and sat down close to the audience and held our gaze, while making subtle shifts of her foot positions. Each time she asked us ‘no?’ looked for our non-verbal response, then answered her own question ‘no.’ She had set up a very clear moment of Lecoq’s Via Negativa (Murray, 2003) approach for herself; holding with the game and waiting until the audience gave her the ‘yes’ she was looking for.
Moment 3
Saving the Show saw the performers take steps across the border of dance and clown to explore each other’s discipline, and the place between.
Dancer Kalanchoe found a shape which clearly meant ‘and…go!’ and repeated it with increasing desperation when her music cut out. She was feeling our enjoyment of her being in the shit, and chose to stay with and repeat this gesture, escalating the tension and so building laughter.
Saving the Show saw the performers take steps across the border of dance and clown to explore each other’s discipline, and the place between.
Dancer Kalanchoe found a shape which clearly meant ‘and…go!’ and repeated it with increasing desperation when her music cut out. She was feeling our enjoyment of her being in the shit, and chose to stay with and repeat this gesture, escalating the tension and so building laughter.
VIDEO: Saving the Show
A montage of moments, including Kalanchoe's repeated 'and go!' motif/gag
A montage of moments, including Kalanchoe's repeated 'and go!' motif/gag
Anemone asked how we could find joyful dancing at the barre- when the form of what you’re doing is tightly controlled, is there space for play?
We considered that we could create space to notice; to acknowledge and be honest about imperfection, and to awaken the part of yourself that watches with pleasure and seeks joy. I recalled a beautiful metaphor from the Mundaka Upanishad, an ancient Hindu sacred text that John Mason riffs on in The Discipline of Noticing (2002, p. 168). The text says:
Two birds, close yoked companions,
Both clasp the self-same tree;
One eats of the sweet fruit,
The other looks on without eating.
In other words, we need to keep part of ourselves immersed in what we’re doing, and another part detached to observe. That part is where the clown’s sense of joy and play can exist, even when the practice is serious.
The other longer strand of reflection that threaded through both days was around the comparative language used by dancers and clowns to describe their persona or state of being in performance. It’s rich and detailed, so I’ll give it space in a blog post and finish instead here with a drawing from the reflective roll. It’s a picture of a sock, helpfully labelled ‘sock’. Sometimes the moment comes and goes, and afterwards I have no idea what it was!
We considered that we could create space to notice; to acknowledge and be honest about imperfection, and to awaken the part of yourself that watches with pleasure and seeks joy. I recalled a beautiful metaphor from the Mundaka Upanishad, an ancient Hindu sacred text that John Mason riffs on in The Discipline of Noticing (2002, p. 168). The text says:
Two birds, close yoked companions,
Both clasp the self-same tree;
One eats of the sweet fruit,
The other looks on without eating.
In other words, we need to keep part of ourselves immersed in what we’re doing, and another part detached to observe. That part is where the clown’s sense of joy and play can exist, even when the practice is serious.
The other longer strand of reflection that threaded through both days was around the comparative language used by dancers and clowns to describe their persona or state of being in performance. It’s rich and detailed, so I’ll give it space in a blog post and finish instead here with a drawing from the reflective roll. It’s a picture of a sock, helpfully labelled ‘sock’. Sometimes the moment comes and goes, and afterwards I have no idea what it was!
Bibliography
Davison, J. (2015) Clown training: a practical guide. New York: Palgrave Macmillan.
Mason, J. (2002) Researching your own practice: The discipline of noticing. 1st edn. London: RoutledgeFalmer. Available at: https://ebookcentral.proquest.com/lib/dmu/reader.action?docID=167124&ppg=16.
Murray, S. (2003) Jacques Lecoq. London: Routledge (Routledge Performance Practitioners).
Wright, J. (2006) Why is that so funny? a practical exploration of physical comedy. London: Nick Hern Books.
|
|