Site specific choreography_Abstract_Kyriaki Nasioula

Summary The subject of this research project is the interplay between architectural space and contemporary dance. Specifically, it examines the process of realizing this interaction and its final product of site-specific dance.

Beginning by defining the terms space, dance and site-specific dance, this lecture analyzes the way in which contemporary dance encounters and incorporates space. Subsequently, the history, that led site-specific dance to obtain its current form, is presented. Choreographic tools used by the artist in order to frame choreography are outlined and the process by which the dancer embodies these tools is analyzed. The notion of the term site is defined via the phenomenological approach of architecture and the extent of its involvement in site-specific performance is classified. The “indexing” of architectural elements by the choreographer is distinguished between qualitative and dynamic categories. Then, the degree of interaction between audience/user of space and performance, and the extent to which this is site-induced is investigated.

The paper ends to the analysis of two case studies: Dialoge 09 by Sasha Waltz and These Asssociations by Tino Sehgal. In Dialoge 09, the choreographer uses the descriptive elements of Neues Museum in Berlin in a guided tour-choreography. In the second example, Tino Sehgal seeks through the narrative elements of Tourbine Hall, the Tate Gallery’s reception space in London, to redefine the function of the museum space through its social features.

In this research, I specify the intersection between the analysis of architectural elements and the composition of movement, that is to say choreography. The above-mentioned phases constitute the practice of site-specific choreography and are presented in the form of a choreographer’s handbook.