July/August 2015
Dance Central A Dance Centre Publication
Content On Attention: A conversation with Jennifer Mascall Page 2
Migrant Bodies: Final Words by Ginelle Chagnon Page 8
Moving Protocols: A conversation with Heidi Taylor Page 10
Welcome to Dance Central
Jennifer Mascall is a dance choreographer, teacher, mentor and an advocate for the art form. She is the Founding Artistic Director of MascallDance, which functions as the platform for her works in choreography and allied media. The company offers choreographic and somatic training contexts through its artist residence program BLOOM and its annual summer intensive Way Out West. Mascall and her nearly 200 choreographies have received the Clifford E. Lee Choreographic Award, the Jacqueline Lemieux Prize, a Dora Mavor Moore Award, a Jessie Award, the Canada 125 Confederation Commemorative Medal, the International Woman’s Day Award, the Ann O'Connor Award, the Edinburgh Fringe Festival Best Performers Award (The Brutal Telling). Most recently, she has been honoured by the Isadora Award 2015 for her outstanding contribution to dance in BC.
On Attention A conversation with Jennifer Mascall
The issue features a conversation with Jennifer Mascall, recent recipient of the Isadora Award,
AK: You have a long history of inviting audiences to observe dance as it is
and Artistic Director of MascallDance, about
being created and to present work in progress, both your own and that
attention, text and the body, and, as it turns out,
of other dance artists, in the context of events like the Nijinsky Gibber Jazz
especially about sound.
Club and BLOOM. Do audiences respond to these invitations in ways that you consider successful?
Ginelle Chagnon sent her last report from Bassano del Grappa where Migrant Bodies has
JM: That depends on the project and the form. For example, we once
come to its final presentation at the end of a
made a 'catalogue', as you would to accompany a visual art show, for a
two-year process and a journey halfway across
piece called WHAT, because we hadn't seen many of these for dance.
the globe.
We hired people from different disciplines — Alex Varty (music), Robin Laurence (visual art), Susan McKenzie (dance), and Michael Springate
In the Critical Movements series, we present a
(theatre) — to look critically at the work and create a discussion, but I
conversation with dramaturg and director of
don't think it was totally successful. It took me a while to understand that
Vancouver's Playwrights Theatre Centre, Heidi
a catalogue in visual art is a kind of eulogy, frothing away about the artist,
Taylor, about dance dramaturgy, creation proto-
which is exactly what we didn't want. We wanted a critical discussion,
cols and the challenges of meeting in the studio.
or a document, and I realized that the transference of dance as it merges with other forms requires us to really understand their context. We can't
As always, we thank all the artists who have
just abscond with a word like 'catalogue'. The Nijinsky Gibber Jazz Club, on
agreed to contribute and we welcome new
the other hand, has over its 25 years constantly tried to change its
writing and project ideas at any time, in order to
approach to talkback. At the beginning, it involved scribes and small
continue to make Dance Central a more vital link
groups, and was about convincing the audience member that when they
to the community. Please send material by email
said 'Oh, I don't really know anything about dance,' underlying that phrase
to members@thedancecentre.ca or call us at
were rampant opinions. We wanted to get them to reveal to themselves
604.606.6416. We look forward to
that they thought they knew quite a lot, and that in a different context
the conversation!
they would speak to it. We did that for a couple of years, and it was very
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Dance Central July/August 2015
useful to everybody. Currently, in BLOOM, we work with comedians, most recently Jennifer Griffin. We ask them to look at the work and then respond, like someone off the street, to what they have just seen. It is quite educational for me, because as a choreographer it is very difficult to put yourself in the place where you can see what somebody else could see when they view what you have done. In some ways the investigation we do on the body obscures day-to-day vision, and it is very useful to have someone tell you what they see, in a non-vindictive way, because you have been working on something you thought was quite abstract like, say, gravity. In the process of some projects we’ve had people track a work over a couple of years of its creation. Sometimes people liked the exploration presented in the Nijinsky Gibber Jazz Club show better than the final performance — perhaps there is a parallel with people who like improvisation and prefer exploration to crafted form. AK: The word exploration seems to be a key to your work. When your audience responds, do you integrate their reactions into the work, or do you treat their feedback as separate from what happens in the studio? JM: We respond to comments. For example, Homework was created for
"my most recent work has made me realize that perhaps choreography no longer needs dancers."
K7 students, and toured for seven years, but there was a woman who announced that it contained material that was only appropriate for high school students. So we began touring it to general audiences, with an introductory lecture called Nail to House, which was about the history of the themes of enclosure and space that had led to the making of Homeof Dance Central July/August 2015
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OnAttention
Jennifer Mascall
five frames out of PVC pipe, and worked on making 'paintings'. You might see me, and then what was behind me, and then the oceans and then the mountains, as well as random elements, like bicyclists going by. We worked with children and dogs because they capture people's attention, and with dancers we placed in the foreground where they were drawing attention to
of Homework, over eighty dances in a period of twenty two
depth in each of the frames. We had fifteen dancers with red
years. During the daytime, we performed in high schools.
parasols, functioning like a sundial in the background, but you
We found that adult, elementary and high school audiences
would barely notice that. There were four layers we worked
loved it equally. That makes me think that the feedback is
with before you got to the ocean, the cranes and wharves and
based on perception; someone might ignore the text, or, as
then the mountains. We had the audience roll up their Dan-
a dance person, look solely at the dance technique, or, as a
cing on the Edge programs and make a telescope to watch the
storyteller, focus only on the stories. Our critic came with a
performance, and we organized events like a family of Great
'high school eye' and heard what fit her perception; so the
Dane dogs, or ten people in wheelchairs with their accompany-
work was like a torte, a layer cake, fitting many different per-
ing dogs to come by. We organized what you could observe
ceptions. I found her feedback very useful, in that I don't feel
but we didn't direct anybody's attention. It reminded me of a
I can assume I know what the market wants. I can only make
project in which a hundred choreographers were being asked to
it, and let the market respond.
define choreography. I like Twyla Tharp's answer 'Art is the only way to run away from home, without leaving it' but I realize that
AK: What interests you most in your work these days?
we come across our own definitions in our work, and in doing this piece I came across the observation that choreo-
JM: The work I just remounted, called the Three-Cornered
graphy perhaps no longer needs dancers.
Hat continues to push an interest I have had for the past five years, centered on the question 'Is it possible to make
AK: Some people have observed that perhaps dance doesn't
the performer invisible, and for the audience simply to see
require choreographers any longer; that movement has eman-
the space between the performers?' I'm not there yet, but
cipated itself and that dancing is choreographing, in a similar
am keenly interested in that, and my most recent work has
way that the relationship between composer and musician
made me realize that choreography perhaps no longer needs
has shifted away from the privileged role of the composer and
dancers. For Dancing on the Edge, I worked on a project with
toward understanding improvisation as a form of composition,
Susan McKenzie and Amber Funk Barton, where for months
or as a process of co-creation.
we went down to Crab Park in Vancouver, to look at how we could perform outside. The outside requires a totally different
JM: I agree with this; perhaps it is a fraction, where the chore-
kind of work; you can't just go and do inside work outside,
ographer doesn't need the dancers, and the dancers no longer
and I became aware that I got to this realization through a
need the choreographer. For me it's a question like 'Do you like
kind of vanity, which is that as humans we just look pathetic
to read a text, where there is a total pleasure in a sentence that
next to a tree: We look so mortal, so finite, and so contrived,
contains thoughts you may want to read again and again?' For
while the tree just fits in. For years, I have been trying to figure
me, choreography is like a good sentence, but I see that the
out what we could make that could fit in, that would allow
ability to craft a good sentence in my world is the equivalent
us—this might sound naive, and I acknowledge that— to be
to a performer who is complete in a world of their own physi-
like a cloud, to be able to make a thing that is the result of
cal articulation without needing a choreographer. We articulate
what is necessary at the moment. An important aspect is that
from different perspectives.
most of my work has been the study of attention, and different kinds of attention, and I noticed that you actually couldn't
AK: The Crab Park piece comes close to what some theatre
pay attention at Crab Park for very long. I might be attentive
artists would consider sited theatre, or even performance art:
to you, and then I would see the birds, and then I would no-
Creating a frame for attention, placing layers and events within
tice a cruise ship, and then do nothing, and then come back
that, coordinating things that might appear random or coinci-
to you. It is very different from seeing a performance in a
dental but aren't, and focusing on how an audience's attention is
dark room with a light. So we used two lamp posts and made
disposed over time.
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Dance Central July/August 2015
"For the past five years, I have been interested in the question 'Is it possible to make the performer invisible, and for the audience simply to see the space between the performers?'"
JM: I would say that is a definition of choreography. AK: Does the role of a dancer in that context differ from that of a physical theatre performer? JM: It may not at all, but I didn't see anything theatrical in what we did. 4
Dance Central July/August 2015 Dance Central July/August 2015
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"Before, I was always taught what was wrong and what was right.
Now, I don't think about that. I don't judge,
I just feel it. "
AK: And yet performers who inhabit both worlds, such as Billy Marchenski for example, describe differences on the 'inside'
of the work, in the body's intention, in the way he communicates, in the arc of his character journey. I imagine that audiences can read those differences.
JM: Yes, I think audiences read that. When I worked in theatre, people were very different, and their demands were very dif-
ferent. It is about time, as far as I can tell, and it may no longer hold, but the actors who work with us want to know what we are doing and why we are doing it, whereas dancers just stay with it and do it.
AK: You work with text, which is another 'theatrical' dimen-
sion. How does text relate to your concept of choreography?
AK: What would you describe as theatrical? JM: I may be caught in a definition from another time, but I would have expected events that had beginning, middle, and end, or vignettes where people would be drawn to notice certain elements. Our work had no narrative or point of culmination, and left you only with a sense of "That's interesting", or "Look at the mountains." It gave you time to look around and direct your attention as you liked. We constructed the work so that audiences might encounter things at different times if they wanted to engage. AK: Was the audience moving or stationary? JM: They were stationary. And there was a moment somebody described as heart-breaking. On the second night, one of the performers' parents attended. Her mother suffers from Alzheimers, and the dad stays quite close to her at all times. They walked across the frame - seniors, very small and in their own world. That might have been theatrical. AK: Sometimes what is perceived as 'theatrical' originates with the frame that an audience is given, or denied, in how they expect to be affected. For example, Justine A. Chambers is currently working on a project with Modus Operandi called SPLAY, inside the Dance Centre's old Scotiabank entrance. They performers are separated from the street by a glass door, and they make no effort to engage the public, I don't know why that is, and I’m not committed to text. which in turn doesn't expect to be engaged as an audience. It just occurs: 'Oh, we need something else, so we'll say Hearing Justine describe the publics' response, it was intersomething now.' esting to note that this absence of a frame creates a form of disorientation; they can neither identify the performance as AK: When you mention attention as a central element in dance until they observe it, nor ignore it as a random occuryour work, it brings to mind Murray Schafer's 'acoustic ecolrence, because it is too highly organized. The result is a moogy', and particularly the practice known as 'soundwalking' ment when their expectations and those of the performers which invites participants to 'compose' by how they direct experience a kind of slippage. More and more, I encounter their attention in the aural environment. work where the categories are subject to a similar process of overlap or slippage, and it becomes difficult to tell if a JM: Yes. I saw a film about Henry Kaiser once, sitting someperformance is theatre, or dance, or a populated installation. where in Antarctica and saying "I hear a little crunch from the snow over there," describing minute sound events. It JM: I don't think the terms matter, except for some on the was fascinating, but I haven't tried soundwalking. outside who wants to clarify the situation
text seems to serve; words seem to come out or arrive at a
AK: It is a process you can 'steer' from within while your AK: And yet performers who inhabit both worlds, such as perception is affected by external sound, and the longer you Billy Marchenski for example, describe differences on the stay inside the 'field', the more you can separate the lay-
certain point when I feel that the body won't say something,
ers and begin to compose rather than just explore a space
won't get there, or won't communicate in the same way.
through active listening.
JM: I sometimes wonder if it is a lack of truth in the body, but
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Dance Central July/August 2015
Dance Central July/August 2015
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On Attention A conversation with Jennifer Mascall
JM: It sounds like it works with the vestibular nerve, like what you do in body-mind centering, where you place your hands, you wait, and see what shows up; you notice this and that, and then you can direct your attention to certain things, or not. With sound, it sounds like it moves from the skin outward as opposed to inward. Do you need a guide, like Hildi Westerkamp or Tina Pearson, who I know work with this? AK: You don't have to, but having someone else select the route and guide frees you from having to make decisions. JM: Do you keep eyes shut? AK: Not necessarily, because then your body will begin to search for information in a different way, and create different conditions for listening. It is enough to focus your attention on the sound. What is next for you?
continued on page 16
"Text seems to serve, when the body won't say something, won't get there, or won't communicate in the same way." Dance Central September 2004
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Dance Central The Dance Centre Scotiabank Dance Centre Level 6, 677 Davie Street Vancouver BC V6B 2G6 T 604.606.6400 F 604.606.6401 info@thedancecentre.ca www.thedancecentre.ca Dance Central is published every two months by The Dance Centre for its members and for the dance community. Opinions expressed are those of the authors and do not necessarily represent Dance Central or The Dance Centre. The editor reserves the right to edit for clarity or length, or to meet house requirements. Editor Andreas Kahre Copy Editor Hilary Maxwell Contributors to this issue: Jennifer Mascall, Heidi Taylor, Ginelle Chagnon Photography: Steven Lemay (cover) Dance Centre Board Members Chair Ingrid M. Tsui Vice Chair Beau Howes, CFA Secretary Margaret Grenier Treasurer Matthew Breech Directors Geoff Chen Susan Elliott Anusha Fernando Kate Franklin Kate Lade Anndraya T. Luui Josh Martin Starr Muranko Dance Foundation Board Members Chair Linda Blankstein Secretary Anndraya T. Luui Treasurer Jennifer Chung Directors Trent Berry, Kimberley Blackwell, Janice Wells, Andrea R. Wink Dance Centre Staff: Executive Director Mirna Zagar Programming Coordinator Raquel Alvaro Marketing Manager Heather Bray Venue and Services Administrator Robin Naiman Development Director Sheri Urquhart Technical Directors Justin Aucoin and Mark Eugster Accountant Elyn Dobbs Member Services Coordinator Hilary Maxwell
The Dance Centre is BC's primary resource centre for the dance profession and the public. The activities of The Dance Centre are made possible bynumerous individuals. Many thanks to our members, volunteers, community peers, board of directors and the public for your ongoing commitment to dance in BC. Your suggestions and feedback are always welcome. The operations of The Dance Centre are supported by the Canada Council for the Arts, the Province of British Columbia, the BC Arts Council, and the City of Vancouver through the Office of Cultural Affairs.
something in partnering with an object that can let both JM: Steven and Hill and I areobserver going to in doon WOW, andthink a fifteen performer outside how we hour workshop. I am for interested in his aboutinterdisciplinary weight and touch. That allows a meeting that strategy to set up a space which suggests what to do is rare. The people of this journey next when you encounter it. That to me sounds very close to you choreography, and interested in it because AK:ToAre interested in theI am presence a 'contraption' each one of us, this project is onlyofone amongst Iwhen have there been is to no two body-mind centering conferences physical interaction, many in our individual journey. Thiswhen is not itsofunctions say that with thepiece, latest information about experiental anatomy, as we a set or as something that structures space? took it lightly. On the contrary, each one of us (all and I want to explore what I found there. Then I am included) was at times overwhelmed by the subject going to Saltspring with three dancers. I seem to be JM:ofTothe me, as a choreographer, it is completely irrelmigration factor, refuted the project itself as it working onlonger solos having to but do with contraptions. Wethis evant. no feel this, at one timeand I feltoften that was Iplanned, explained or understood in will continue toissue, work aon The Three-Cornered Hat and was a political worthwhile revolution, to stop disbelief of the artistic and administrative work to be I’ll go toobjects a school Winnipeg where I made a piece having setin up and move around them, but ina accomplished. Whether we feel that we succeeded couple of years ago, trying to research how we actually 2015 thatinteresting no longer works feels like point worth making. to do is, Iabelieve, at this point in access the inherent sound of a part of our body, and of the journey, quite irrelevant. The “success” aspect of aAK: movement. In experiential anatomy we arethat taught that In The White Spider youon used object this project does not rest thean product as wealso often every part ofground. the body -the kidney, the liver, and all the acted as the measure success / credibility. What was important organs as a group - has a sounding tone. Sometimes was the challenge at hand, the attempt to re-evaluate you can first make a sound when you move andkind youofknow JM:our The Alan Storeyas made was Lazy task inthing today’s society artists anda supportthat is exactly the right sound, and I’m interested in why Susan mounted included a mountain, ers of the arts,vertically, to engagewhich in dialogue with others but and when that happens. onceworked createdfor a piece where and rock climbing points.I We a month and especially with oneself. The numerous questions that the dancers werejust sounding all the way through, which feltwe likeasked we were getting to know it, but at the next along the way about the subject of migraturned out to beforgot very funny. I have that foundsomost residency bring the mountain the of tion mayAlan still remaintounanswered but to put them the time started if you earnestly do research, outsiders will find dancers to jumpand on be the piece and slide, andways he forward collectively challenged by other itsaid very funny. what you need to do theour dance!’ . I found of 'That's thinking, hopefully made us in shift actions and that very interesting. alsoworld madeinme thinkwe about our point of view ofIt the which live.the AK: You say you like working with contraptions, and you historical aspect of collaboration, having been trained in have been working with Bill Pecket and Alan Storey for a theFor postmodern I would another the artists, tradition, it started where in Bassano del invite Grappa late long time. What interests you their in working with a Iphysical artists space to organizers, make work, while would Juneinto 2014the but for the it began a year presence other than a body? make my work, without asking for adjustments and before that. The project has finally returned home to changes to del respond to my work. realized that was now Bassano Grappa for its last Igathering in the sumJM: I remember working with a small organization in anmer anachronism to this shed. of 2015 and final event of Migrant Bodies, Victoria called Bounce. Six choreographers had pieces, a symposium on migration, was to assemble our and itThank was my job to come in and help them create a AK:voices you! and allow the onlooker to question his own performance. Choreographer Lori Hammer had created point of view on the subject at hand. We are here to a film of herself dancing with Doris, her 7-foot Python, celebrate and to be touched by our differences as we and another where she danced in the woods. She talked form a family of close and distant relationships. Now about the experience of holding her snake and realizing this small group of artists will separate into different that Doris loved being touched, so she started dodirections, east, west, north and south, as each one ing contact improvisation with her. Then she became of us goes towards new questions to embrace. As interested in using large, heavy pieces of driftwood and we part, my wish is that we always aim to elevate the started partnering with them. In her dances, she was human spirit as we pursue a critical look into the able to show to an audience the partnering that we feel reality of human behavior. with the air by showing how she understood the weight of the python and the weight of the wood. There is continued on page 22
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Dance Central July/August 2015
Migrant Bodies: Final Words by Ginelle Chagnon Artists and organizers Raquel Alvaro, Elisabetta Bisaro, Roberto Casarotto, Ginelle Chagnon, Sonia Chiambretto, Sammy Chien, Xavier Curnillon, Daniel Favier, Marie-Claire Forté, Francine Gagné, Jacques Hoepffner, Dorta Jagić, Lee Su-Feh, Matteo Maffesanti, Alexa Mardon, Ivan Mrdjen, Cécile Proust, Manuel Roque, Alessandro Sciarroni, Anna Trevisan, Jasna Vinovrski, Mirna Zagar, Josip Zanki and Antonio Gabelić. People that we met along the way: Some were guests, some we visited and others are the invisible team that organized, coordinated and supported this project and who are rarely credited with the work that they do. Italy (Bassano del Grappa, Verona, Trieste) John Mpaliza, Dany Mitzman, Roland Serge Nzonzi, Longo Issiya, Jabir Zaïra and her children Mustafa and Ines, Martina Cortellazzo, Walissa the couscous chef and her daughter. Anna Zonta, Rosa Scapin, Sofia Girardi, Roberto Cinconze, Sandro del Pra, Alessia Zanchetta, Agnese Scapin, Sebastiano Crestani, Tiziana Bolfe, Caroline Laurin-Beaucage, Steinunn Ketilsdottir, Greta Pieropan, Valeria Castellaneta, Marta Melucci, Martina Gregori, Martin Romeo, Marta Bellacqua, Corrado Canulli, Francesca Debelli. Croatia (Zagreb and stork village Lonjsko Polje) Tena Bošnjaković, Antonio Gabelić, Tena Srdelí, Darja Mrdjen and the children in her classroom, Duško « Riki » Richtermoc, Bojan Gagić, Nikolina Šardi, Clément
Canada/ Québec (Montreal and Cap Tourmente) François Bellefeuille, Dominique Bouchard, Mathieu Chartrand, Mélanie Primeau, Sigrid Hueber, Élodie Malroux, Sol Millan, Daniel Villeneuve, Magali François, Virginie Desloges, Pauline Védie, Angélique Willkie, Valérie Michaud, Peggy Wilson, Sasha Kleinplatz, Pierre Bissonnette, Pierre Bruneau, Linda Rabin, tour guides in Montreal and in Cap Tourmente. Canada/ British Columbia (Vancouver and South Coquitlam) Anne Daroussin, Claire French, Heather Bray, Justin Aucoin, Hilary Maxwell, Cease Wyss, Margaret Grenier, Nigel Grenier, Jason McNair and Thibault, the men at the salmon hatchery in Coquitlam, David McIntosh, Aryo Khakpour, Michelle Lui, Justine A.Chambers and her dinner gang, Olivia Cheung, Harsha Walia and Geraldine Pratt, Arielle from the Filipino Women’s Centre. France (Vitry-sur-Seine and Paris) Franca Malservisi, Christine Fouilleul, Fred Vannieuwenhuyse, Véronique, Sammy et Christophe, Oriane Baudrand, Pascale Pommat, Cécile Vernadat, Justine Lefebvre and Zalia, Camille Schmoll, Zahia Rhamani, Fannie Sosa, Barbara Gessler from the European Commission. To colleagues, visitors of our events, participants of activities (the students of Zagreb and of the Winnipeg Contemporary Dance school), public Protocol sessions, dinners, chats, lectures, workshops and to you the onlooker;
Layes, Miloš Postić, Alija Mesi, Cindy and Klub Mladeži Roma Hrvatske the Romani community in Zagreb that sang and danced with us, the angry woman in the
Thank you.
green dress, her neighbours and families, the refugees in the Zagreb asylum who still remain nameless, Lucija Kukor, Drago Župarić, the stork park Lonjsko Polje tour
Ginelle Chagnon, Bassano del Grappa, July 2015
guide Igor and the people in the village.
Dance Central July/August 2015
9
Moving Protocols
Critical Movements: A conversation with
Heidi Taylor
AK: From what I know of your practice, dramaturgy reaches into
beginning of that practice, and through my mentorship
many different forms of performance. How would you describe
with DD Kugler, I was looking at dance, and at any kind of
the relationship between dance and dramaturgy that you are
performative activity, and even visual art, in terms of the
interested in?
conceptual architecture and how the practitioner wanted to move from concept into practice around a certain set
HT: I haven't been involved in a critical role in the dance world
of ideas. The people whose work I was supporting were,
as much recently, but I am working with Amber Funk Barton and
from an early stage, all very interested in formal ques-
Mindy Parfitt on a piece right now, in a collaboration that came
tion, and those have always been foundational to my
out of our work on This Stays in the Room. If anything, I cease
concept of dramaturgy. The first piece I did after my MFA
to categorize these activities. It seems like everything is drama-
was a project with the composer and ethnomusicologist
turgy now...
Dylan Robinson. It was all about music, and coming to performance through music, and all these elements had
AK: ...it does seem to be spreading like a virus sometimes.
an impact on the kind of process design that we engaged in, on the rules of performance that we were looking at,
HT: William Gibson, in his book Pattern Recognition, refers to
and on our intention to find those through an emergent
an affliction called Apophenia, which I seem to be subject to,
practice rather than by deciding what they were before
where everything is linked to everything else...
we got into the work.
AK: You came to dramaturgy from an interdisciplinary back-
AK: In your current practice, is there a preponderance of
ground. Did you think of it as specifically related to text, or do
text-based work?
you think of a wider frame? HT: Yes, it comes with the territory of the Playwrights HT: I certainly encountered dramaturgy in my early training at U
Theatre Centre's mandate. Taking on the artistic direc-
of T where it came very much out of a German model. We did
torship a couple of years ago has narrowed the scope
work on some new texts, but we were working mostly in a pro-
of the freelance work I can take on, but my own idea of
duction dramaturgy context. When I began to apply that knowl-
playwrights concentrates on the 'right'-ness of mak-
edge in my early producing and making years in Edmonton, I
ing rather than the 'rite'-ness of making. We worked on
was certainly very interested in other modes of performance,
seventeen pieces over the past year at PTC, and out of
and I was working in the visual art community as my day job,
that I would say a quarter is coming from other modes
so I was very engaged in the whole question of performance
of performance, whether that is studio-based practice,
versus theatre, as critical fields, and I was very frustrated with
or research or conceptually based practice. Most of our
the lack of criticality in the theatre community. When I did my
work has words in it in some form, but narrative is by
master's degree at SFU, I was doing dramaturgy for other mas-
no means a rule. It certainly helps to have the studio as
ter's students, one of whom was Cam MacMurchy, and from the
our home base for practice, which means that there is a
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Dance Central July/August 2015
whole lot of rolling around on the floor—which is my natural
Heidi is a Vancouver-based dramaturg, director and performer.
state. In comparison with my practice with Proximity Lab,
She moved into the role of Artistic and Executive Director, after
this is a much more textually informed practice, but what
serving as Dramaturg for seven years. She has dramaturged plays
I bring to that is my training, not in playwriting or dramatic
from across the country in the annual PTC Writers Colony, and
theatre, but in focusing on questions of audience relation-
works closely with the six resident PTC Associates. She also co-
ship, site relationship, and on what performative assumptions are encoded in a creator's choices, so that they can see what those assumptions are and question whether they are the ones they want to move forward with.
created and produced cross-disciplinary projects with Proximity Arts from 2003-2011, including Susan Elliott and Tanya Marquardt’s sited dance piece, Mal de mer, an audio walking PodPlay, and the interactive sound installation antic. Heidi holds an MFA from Simon Fraser University, where she taught intro acting for eleven years.
AK: When working with choreographers, do you have a set methodology or does your approach change with each project, compared to working with playwrights? HT: I would say that it takes a little longer to develop a relationship, because with writers, even if they come at the practice from an embodied perspective, there is usually some form of text work that I can read and react to directly, whereas with choreographers, I approach it as a completely fresh beginning, in part because I don't have the same level of discourse training around dance that I have with theatre performance. I find that a lot of my work involves watching, and a gradual transition from watching into conversation. In the early stages at least, my practice is much more descriptive, reflecting what I have seen to the choreographer, and that becomes an opening into the generative conversation. What I bring from the beginning are questions around audience and site, and different kinds of performativity— which the kinds of choreographers that I tend to work with are usually already engaged in, in a rigourous way. AK: There is a movement in the Vancouver dance community to develop a critical language that reflects the needs of embodied practices. Artists like Lee Su-Feh have long been advocating for a relationship between audience and dance that allows for a different kind of criticality, both in terms of the frame of reference, and in how critical thinking is expressed vis a vis the performance experience. The question then remains, what kind of language is available, and whose model do you adopt—be it from visual art, from traditional dramaturgy, or whether there needs to be a new language. Do these questions appear in your practice? HT: Yes, I have certainly followed Su-Feh’s work, for example in the Migrant Bodies project, and I have had some really generative conversations with her, most recently at the Impact Theatre conference in Kitchener—Waterloo. I feel like I am not necessarily a part of that conversation,
"Across the performance territories I roam, there are many vocabularies that need to be engaged with, but I would put it in the context of
protocols."
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Critical Movements: A conversation with
Heidi Taylor
because I am working from a theatre perspective, and across the performance territories that I am roaming there are so many vocabularies that need to be engaged with, but I would put it in the context of protocols. There is a very rigourous conversation going on right now around indigenous protocols, and I think that can be a model for any
"I was looking at dance, and at any kind of performative activity, and even visual art, in terms of the conceptual architecture and how the practitioner wanted to move from concept into practice around a certain set of ideas." 12
Dance Central July/August 2015
kind of work that we are creating. I think there are protocols for what happens in any creation process that need to be negotiated, and the more we articulate the need to negotiate them, the more visible our assumptions and vocabularies become. If we are willing to do that both with people we always work, and in new working relationships, it can help to make us more aware of the power that is encoded in our own assumptions, which is where the contesting of language around dramaturgy and the contesting of critical language with audience is seeded. It is really about who has power over the way dance or performance is interpreted, and the main challenge to me, in theatre and in dance, is how these conversations are brought to an audience. There are instances that I can think of where work has been presented in a multi-disciplinary context and couldn't be read effectively by the audience because they were coming from a different set of assumptions, or vocabularies about what constituted performance in that context. I don't think there is a simple answer to that, except that the whole protocol conversation could extend to creating relationships with the community for whom a performance is being created, and that creates an opportunity to shift vocabularies and assumptions around how and why we are making performance, and how the intended meaning can be received by an audience. For dance, specifically, I think the impact of not finding a critical voice is related to the narrow platforms that artists have to engage in a conversation with their audiences. I wonder if it is also harder to engage with dance audiences because the runs tend to be shorter. AK: I observe that Vancouver audiences tend to be overly polite, having been trained to take the 'thank you for your work' attitude, and that they are reluctant to take a chance when there is no narrative structure to relate to. They are also implicated differently in dance, where the work takes place inside them. Even when they are encouraged to respond individually, for example in Ame Henderson and Matija Ferlin's The most together we have ever been there is no protocol for the audience to articulate their experience beyond formal or emotional aspects of the performance. When you work with choreographers, what expectations do you encounter?
HT: I find that initially there is no expectation, because many
AK: I am curious about the role sound, and music plays. The
dance artists have not worked in a formal dramaturgical
relationship between dance and music is shifting, but sound
relationship—even though there is always lots of drama-
still is usually an important element of dance performance,
turgy happening when stuff is being made—so usually it is
and inherently structures what an audience experiences:
a conversation where I give them a number of contrasting
narrative, site, space, relationships, emotional tone, all of
examples of ways to work, and then we talk about aspects
which strike me as dramaturgical home ground— do you
they have found most engaging, productive or limiting in the
find yourself in dance-related projects working directly with
past, and then we set up a template, with specific times to
musicians?
change or adjust our approach, to see how things are going. In the current process with Amber and Mindy, there is a vo-
HT: Yes, I have been very lucky in that the choreographers
cabulary that the three of us have developed while working
and dancers I have been working with are already very
on a theatrical project, but we have also developed a differ-
sophisticated in their approach to sound as a component
ent vocabulary around structuring the piece, talking about
of a work, and that they are not looking at it from the point
accumulation and release, and more about spatial structures
of view: 'I am making my work and this sound is going to
than might happen with a text-based piece, although this
support it'. I observe very visceral collaborations with sound
piece has text in it as well, so there are interesting questions
artists—and not necessarily musicians—and they look at
around performative issues, that I think are common in work
sound as a material in the space, as much as the bodies.
when people work outside their area of expertise. Generally,
That is something that I as a creator have felt has been an
I find that choreographers don't bring a lot of expectation
important part of the relationship in our current work as
and prefer to construct a working method together.
well. Martin Bédard from Montreal is creating the sound,
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Critical Movements: A conversation with
Heidi Taylor
HT: It is quite varied; it depends on where the conversation is taking place. In the studio we often talk about movement qualities, and energetic aspects, how movement rests differently or similarly on the bodies of the two creators, and what
and there is a more musical approach to the creation than I have
my personal reception is to being in the room. We often talk
encountered before. Amber and Mindy create things which they
about what was satisfying because of contrast or synchron-
send to him, he responds, and then they work with that, so it's a
icity, or how a particular movement is being accomplished
very conversational and refractive process, not necessarily about
differently by different bodies. The studio conversation side is
the music shaping the arc of the piece, but a much more combi-
fairly embodied: "You know, when it goes 'Shhhhhh', it should
national relationship. Amber's work references pop in a number
go 'Kkk-kkK' after that." It is onomatopoetic, we are on the
of ways, and that means that there are a number of quotational
floor, and it is sweaty. When, we meet at PTC, we tend to go
approaches to sound and the vocal score of the piece, which is
into structural conversations, and moving the work from an
interesting in determining how these references function for a
implicit to an explicit knowledge—so we make a lot of lists,
heterogeneous audience. One of the challenges of working with
which usually act as a trigger for the co-creators, because
pop references is that ten years age difference in an audience or
they know different things and we try to create a framework
among co-creators means a completely different reading of a
for questions, and that is when we find that the vocabular-
sound's meaning. There are also some classical dance references,
ies that emerge can be cohesive or divergent based on their
and it will be interesting to see how meaningfully those will tran-
training. I would say I use the same vocabulary, but I adapt it.
scend the world of dance aficionados. I will be very interested to hear back how the sound will be working in a material sense, and
AK: In working as a scenographer, for example with Lola, I
in an event-structuring way during the next workshop.
have sometimes found myself in a dramaturgical role that focused on expressing tensions that informed the work's
AK: Do you speak to the sound designers or musicians directly?
rhythm, spatial and sonic configuration, and the impositions on the body. The language we used, or developed from dif-
HT: Often, I do. In this case, Mindy has been the conduit to the
ferent vocabularies became shorthand for a kind of four-
other collaborators, but that will change after the next workshop,
dimensional description of how the performance elements
and as long as we are all appraised of the conversations that are
related. It was not purely about movement, nor sound, or ob-
happening, we will be fine.
jects, but about their interaction. Is your experience similiar?
AK: What kind of language do you use when talking to a dance
HT: With Amber, a theatrical vocabulary applies to a lot of the
artist like Amber?
impulses she brings forward, because she is very interested
"The studio conversation sid fairly embodied: 'You know, it should go 'Kkk-kkK' after we are on the floor, and it is s 14
Dance Central July/August 2015
in pedestrian movement and a full range of bodily activity,
at the same time, but was intended for four different pieces, and
so we talk about expectation, thematic content, questions
part of my work was to help her discern which part belonged to
of identity, power, and research in to neuroplasticity, as
which piece, so when she was improvising we talked about things
well as personal source material. We are still in a genera-
like "The scooting part—that belongs to the house piece" and so
tive, discerning phase rather than a staging phase, but the
on. It is always a question for me how we retain the knowledge
conversation will shift.
gained through the body in the discourse about the piece. I don't know that I have any particularly effective system for that, except
AK: Most dance artists generate material by improvising,
that the way we talk in the studio is the right way to talk, and we
or observing others improvise. Some theatre artists work
can trust it until it demands a different name.
in a similar way, but playwriting imposes limitations on that approach, whereas dance has developed a whole
AK: That leads me back to the beginning, and to the question
range of systems to work with improvised material. How
whose language we use, and what distinguishes 'critical' lan-
does dramaturgy engage with that process?
guage from the language that finds its shape in the activity, and in reflecting and being reflected by others. I often hear the demand
HT: I would say that when theatre comes from a physi-
that there should be a critical language, and even critical theory,
cal theatre and performance approach, improvisation is
applied to dance, but I have yet to encounter a successful exam-
a huge part of creation, and in the hybridized indigenous
ple such as you might find in visual art, that audiences can share
practice I have learned, for example with Lisa Ravens-
or engage with without losing the content of the embodied work.
bergen, but also with writers like Jeremy Waller there has always been a huge amount of studio time that precedes
HT: I think about it in the same sense as architecture, in that
and accompanies the text development. Even in process,
architects need to engage with all kinds of theory around place,
I am working on with Shigematsu, there is text, but the
indigineity, civic planning, use of materials, and a whole history of
piece is improvisational in that the performative questions
architecture, and yet, in the most successful pieces of architecture
can't be resolved on the page; they have to be resolved
that I encounter, I am not thinking about those things; I am engag-
in the room. The whole process of tracking and retain-
ing with them bodily, and it delights and confounds and questions
ing those approaches is very interesting, because even if
me from my experience as a human being, not from my experi-
the movement is abstract or not particularly symbolic, it
ence as someone who has dribs and drabs of training in critical
sometimes becomes attached to a story of how it came
theory. I think there is a bit on confusion or conflation between
to be, or a description of what it feels like. I remember
the demand that makers should engage with a rich knowledge of
working with Caroline Liffman, in a residency through The
history of current practice, of criticality across different spheres,
Dance Centre. She had a lot of material that was appearing
and how that should inform their intent to make, and what the
de is when it goes 'Shhhhhh', that.' It is onomatopoetic, sweaty." Dance Central July/August 2015
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Critical Movements: A conversation with
Heidi Taylor
JM: Steven Hill and I are going to do WOW, and a fifteen hour interdisciplinary workshop. I am interested in his strategy to set up a space which suggests what to do next when you encounter it. That to me sounds very
real conversations that we want to have with audiences might
close to choreography, and I am interested in it because
be. As an audience member, I don't come to dance with a
I have been to two body-mind centering conferences,
particular set of critical terms that I crave to have fluffed up. I
with the latest information about experiental anatomy
come to dance for a time-based embodied experience, which
that I want to explore. Then I am going to Saltspring with
may engage me on a nonverbal level. I may not be able to
three dancers. I seem to be working on solos that have
actually describe my experience but that doesn't negate it, or
to do with contraptions. We will continue to work on The
lessen its impact, and there may also be cultural or physical
Three-Cornered Hat and I will go to a school in Win-
or political contexts which I then go to have conversations
nipeg where I made a piece a couple of years ago, trying
with other people about. In some ways I think: 'Yes, I would
to research how we actually access the inherent sound
like to have more critical conversations about the work I am
of a part of our body, and of a movement. In anatomy
making or engaging with,' but in fact I think the purpose is to
we are taught that every part of the body—the kidney,
have audience members talking to each other, and to rest the
the liver, and all the organs as a group, have a sounding
of their community about their experience. I don’t know how
tone. Sometimes you can make a sound when you move
we measure that and I don't know if there is a need to offer
and you know that is exactly the right sound, and I am
a better vocabulary, but I do think there is a need to foster
interested in why and when that happens. I once created
that conversation. Thinking of 'So You Think You Can Dance'
a piece where the dancers were sounding all the way
and what that show has done to create a sort of a vocabulary
through, which turned out to be very funny. I have found
around what dance is and what it should be, and the terms
that most of the time if you earnestly do research, outsid-
that should be used to evaluate it, I am reminded of when I
ers will find it very funny.
was sitting in Thunder Bay in a cottage, talking to a friend of my mom's. He is a millworker and probably has never been to
AK: You say you like working with contraptions, and you
a live dance performance in his life. He went on for about fif-
have been working with Bill Pechet and Alan Storey for a
teen minutes about a particular dancer and a particular piece
long time. What interests you in working with a physical
he had watched; he loved the show, he was very discerning
presence other than a body?
in his evaluation of the work, and he really engaged with it. From a contemporary dance perspective, this may seem like
JM: I remember working with a small organization in
a miniscule aspect of dance discussed in a very small box, but
Victoria called Bounce. Six choreographers had pieces,
I wonder how contemporary performance practice can make
and it was my job to come in and help them create a
itself more available to an audience to engage, with language
performance. One of them, Lori Hammer had created a
tools, but also with a certain confidence in one's response.
film dancing with Doris, her 7-foot python, and another
I do think that is the barrier, in both theatre and dance, in
where she was dancing in the woods. She talked about
creating conversations that ripple outward from the creators.
the experience of holding her snake and realizing that
There is a lack of confidence that the thing I got is the thing
Doris loved being touched, so she started doing contact
I was supposed to get. Audiences sometimes have that fear
improv with her. Then she became interested in using
around non-narrative work in particular, and I think it would be wonderful if we can help them lose that fear. AK: Thank you!
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Dance Central July/August 2015
large, heavy pieces of drift wood and started partnering with them. In her dances, she was able to show to an audience the partnering that we feel with the air by show-
On Attention A conversation with Jennifer Mascall
ing how she understood the weight of the python and the weight of the wood. There is something in partnering with an object that can let us, as a performer in on how we think about weight and touch, and an observer on the outside can understand the same thing. That allows for a meeting that is rare. AK: Are you interested in the presence of a 'contraption' when there is no physical interaction, when it functions as a set piece, or as something that structures space? JM: To me, as a choreographer, it is completely irrelevant. I no longer feel this, but at one time I felt that this was a political issue, a worthwhile revolution, to stop having objects set up and move around them, but in 2015 that doesn't feel like a point worth making any more. AK: In The White Spider you used an object that also acted as the ground. JM: The first thing Alan Storey made was a kind of Lazy Susan mounted vertically, which included a mountain, and rock climbing points. We worked for a month and felt like we were just getting to know it, but at the next residency Alan forgot to bring the mountain and the dancers started to jump on the piece and slide, and he said "That's what you need to do in dance!" I found that very interesting. It also made me think about the historical aspect of collaboration, having been trained in the postmodern tradition, where I would invite other artists into the space to make their work, while I would make my work, without asking for adjustments and changes to respond to my work. I realize now that it was an anachronism to shed. Ak: Thank you!
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