THE DUET OF BUCHAREST AND THE BODY by Beatrice Jarvis

The duet of Bucharest and the body Towards choreographic mapping Beatrice Jarvis

Towards as socio-choreographic practice: Choreographic Practice: Memory, Urban Narratives and Personal Cartographies Beatrice Jarvis, University of Ulster May 2012: Bucharest The social power of bodies in urban spaces. Choreographic method as apparatus of socio-cultural empowerment. Practice aims: 1. To test choreography as a means of urban analysis through uncovering the body as an archive of lived experience in cities with complex social geographies. 2. To demonstrate how choreographic practice can articulate counter cartographies and personal narratives of urban history and memory. Bucharest: • This study takes inspiration from the social position of dance within Romanian society as vehicle for social expression as to the political and cultural realities of daily life. Initially forming a series of choreo-architectural interventions in public urban space; I shall use the body as a means to explore the presence of memory and history in the city. Taking inspiration from a series of counter-cartographies developed by local residents and ex-pats; I will explore how far the fall of communism still invades the city through architectural and planning presence and reactions to such ‘relics’ • I will be working with specific individuals to explore the social realities of their daily life to form a formalized performance. This seeks to enable a group of participants with limited political voice a space of creative exchange and presence. The production of performance, which can be toured, will allow for the exploration of the potential of choreography to develop cultural platform for raising social awareness as to the many co-existing socio-cultural realities of the city. The emphasis of this project is both internal and external. As there already exists harmony and collective ethos between participants, the significance is centred on their ability to communicate to a wider audience outside of their existing social network, and exploring how far choreographic practice can enable this to occur.

• Taking a series of derelict sites as resource I aim to hold a series of intervention performances and exhibitions of choreographic documentation as to my shared explorations of the city; aiming to form a center for debate and dialog around my choreographic practice; using the city as stimulus and resource.

• What is your relationship to Bucharest ? • What is your relationship to Dance? • How does your relationship to dance affect your relationship to Bucharest? • Do you regularly/occasionally partake in social dance activities in Bucharest (Clubs/ socials/ outings/ church events/weddings/exercise classes) • How far do you feel dance/movement contributes to the local culture in Bucharest?

ENTER THE CITY: How can the body become a reflective mechanism for the experience of the body in the city? How far can the city be shaped and moulded by the actions and reactions of the body? THE CITY IS THE CHOREOGRAPHY OF LIFE, AND IT CAN BE USED AS RESOURCE FOR ARTISTIC PRACTICE; IT CAN FORM A PRODUCTIVE AND SUBSTANTIAL INPUT FOR THE CREATIVE MIND. THE MOTIFS OF HUMAN FORM REPEAT ON THE STREETS, TO BE OBSERVED, INTERPRETED, OR SIMPLY LEFT IN THEIR FLUX. CRESCENDOS AND DIMINUENDOS OF THE BUSTLING STREET RISE AND FALL WITH THE BREATH OF THE CITY, A LIVING ORGANISM, WHICH ONE CAN WALK UPON, IN, BESIDE AND AMONGST.

‘Our consciousness is like a body interacting with the exterior world. Because our nerves cannot extend beyond our skin, we only really sense our selves in contact with the larger world, but separate from it. In the same way we only know what is present within our consciousness, contours and textures of an infinite world that exists beyond the boundaries of knowledge.’

‘To look at human movements as action signs is to conceive the human body itself as signifier, to conceive of the body as a signifying body. What this means is that we have to conceive of human act/actions as embodied intentions and that we have to be able to see a lived space as intentionally achieved structuring, some that has been willed or is now willed by someone or some group of persons.’

Kent De Spain in Albright. A. C. Gere. D (eds) Taken by Surprise. A Dance Improvisation Reader. Wesleyan University Press. P37 2 Farnell. B ( 2001) Human Action Sign in Cultural Context. The Visible and Invisible in Movement and Dance. The Scarecrow Press. Maryland. P53

Practising Space: Review of potential practice based spatial observation tool kit. Beatrice Jarvis University of Ulster.

copy, imitate what you see there, try to be unobtrusive but also be aware of what you are doing. Do this for long enough to blend

, simulate,

2. Then merge with the patterns of movement you see there…See the

people and their actions; remove them from their space; see them and their bodies. .....join in, mimic

their patterns, notice stances, postures,

location…take a long slow look around, the way people are moving, the way they come and go, the things they do, their pace and

you. 1. Arrive to

Towards Amplifying Space: Making Place. Making the city choreograph |

repeat until it feels

changes. With the movement you have created; take it to a different location in the same space and try to directly apply it. How can the movement you have created become an architectural intervention or social intervention? How can the body become a means to unveil the potential ( used in the subjective realm) of the space?

Change and modify this as you repeat them, adding improvised cadenzas and unexpected

already ‘taught’ yourself ….and then ‘perform’ that in the space,

into a more set ‘piece’, half natural half new movements of your own, something freer and more complex perhaps than the original you have

exhausted; notice the point of exhaustion and repeat again. 4. Next teach yourself these movements and add to them…….turn them

are you being looked at? THEN do the same with your eyes closed a few times! Consolidate this pattern and

with the patterns, possibly 5 minutes or so, trying different movements and sequences if you like

.3. Then from that ‘ordinary’ sequence choose one or two – a step, a stance, a gesture….and repeat that in the place you are working in. Note your feelings and if anything feels strange –are you uncomfortable?,

LOCATIONS SELECTED: OBOR MARKET/ LIPSCANI/ PIATA ROMANA/ CREATING A MOVEMENT MEMORY CARTOGRAPHY OF EACH LOCATION; -‐ allowing the body to become an archive of your experience -‐ allow the body to become a container -‐ allow yourself to reflect your experience of the city. TAKE A MINUTE: Imagine yourself dancing… Don’t worry about what the word dancing means Close your eyes and imagine yourself dancing. For one minute. Now clasp your hands and continue. Tell the person you are walking next to: what did you imagine. What was the movement you saw? The texture? Did the moving make any sound? Were you alone? Were you feeling it? Is it possible to dance like you imagined? How would you like to dance in the city?

Beatrice Jarvis: Practising Space | The body landscape. Practice Research study. University of Ulster.

Score Two: The body accepts | The body resists Performance score. Arrive to location; What does the space necessitate you to do? Consider pace, stance, emotion, proximity to others, placement of body in space.

Allow your body to mirror, imitate and follow movement sets which you notice around you. Allow your body to blend with such patterns.

Allow such motion to happen

Let it pass.

Return to the emotion of arrival; remember your preconceptions; trace the stances which they have left on your body.

Trace the acceptance you fabricated to the space.

Simplify

Allow your body to repeat the motions you chose to represent.

Notice if anything feels uncomfortable

Closing your eyes allow yourself to dismiss the response to the patterns which you performed.

Dismiss.

In softness, find comfort and stability in newness; in your own innovation to dismiss the constructs you first constructed.

Beatrice Jarvis: Practising Space | The body landscape. Practice Research study. University of Ulster.

Take such movement and reapply allowing yourself allowing yourself to emerge to a new point of arrival.

Take a sense of the liberation you experienced in this momentary freedom. Is this freedom? Attempt to externalise a movement which reflects freedom from spatial expectation,

Return again to a sense of others passing by you; move from the internal personal exploration to the external.

Return to a sense of place; how are people around you walking? How can you feel and sense the pace of the space? The emotion by which the space is allowing people to move through it; how do you fit into this scale? How does your body fit to the construction around you?

Return to forms to space to generate an understanding of the body; see how shadows of buildings may affect or generate shapes and forms in location.

How are you accepting the behaviours of place and how can such observations manifest as contract in your body

Take a moment to allow yourself to formally agree to the expectations of the space you occupy.

Pause; filling the space through breath; envisaging flux both internal and external.

Actively dismiss the patterns and observations of the space you occupy. Allow yourself to actively become a spatial anomaly to the space you occupy.

Play with alternating these positions, pacing acceptance and dismissal as you wish.

Return to the space as neutral; become void

Return to your breath; acknowledge streams of thoughts to come and to pass, direct attention to breath, the rise and fall of the exchange of the breath which you consume and direct back into the space you are in dialog with. Beatrice Jarvis: Practising Space | The body landscape. Practice Research study. University of Ulster.

Finish such experience as you wish, setting out however the terms by which you are acknowledging and dismissing your reality as to what the space demands and reflect to you.

COLLECT GATHER MERGE COLLATE REPEAT FORM Using the three solos you have made; we will repeat them in a different location. This will be an abandoned location; removed from the sites which we have worked in. How do your movements merge/ clash/ combine with your fellow movers; how far is the site apparent in the quality of your movements; can place become transported some how in your movements; is this a quality we can work towards. Move to tell a story Discover its elements while you are moving Move to send a message A message of yourself and the story Move to the rhythm of the words of another’s story and the details, which they tell you of.

THE VOICE: THE STORY OF YOUR GEOGRAPHY: In each location we will make a voice recording of your immediate responses to the area; in terms of your relationship to it and your observations; these will then be used as ‘prop’ in the further location. Then say a small sentence about the city This can be a memory This can describe a place This can be to say your favorite place This can be to say where you least like

of in in in

the the the the

city city city city

What are your routines in the city? Where do you go most frequently in the city and where do you avoid to go in the city? Do you have a favorite place in the city and can you describe why this is your favorite place? Do you walk regularly in the city and how well can you describe the routes you walk.

Urban space within this research becomes a canvas; upon which numerous marks, symbols and lines are added to; such marks and codes constitutive of some form of spatial and movement language; yet how can this language be transcribed, documented, recorded and then retold? To translate is a lie. Just as to converse and re-present scenarios of the urban encounter relies on the subjective realities of the author to generate a narrative which another then reform a presentation of. Losing all sense of meaning to cultural assemblage of language. Concept of universal language as impossible as language is shaped by geography, history. Patterning; which in the fabric of its construction lays bear the failures of communication into physical fruition of the desires of the mind in its solitude? The results of this research aim to function as creative subjective impressions initially; the weight of the task forms as to how such a subjective experiential task can bare productive social fruit; a dialog, which can further enable new methodologies as to how the space is used. The practice of choreography in this context extends beyond the limits of dance; choreography here reflects a socio-spatial practice exploring and framing the movement of bodies in urban space as means to a cultural discourse as to how people use urban space and the various social syntaxes this encompasses. In order that choreography can be perceived and utilized as apparatus; it is essential that a definition of apparatus emerge initially as a framework for departure. This research stems from a personal desire to expand the field of choreography to become a social medium; beyond the field of dance; whilst utilizing traditional choreographic concepts to engage a choreographic discourse; this research borrows key aspects of qualitative research method to expand the nature of the enquiry to a more social field of understanding. How can the act and practice of an application of choreographic frame be utilized as spatial and social research methodology; how far does the process by which choreographic data and process is collected and re-presented enable sociological understanding to be cultivated

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For more information about my practice please see below: BEATRICE JARVIS Choreographer | Performer | Researcher Beatrice is an urban space creative facilitator, choreographer and researcher. She utilizes key concepts of choreography and visual arts methodologies with the intention to develop, original doctoral research on the connections between choreography and urban cultures. She is currently undertaking her practice based PhD funded by DEL titled; The Choreographic Apparatus| How Far can Choreographic Practice be used to Develop New Methods to Explore and Offer Insights into a Range of Urban Contexts. Her practice merges essential techniques in a sociological framework of critical perspectives. Beatrice is currently a visiting lecturer at various town planning and architecture departments in London developing a platform for the conceptual and physical integration of urban planning, sociology and choreography leading to practical social creative implementation. As a dance artist she works in Romania, Gaza, Germany and Northern Ireland to generate large scale choreographic works underpinned with a sociological inquiry; exploring the social power of movement. Beatrice is keen to create platforms social interaction using urban wastelands and reflections on urban habitation as a creative resource; her research currently focuses on how far choreography practice can develop a new methodology to interrogate a range of inner city conflict zones. Beatrice has recently initiated a new urban forum: Urban Research Forum for artists, architects, urban designers, cultural researchers, sociologists, anthropologists and all with an urban interest. This is conducted through seminars, workshops, performances and exhibitions. Collaboration, discourse and intellectual inquiry are seminal to this concept. The city with her practice becomes a live laboratory for social and spatial research of urban space use developing from this research innovative and interactive future space use programs through creativity Current research funded by DEL. ( Dartington College of Arts 2005-‐8 Choreography and Visual Arts BA hons First Class, MA Goldsmiths’, Centre of Community and Urban research, AHRC Funded; PhD, Ulster; Architecture and Art and Design, DEL funded) For further information about my practice please see the following links: • • • •

Creative City life: http://beatricejarvis.com/ Urban Research: http://issuu.com/urbanresearchforum Documentation: http://www.blurb.com/user/bj87 City as Studio: http://urbanorganics.cultura3.net/Resources/media/promo.mov

Work Examples: Heygate Estate/Elephant and Castle: http://vimeo.com/26177151 password: city and http://issuu.com/urbanresearchforum/docs/towards_embodied_methodology?mode=window&viewMode=singl ePage Deptford Study for Steven Lawrence Centre: http://issuu.com/urbanresearchforum/docs/exhibition_catalouge_practising_space/3 and http://www.practisingspace.com/events-‐and-‐exhibitions.php Bucharest Study for local government AHRC: Dansul Objectul din Bucuresti LaBomba http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/invited/1015638/a8bd37a9fad73767cb13edef857dba7d Northern Ireland Cartography Project: AHRC: CollectingTrails http://www.blurb.com/bookstore/invited/1002909/405ee1c548a4b9718763503e118327cc

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