val
smith writes about Man Made, a choreographic
work by Oliver Connew
How is art a
tool of social change?
How do
body-based explorations impact cultural discourse?
How do
artistic experiences transform our imagination of what’s possible in our world?
How do race,
gender, economics give or withhold voice in our society?
Retrieved from http://counterpulse.org/2015/
Across
the Pacific Ocean, Julie Phelps, the Artistic Director of Counterpulse in San
Francisco, relays the above questions in regards to Miguel Gutierrez’s new work
Age & Beauty Part 1: Mid-Career
Artist/Suicide Note or &:-/, noting how such questions are currently in
dialogue in that part of the world. Here in New Zealand, Oliver Connew returns
from his European base in the artistic mecca of Berlin, to present a choreographic
work Man Made, which deals with the privileges of being male and white in contemporary
society.
Employing some clearly defined and intriguingly
indistinct structural methods of practice,
Connew and collaborator Gareth Okan present a series of choreographic episodes
that intelligently question how their apparently able-bodied, middle-class,
thin, and cisgendered male physicalities reflect various cultural positioning
and advantages. Through a participatory game structure, a non-linear
investigation of space, an endurance test involving bunches of green bananas, and
a boxing style gym routine cum dance-dance, the two performers innovatively touch
on the power dynamics of colonialism, patriarchy and capitalism. The
self-aware performance piece navigates performance issues of coercion, force,
bullying, competition and ownership, in ways that implicate, absorb and amuse
the audience. Man
Made not only employs choreographic innovation as a rule of thumb, it also
represents a solid transdisciplinary approach to collaboration, bringing
together the inspired lighting ideas by Amber Molloy and Marshall Bull, the
rousing beat making and mixing of Andrew Cesan, and the choreographic
contributions of the two dance artists.
Whilst
I am well interested in how this work deals with the issues at hand, the more
significant impact for me of Man Made,
is in how the choreographic structuring and styling challenge unspoken rules
embedded in the fields of dance and choreography. These rules, or dance making
conventions, assert that a well-polished
choreography worthy of praise should display: tidy compositional structures;
relentless and virtuosic acts of physicality; quick and seamless transitions;
and should conform to tight and comfortable time frames. Man Made
offers alternative choreographic values that resist these rules in a number of
ways:
- - In an extended
episode of fuzzy actions and roamings, Man
Made emphasizes the workings of its transitions without a concern for tight
compositional control,
- - The work resists the
idea that choreography should never linger in a territory where ‘nothing much
is happening’, or dwell for ‘tooo long’ in any movement terrain at all (a rule
of thumb monitored mostly by audiences),
- - It also
disregards the convention that any prop or lighting change should be rendered
invisible, and not acknowledged as part of the choreography itself,
- - Unapologetically
playing in the space between sections or action, Man Made asserts waiting and resting as choreographically
worthwhile and meaningful performative acts.
I
am perplexed and inspired by these choreographic counter-values, becoming particularly
engrossed in how the work utilizes physical actions and performative gestures in
material I can best describe as knowing
and unknowing.
The
opening episode of Man Made, a participatory ‘game’, invites us into a competitive
environment that tests our physical balance with a partner. The hosts of the game, Oliver and Gareth, set
a tone of tongue-in-cheek irony into the competition, a tone that lingers to
the end of the work emphasized by the performers’ sports shoes and lycra costuming. We are instructed to choose another audience
member and attempt to make them fall off the spot, the winner being the one
whose feet stay planted. As someone who
finds the call for adrenalized alertness and roughness in competitive sports alienating
and ridiculous, I instantly feel awkward and resistant to the game. I’m not sure whether to politely comply with
the given instructions, or to rebel and risk looking like a snobby wanker. I partner with fellow improviser Kristian
Larsen and we end up playing with the intricacies of pressure between our hands,
and with the possibilities of articulation, in a manner that does not buy into a
desire to win or finish our round quickly. Do we represent part of a percentage of renegade
resistors in the audience who, when faced with parameters that ask for
particular kinds of involvement and interaction in the performance, looks for
ways to participate differently? Employing
the known structure of a ‘game’ brings into conversation the psychological
forces innate to methods of participation as well as the competition at hand. When faced with the rules, guidelines and
parameters of Man Made, in this
section and others, the audience is visibly
compliant, but I wonder how power dynamics are playing out in the subjective
experience of each audience member. This
work seems to be carefully and consciously highlighting a complexity of power
relations operating within a performance context.
The
game has created a sense of connectedness amongst the audience, and between us
and the two performers. This feeling of friendliness and openness shifts us
easily into the expanded episode to follow. This second episode combines indistinct
movements, meanings and intentions in a way that is hard to describe, hard to
describe because I’m not quite sure what it is that I am witnessing. This challenge to implicit notions of what
constitutes good dancing and successful choreography, opens up new ideas for
dance making. What if we deliberately do what the rules of dance tell us not to
do? Will this reveal new understandings
about our construction and conception of time and space in choreography? The outcome of this episode is a curious assertion
of uncertainty as a compositional value; I am clearly watching a piece of ‘thinking
dance’.
The
third episode (or is it an extension of the previous episode?) explores a
process of making and unmaking space. The
two performers work together to imply and define spatial parameters using
gestures, statements, props and lights, creating a politics of ownership,
colonialism and the domination of space by white men. A long string of lights is used to create
non-linear spaces; the performers are playfully investigating ways to fill and occupy
the temporary spaces with their bodies. The
spaces created morph again quickly; no space is clearly defined for very long. If
you buy into the idea that what you believe in becomes your reality, then this
episode speaks to how we force our ontological beliefs onto others. A performer states “this is my space”,
reinforcing his claim through an encompassing gesture with his arms. In another statement, “the space between my
arms is a void, and no one can sit there” along with an assertive arm gesture
is enough to clear the audiences bodies out of the zone conventionally
designated for us. Unsettling our comfortable
grouping into one big togetherness, this action that divides the audience into
two halves sets up an awareness of our separateness. Is this strategy testing
how we might respond to force and coercion?
Following
on is a test of stamina and endurance. The
two performers now face off against each other grasping a bunch of green
bananas in each hand out in front of their bodies. Who can hold the 2nd position squat
the longest whilst maintaining an eye lock with the other? The static stance quickly becomes physically demanding:
perspiration forms, their breathing gets deeper and quicker, we can see the effort
and determination on their faces and in their bodies. I adore the simplicity and implied politics of
this section, with its piss take on codes of masculinity. Gareth increases the stakes part way through this
test/competition by significantly deepening his squat, signaling the absurdity
of how far some men will go to prove their masculinity. His body starts to shake, and I find myself
wanting to cheer him on, like an enthusiastic sports mum or a bloodthirsty
sideliner at a dog fight (weird feelings, but strangely empowering). Again, Man
Made is revealing complex layers of power, this time in relation to
dynamics that operate between viewers and the object of their gaze: the episode
is clever and thrilling.
This section ends
when Gareth, exhausted, collapses in a heap on the floor. Oliver follows suit and they rest on folded legs
for a period that moves beyond a body time that we know to be ‘ok’ in the
context of theatre. Continuing with
their rest and recovery beyond that comfortable timeframe triggers laughter through
the room. I’m not sure if this is uncomfortable
laughter, or a laughter that recognizes the performers are doing something ‘cheeky’
or ‘smug’? This intentional rest moves
our intimate relationship with the performers beyond an admiration of their athletic
aptitude to empathize with their fragility, sensitivity and humanness. Is the choreographer presenting a scene of sitting
inside vulnerability and being ok with not doing much on stage, to suggest a
shift in contemporary dance values beyond the desiring for a display of physical
virtuosity?
The
final episode uses movement material derived from cheaply styled Les Mills boxing
drills (I think?) with well-known methods of choreographic structuring. The performers move in time with the music, emphasizing
the down beat with movement accents. It’s
entrancing. This has me thinking about
the dominance of physical routine in contemporary dance training, the repetition
and the discipline that dancers are encultured into. As I watch the two dancers performing the
same movements in unison and canon, I am also thinking about the privileges of a
body that ‘knows’. Whilst we can see that
both Oliver and Gareth have highly trained dance bodies, they don’t look the
same. They have distinct bodily features
and shapes, and in this section Gareth’s body appears to know the boxing drills
well, as if they have been trained into him over time. Through his body, the execution of the
movements looks easy and coordinated, whereas Oliver’s physicality doesn’t seem
as confident with where to place weight, how to angle the torso or shoulders to
allow full movement, how to gain maximum force behind the punch or strike. I find this point of difference fascinating, and
again I’m thinking here about the complexity and layering of power dynamics in the
field of dance. Keeping in mind the Western
tradition of contemporary dance training, were the perfection of line, form,
shape and body is relentlessly insisted upon, how are we evaluating the
difference between these two male dancers’ physicalities?
Man Made contributes to a conversation about whiteness,
maculinity and individualist middle class values through its’ exploration of control,
misuse of power and manipulation in performance. How can we continue the conversation opened up
by Connew locally and consider questions currently being explored in the work of
internationally active performance artists? Is it possible to create anti-racist practices
in the field of contemporary dance here in New Zealand Aotearoa when its values
are embedded in histories of colonialism and white ideals?
Further information on Oliver Connew: https://saltedsinglet.wordpress.com/
Reference: “Interview with an Artist: Miguel Gutierrez responds to
Julie Phelps”, retrieved from http://counterpulse.org/2015/
