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Monthly Update - June, 2006
1) Teaching a class in August & September
BODY & SONG
This class will combine technical instruction with improvisational play. Working with dynamic song and movement structures, participants will be challenged to discover new levels of energetic and organic engagement. They will also be invited to discover, through patience, their own self-initiated practices, and to develop these towards simplicity and quality. By calling on the body through sweat and song, and on the mind through individual exploration, we will develop our embodied understandings of performance craft and learn how to open ourselves.
Sundays from 4:00pm - 6:00pm
Panetta Movement Center
Contact:
PLEASE DISTRIBUTE WIDELY
2) Artist Statement
In the past, I have directed experimental theater pieces involving integrated multimedia audio and video technology, long-form character-based improvisation, and movement set to music; and I have performed two solo text-based works. However, in the past year I have undertaken a project of individual exploration and embodied research of a very different nature. Specifically, I have worked to incorporate and what I learned during two years of training in Poland and Europe into a self-initiated performance training and development process that is grounded and defined by the intersection of body and song.
Body: Physical training is the foundation of my work, consisting of basic elements such as running, walking, crawling and jumping, with special attention paid to the connection between spine and extremities. These elements must be enacted in a way that is simple and dynamic, with an emphasis on receptivity and awareness rather than the achievement of specific choreographies. Unforced surplus energy is required so that the reality of each moment can be served without prejudice or laziness. Precision is cultivated in terms of the ability to react and respond to what is present. Repeatable forms of movement are discovered and developed slowly, through a highly personal process of erosion and germination.
Song: Once physical openness and receptivity have been sufficiently awakened, they can be structured through the use of song. Each person has in their memory a landscape of song-memories that comes from their personal musical history and relationships with songs from different sources. Out of this landscape, simple repetitive structures or "song fragments" can be developed. These tend to be melodically simple, but the process through which they are linked to specific qualities of song is complex. In seeking to rediscover these qualities, the singer must work with memory as well as technique, and must engage the whole body in the act of singing.
Intersection: This word signifies a search for actions that organically require the full use of body and voice simultaneously. This is distinguished from the layering of music and choreography as two parallel tracks, and is linked to the use of the body as a single instrument. In this context, the combination of song fragments with an open and responsive body can evoke a kind of abstract acting, in which the emotional life of the performer is structured by technical elements of song and movement. An observer sees neither a formal dance nor a clear narrative, but a dynamic flow in which all the elements of performance intersect.
Self-Initiation: For many people, the challenge of self-directed or self-initiated work is more difficult than any other. Even seasoned actors with significant experience may balk at the idea of working alone, while directors who are comfortable in positions of leadership are often at a loss when asked to lead in an embodied way. In order to work alone for any length of time, there must be a strong, positive relationship between the mind and the body. The issue of combining joy with discipline, which exists in all artistic work, is especially apparent in long-term self-initiated work.
3) New video clip
There is a new video clip in the portfolio:
The Master and Margarita – a fragment (Wroclaw, Poland, 2005) http://www.junkriver.org/site/portfolio/clips/mistrz.mp4
4) Journal excerpts
With these excerpts, I am looking for the proper balance of vulnerability and strength. I don't want to include too much of my internal doubting and complaining, because for most people that won't be a very good read. On the other hand, I don't want to give the impression that my journal is entirely made up of confident analysis and commentary. Here once again I am experimenting, looking for the right proportion of each.
As always, comments, criticisms, and questions are welcome. In addition, I would welcome and appreciate feedback on the class description and artist statement above.
> June 17
Everyone knows that different kinds of art are not better or worse than one another. Only a fool would say that ballet is better or worse than tap or jazz or modern. Yet in order to train rigorously, your vectors of effort must be extremely strong. "Not this way but *this* way it must be done!"
So what is this border? Pedro Alejandro, a mentor of mine, called these two approaches "anthropological" (without judgment) and "choreological" (with strong valuation). But he never raised the question of how you transition from one to the other, especially in the working process itself.
In the "real" world of social infrastructure, actions have to be justified by what they achieve. Vectors of pure effort are not enough--they must be justified in terms of entertainment, fitness, politics, or other good things. But it's interesting that the root of all this goodness is not the nature of any specific technique so much as the labor and love that goes into it. This appears as a paradox: It doesn't matter what technique you have, but you must have technique. A strong and pure vector of effort is the key to art, but it can be in any direction...
But it's not a paradox when you see that there are two parts of the human being. The one in the mind must not be judgmental, for that always leads to some kind of violence. But the one in the body must act in a certain strong way--a "decided" way. So what is this strength that is not violence, this discipline that is not fascism? It is not something that can be discovered through language, and for me it is so poignant and important that I can't bear to hear directors and teachers speak in theoretical or generalized terms. I have always been allergic to totalizing narrative--yet I ache for craft and intensity!
So it is for each and all of us to discover the flower without words, the special kind of energy which is not linked to achieving anything. This can come only when there is no reason or explanation for why we do it one way and not another. Beyond that, we simply do. It must come from underneath words, from the animal self.
> June 20
What is the difference between a monastic approach and a professional one, in terms of technique and craft?
> June 22
Any runner knows there are different ways of running. Running coaches tell their athletes how to place the body in alignment, etc. But I'm not looking for the way of running that is fastest in a sprint or marathon. I'm looking for the way of running that is most open, the way of running where it is possible also to sing, to jump, to fall down, to gesture from the spine or heart. I want to run in a way that is most close to the "center," where the center is defined by the range of what is possible from that point. Running as an "empty channel" (not to say neutral), so that one can be receptive to all other impulses at the same time.
> June 23
Song ---> Movement
vs.
Song ---> ("something else") ---> Movement
How to describe, and how to discover, this "something else"?
> June 25
Monday morning. A rough time. The beginning of the week. My body is angry at having to wake up so early, and my mind is angry at all that has been lost since I was in the studio last Friday. I ache with longing for what I hope to accomplish in the time it takes to fill this new notebook with words--but the frustration is ready to snap back at a moment's notice, with its cruel assessment of how unlikely that achievement is.
I can't do anything unless it's for the actual pleasure of doing it. And I know that understanding comes only after the thing is learned. The teacher is there to give it faith. I am looking for that part of myself that can take the leap of faith, to do without understanding. The part that is simply willing--or even, "innocent."
Someone told me a year ago that I am not innocent. His words are still ringing in my ears because of how right he was. In order to touch real beauty, I have to be innocent and abandon my ambitions. But it doesn't mean to fall down. I would like very much to go back to bed... I have to remain standing, alert, ready, but do nothing, force nothing, and it is so painful, it hurts so much to do that...
I have such emotions! I am filled with them like a teenager, and like a teenager I can't believe that that isn't enough, that I am expected to do more than just experience and learn in the world…
Bitterness isn't something one should fear encountering with old age. There will always be projects to do, even if they are less ambitious. Bitterness is a more constant enemy, a daily enemy, and not one that we consciously share with others. Yet we face it in ourselves every day. I come to the studio maybe just in order to face my own bitterness, and to release myself on the blade of the practice of overcoming it. Each day, so much bitterness against my own ability to move and sing! Not flexible enough--not loud enough--not rich enough--not skinny or muscular enough--not enough. Simply, not enough.
What does it take to begin? Not words, but something else.
> June 27
There are two ways to understand "what I saw" that day in Moscow, and that's all I have to go on right now. First, "what I saw" could refer to the actual technique, the technical elements. Or second, it could refer to the dedication, the supreme giving and sacrifices that have been made over the years by those artists. The love of work, in other words. If it's the former, then I need to get myself over to train with them, because you cannot invent another person's technical knowledge. You have to learn it from them.
But Grotowski didn't spend many years becoming a practical master of the actual techniques of Stanislavski. It's debatable whether that would even have been possible for him. What he did was to follow his own inspiration and continue what he took to be Stanislavski's research. The questions seemed to him to follow out of Stanislavski, India, etc.--but the quality of the work was the result of his own dedication and courage. So each person's work ultimately reveals their own level of dedication and courage.
In the end, the ghost of Grotowski says to me exactly what Peter Sellars said to me: DO THE WORK. And now, after the last few months, I am beginning to understand that this really isn't an admonishment regarding discipline or the number of hours you put in. It's about doing what you want to do--what you choose to do--and not what you think you ought to be doing. And if you don't have this courage, this power, then no amount of hours or sweat can make up the differences. Because what is the quality of the hours? What is the quality of the sweat?
> June 29
It's the teachers' faults if there are dilettantes. When the teacher learned, it was a slow process. It took a long time. Later, if they try to pass on the technique too quickly, the students will leave thinking they "got" something. So the consumerist model is reinforced. It's not possible to leave a real class in this way, as a dilettante. A real teacher gives no cheap prizes, and there is no illusion of getting any "skills," so whatever you take away is really yours.
Teaching must happen at the pace of actual learning and discovery, which is no quicker the second time around. Bad teachers make the mistake of thinking they can "save the students time" by teaching shortcuts. This is what produces dilettantes. Good teachers accept that the students won't learn any faster than they (the teacher) did. This way there can be no dilettantes, because the outer teaching matches the pace of the inner teaching.
Ben Spatz
August 20 and 27, September 3, 10 and 17
214 West 29th Street, 10th Floor
Fee: $100 for five classes
Ben Spatz
(917) 566-8205
urt@junkriver.org
www.junkriver.org
New York City