DM1
1. What, when and where
Compagnie Marie Chouinard
“Henri Michaux: Mouvements“
Visited on
Nov-27-2013
at
Schouwburg Arnhem
2. Description
Henri Michaux,
born 1899 in Namur
and died 1984 in Paris
Michaux worked with the
boarders of speech
and written language,
he researched on the
characteristics of
signs.
He described some of
his drawings and oil
paintings as “scripture
and writing of no
specific language.
Without affiliation and
concatenation”.
His Painting and Peotry
always were worth
the same to him.
1945 til 1959 he experimented with Meskalin.
He made drawings and
paintins under the
influence of the drug.
For him this was
researching on the expansion
of human perception and
awareness.
So the Performance I saw was very connected to these
drawings. In fact there was a gigantic projection of the drawings on the back
wall.
White paper with black drawings - white background withblack dressed dancers.
I would like to divide the performance into four parts.
The first part worked like this: One little drawing
was projected and one dancer imitated the form of the spot of color.
Then one dancer grabbed a microphone and, while she
was hiding under a stripe of the dance carpet, recited a poem which appears in
the middle of Michaux’s Book .
A fluent transition back to imitating the figures
happened. But now it happened to be many signs at once, performed by groups of
dancers.
The speed of the projection changing from one picture
to the next increased untill in the last part there was no drawing seen longer
than half a second. Of course the dancer could not change positions in that
tempo, but they used a technical trick. Strobo lights as they often are used in
nightclubs. Basically that means there are flashing lights that turn on and of
at incredible speed. So the dancer just moves fluently in that light but
because there are many short blackouts the viewer only sees the moments when
there is light. This looks like the dancer is moving staccato and changing poses
at impossible speed.
The whole time there was a very aggressive and chaotic
music that could be compared to super extreme metal rock. Sometimes it appeared
to be even only white noise. The dancers were screaming and hissing at some
points whenever they were in animal like poses.
There was a white dance carpet on the stage but it
didn’t cover the whole floor. There was some space left at the sides. So when a
dancer stepped onto the white floor he was “on stage”. Otherwise he was kind of
off stage, even though he was still standing on the stage, just not on the
white floor.
The Style of the piece was of course very
contemporary, super fluent movement. Sometimes bizarre or ugly gestures and
poses. Extreme facial expressions and grimaces.
But the purity and the plain choice of color gave such
a strict and clean look to the piece that it had some touch of neoclassicism.
The performance durated approx. 35 minutes.
3. Reflection
I really don’t like the style of that company, but
that is just a question of personal choice. I was not enjoying any of the three
pieces that were shown that evening. I was annoyed by the music, I didn’t like
the dancers, the humor, the costumes etc. But apart from that I was still
amazed by what I saw and still went home very pleased that evening. I was
talking about the single parts of the piece and I think they were timed just
perfectly. Whenever I thought an Idea has had it’s time, they changed to
another part. There was neither boredom nor rush. Perfect timing. And also the
horrible music I mentioned really makes sense as the taschistic drawings
concern a minds awareness under the influence of drugs. They really show the
world that is created in such a mind.
All the sounds, figures, fears, lights, shapes etc. that appear in the mind,
appear on the paper and also appeared on stage. In fact the choice of music was
a perfect one to match the topic. I think the concept was not very deep or
complicated but still interesting for the time of half an hour. And it was
worked very well. Decisions must have been made precisely and reasonable.
My appreciacion to the choreographer, director and
dramaturgist and everybody else who made those decisions.
“Henri Michaux: Mouvements“ by Compagnie Marie
Chouinard was definitely a well crafted
work of art made magnificently and with a lot of experience!
