Reality?

                Throughout each study within this class I have used different stimuli to create my movement.  With this study I decided to create movement for movement’s sake.  The only stimulus that I had was my imagination.  “The conscious recall of suitable movements for communication of liveliness occurs within the imagination of the composer” (Smith 213).  With only the four movement qualities of light, heavy, direct, and indirect to give me compositional motivation, I found it surprisingly easy to create the phrases.  It wasn’t until trying to fit them together that it became difficult, especially with using the element of chance. 

                When I began creating the movement for the four phrases to be used in this piece, I had an idea of using one movement idea throughout each phrase.  “The composer, with this in mind, then begins to manipulate material to fit these conscious images, and thus start composing” (Smith 213).  Instead of having a lot of material, I wanted to simplify the movement.  After hearing the feedback from my class, I realized that this didn’t work choreographically throughout the entire dance.  Ellie made the comment that the direct section was very clearly movement that was made from my vocabulary, but that the other sections just looked as if I gave them improvisational words pertaining to the Laban dynamics I was attempting to portray.  This was true for the transitions between each section as well as the use of structure improvisation for the indirect section. The problem with this was that the transitions lasted longer that I had planned them to.  Instead of being invisible, the transitions took over.  The indirect section was also structured improvisation that was meant to use the indirect quality of focus.  I originally wanted the dancers to use only their focus to portray the indirect quality as they simply walked around the space and each other.  While this plan worked within my head, I hadn’t planned for the dancer’s to interpret the structure differently on the day of the performance.  This was a risk I hadn’t taken into consideration. 

                I decided to ask one of my roommates to randomly draw the numbers out of a hat to figure out what order my phrases would be put into.  My roommate said, “three, one, four, two” without drawing any numbers.  I then asked him again to please draw the numbers then read them to me.  As he drew the numbers out of the hat, it was the same order as he had said.  I would have thought that he somehow cheated and saw the numbers before drawing them, but I had written out the numbers on the paper myself and made sure that they couldn’t be identified by looking at them.  This was a weird experience that just added to the “chance dance” madness.  These numbers put my dance in the order of heavy, direct, light, and indirect. After randomly selecting my props to be put into my movement phrases I had a hard time making sense of them and connecting them without being cliché.  

                I felt like my group members who performed in this piece performed the opening section pretty well.  They had a “clear use of focus to communicate the dance idea” (Smith 180).  I wanted the floor crawlers to have their focus on the objects in their hands so that the audience would be interested in what the objects were.  After the performance, Professor Ellie made a note that when objects are small, the audience can’t see them unless they are introduced properly.  I know that she had made a similar comment the day before in reference to how well the introduction of a paper clip was, but I wasn’t thinking about my objects still being in the smaller sized category with this reference.  Due to limited time in rehearsal, I hadn’t seen Christina using the brush to brush Jake off of Amy to the back instead of where the audience could see the action.  Since this didn’t show up as a problem in rehearsal, I never thought to specify the placement of the action.  I would seriously take these ideas and notes into consideration if I ever decided to rework this piece.  The other two props within this section were a candle and a pair of glasses.  As the three surrounding the duet in the middle were making their way toward the middle I had them use their props to make noise.  The only problem with this was that while Christina and Isis were able to make noise, Yuki wasn’t able to with the eyeglasses.  I hadn’t thought that this would be a problem, but during the feedback someone had mentioned that it didn’t make sense for two to make noise when Yuki hadn’t been able to.  I also used Yuki putting the glasses on the back of Jake’s head as a way to remove the props from the phrase, but since one of my dancers didn’t give the remaining third prop to Jake, this didn’t make sense either.  If I could change this in the future, I would highlight Jake’s transition to give this idea more clarity.

                The direct, light, and indirect sections were all easy adaptations to the use of my props within the phrases.  During the direct section, I had selected my favorite sweater and Sudoku book.  Instead of having the props spread across the space, I decided to have Yuki use both of them so that the audience wouldn’t have a hard time processing what the props were.  I had decided to have Yuki put the sweater on her legs instead of just having her wear it as it would traditionally be worn.  I also played with facings and groupings with the other four dancers put into pairs with one pair facing toward one another and the other facing away from one another.  With the class feedback in mind, the audience felt that this section worked.  In the light section, the sweat pants were used as a barrier for three dancers while Jake performed the movement with the heating pad wrapped around his neck.  Because the cord was so long Jake was able to play with the use of his new attachment while dancing.  Lastly, the tennis ball, body spray, and socks were quizzical at first, but simple explanations led to the final section’s success.  For one, I know that Jake loves to slide around in his socks. Secondly, I know that he wouldn’t want to smell like a girl all day.  Lastly, I needed a counter balance for the audience due to the chaotic motion in the background.  The strongest feedback for this section was that the audience wanted it to last longer.