Direct Action Flâneurs & 1234 I declare color war

Ale (one of the Occupy Wall Street’s originators) had a birthday-transmigration party @ Liberty Square (aka Zuccotti Park) on July 12th, 2012. Ale brings colored powder, Rob and I bring typewriters to create a joint Direct Action Flâneurs (DAF) pluripotential temporary autonmous zone. The paper for this action: three 10-page long scrolls made from copies of the DAF writings at the 6-months anniversary of the occupation of Zuccotti Park. The reverse side is printed "ALEXANDRE THE GREAT A BLOODLESS RLOVEUTION" – and the Imprint may help provoke writers to go beyond bye-bye messages for Ale (he has to return to Rio because his visa did not get renewed). Each scroll loops between two typewriters--a symbolic act of togetherness. We integrate the Park's architecture by placing the 'paper-connected' typewriters on top of the long marble stone benches. "1-2-3-4, I declare color war," Ale screams, and starts dancing with others with the colored powder. Meanwhile, there is pas-de-deux-typing with committed observations about sensations, thoughts, like "warm-up writing" for action. The dancing bodies form a "moebius strip" just like the scrolled up paper. As time passes the two typers come closer together, as the paper moves relentlessly towards union. But the scrolls are too long—and we never quite get to touch each others’ faces.
Dance and Mind in Action:

 One small part of the three long scrolls writing by one or more of the over 20 anonymous participants who became temporary DAF

Direct Action Flâneurs @ Edinburgh Scottish Parliament

I and my fellow Direct Action Flâneur Robert Neuwirth escaped the TED GLOBAL 2012 community for a couple of hours to find TED's theme of ‘Radical Openness’ in the Edinburgh community.

Thursday June 27th around noon. We get to the Scottish Parliament and come upon a group of anti-rape protestors.  We sit on the floor in front of the Parliament. With our analog typewriters -- an Antares Parva (pictured) and an  Everest K3 -- and our 'sit-in' body action, we create a community in the moment with the anti-rape protestors. It’s a 21^st century temporary autonomous zone. Our sit-in ends when the policewoman demands to see what we have written and walks off with it and we demand the papers back. Audio file: an excerpt of the physical-aural interaction.

http://soundcloud.com/directactionflaneurs/da-flaneur-edinburgh-audio2-1 

Would we have handed our writings to the cops in New York? NO WAY. Here in Edinburgh, though, we saw ourselves as guests and so automatically accepted a conditional hospitality!

 




For more on the demonstration itself go to:

http://www.scotsman.com/edinburgh-evening-news/britain-s-most-unwanted-all-requests-made-to-other-uk-councils-to-house-rapist-refused-1-2384168

Direct Action Flâneurs @ Rio+20

Onward Ale(Alexandre Carvalho)! He went to Rio + 20 and his activity was an inauguration of the Direct Action Flaneurs in revolutionary cultural struggle check it out:

http://noticias.bol.uol.com.br/ciencia/2012/06/22/protesto-surpresa-vai-de-nudismo-a-poesia.jhtm 

Direct Action Flâneurs & Morgan Subway Station

                

The Thinking Body and the Dancing Mind.

We settle in this public in – between zone with small plastic chinese chairs. Some type, others dance to the ‘dancing’ typewriters’ sound. People are in a rush to catch the train but some take the risk to stop and type. Other times we flaneur—carrying the typewriters and we pause—and some of the commuters, these underground “subway runners,” take the pause as an invitation to write on the typewriter. If we did the same thing in the Times Square station, how long would it take until the police told us to move? Here in Bushwick where workers, immigrants who share a single metrocard in a very hidden way, and hipsters all share the space, the police never arrive, and we stop our action through our own choice. We had a great DAF team alex, rob, amelia , me and the subway runners; we created a residue-- a leftover energy -- a possibility for change? 

 

Direct Action Flâneurs & Grand Central Station

A day that showed many possibilities to create a pluripotential zone in the moment. Sense Collection with Typewriters and chinece plastic chairs in a circle formation. Did the small colored chinese plastic chairs and the old typewriters encouraged the police from above to wait 20 minutes before they came to us and told us that we can not settle in in the middle of Grand Central Station?  People joined us for a temporary moment either by typing, talking and/or observing.

Direct Action Flâneurs &March Against Police Brutality

The march against police brutality, and a call for police commissioner Ray Kelly to resign, or be fired, began at Liberty Plaza a/k/a Zuccotti Park

The Lagosians are watching...we are fighting for 'Access To Clean Free Water'

Lagos, Nigeria one of the biggest growing urban mega-city on the planet faces the challenge to bring clean safe water to everyone. Site-Specific Social Choreography. I was working with 7 choreographers and over 40 Nigerian dancers during a five - day period to practice Dance as a Social Choreography for the Global Water Dances Event "Clean Safe Water for Everyone". Performance was on June 25, 2011. The  project was produced by the Society for the Performing Arts in Nigeria (SPAN). 

We are over 60 procent out of Water. Water doesn't stop. So I created a concept with the idea of on going, like water, flowing into the streets of Lagos. The "Human River" dance began at Tinubu Square and moved through the streets of Lagos Island into Freedom Park. In the Freedom Park we shared our space with the singer Olufunmi Olajoyegbe and the dancers continous to flow with the theme "The Water Seller's Tale". This part of the Dance was created in collaboration with Nigerian choreographers: Offiong Anthony, Konwea Frank Chinedu, Umeigbo Celino Nneka, Uche Onah, Lovette Ortegbola, Ukalina Eline Opuwari and Agocha Shilh Davies.

To fully empower the Lagosian, I made a conscious artistic choice not to dance in the work. And I like to remind myself on this point on the very important written statement in 1957 by Guy Ernest Debord who founded the Situationist International, a radical group of creators searching for new forms of action in art and politics.

“We have to change the world. That’s what we think. Change society. Change life. Do it for freedom. Get us out of this prison. We know one thing: this change is possible. All that remains is to figure out how to do it.” 

Lagos - THE UNKNOWN

This video compilation consists of two events from November 14, 2009. The first is a video shot out of the window while driving from Mile 2 to Festac Town in Lagos, Nigeria to a performance. The second is the performance itself, at the gala event celebrating 365 days of the leadership of the local government of the Amuwo Odofin area. The dancers are from the choreography workshop I led at the Society for the Performing Arts in Nigeria. Additional Sound Track for the video compilation: Eric Dolphy performing "God Bless the Child," on the bass clarinet. In a very short period of time we created the work. Since the Choreography Workshop was all about the individual in the collective, each dancers created for this work their own movement phrase. It was challenging for them. Truly challenging it was for the Nigerian Audience to see a dance without music and the use of 360 degree performance space.

DIALOGUE '120 dishes' begins!

The new project DIALOGUE '120 dishes' was born during the two-week residency at Tanzhaus Zurich in February 2009! For the development of the work I invited six performers (Einy Aam, Elke Rindfleisch, Yin Hou, Francesca Honegger, Katja Vaghi, Laura Vogel) living and working in Switzerland, New York and China, and the Chinese artists Zhao Xiaoyu (composer) and Xiaohua Sun (new media). I approach DIALOGUE ‘120 dishes’ as a social experiment in communication, set on and around an arrangement of conference tables, that overtime take new configuration to establish new "dialogue' situations (One- to- One, Panel, Round table etc.).  It is a dance piece, a theater work, an installation, and a verbal dialogue. Some of the residency questions we embodied were: Who are we as performers with different dance traditions in different cultural and social settings (what role art plays in this social/political settings)? How do we negotiate between each other, the audience and the architecture (table formation etc)? What means individuality towards collective decision making. How to give everyone in the room a voice? How we can expand the dialogue also into the virtual world --where audience can send their thoughts to the performers with help of the mobile phone..?--{The Resources of this new work ranges by looking at gatherings in commercial context, within a cultural venue, at community board or in the context of a political or civic debate. By taking this highly formalized events, both spatially and corporally we are trying to find possibilities for a more dynamic, anti-formal approach to space, body, movement, gesture..

Thanks to co-director Meret Schlegel at Tanzhaus Zurich with her team and production manager Martina Alfonso with her wonderful friends we were able to present to the Zurcher Audience the first stage of this new project last Tuesday, March 3rd. Check out the result of this two week residency by clicking on the slideshow RESIDENCY DIALOGUE 120 DISHES. Photos by photographer Christian Glauser.

Pure Water - Lagos, Nigeria

a fragmented stage in a garden/40 dancers with different abilities/a collaboration with Nigerian choreographer Adedayo Liadi/working in the heat/different realities-different environments. How pure is a creative process that had so many given parameters? 'Pure Water’: small plastic bags of water sold on the streets; Lagosians rip the corner off with their teeth and squeeze the bag to squirt out the water.
Our collaborative performance work Another Day of Life was presented by the Society for the Performing Arts in Nigeria (SPAN) as part of the event MESSAGE IN THE GARDEN, November 25, 2008. The founder and chairperson of SPAN, Sarah Boulos invited me to teach contemporary dance and to create a dance work with Adedayo Liadi.

spicy city - 120 dishes

Sharing lunch with five members of the Sichuan Modern Dance Company, I count 120 dishes on the table. Eating and laughing: A must in Chengdu.

pressing the body into the wall

TASK for the Sichuan Modern Dancers: Press the Body into the Wall and Wait. Why do the dancers have such a hard time simply to wait (Is it because they are on top of each other?) Imagine you are on the stage and in front of you is the public. I guide them with words: "Use direct address, eye contact and silence from the stage to the public. Give them Silence. Give them time." The words help-they are able to wait.

the golden mask

At the Jinsha Site Museum outside of Chengdu, I'm wowed by how many years humans have lived in the region [well? How many?} and by the culture of the Shu Kingdom. This is a rare relic --- a golden mask used in classical Chinese dances. To appreciate and understand the different ethnicities of China today and the dances performed by the Sichuan Song and Dance Troupe, do I need to know ancient Chinese history?
Chengdu located in southwest China, is the capital of Sichuan province and a sub-provincial city. It is the fifth most populous city in China. More than four thousand years ago, the prehistorical Bronze Age culture of Jinsha established itself in this region.

identity transformation

Five days ago: The Sichuan Modern Dance Company dancers explore their individual identity: Their movement task is to pinch and pull on their skin and others meanwhile transform their daily dance outfit into fashion. In the end they posed for the camera.

Present to Past

To understand - to communicate - to have a movement dialogue with the dancers - to provoke new movements that arise somewhere between my knowledge of dance and theirs, I have the need to get a sense of their culture from the present to the past. Images: Near Zouma Street after midnight - Wen Shu Temple. Do we need to discover someone's environment and learn about their historical cultural background to understand their movement choices?

I have no idea what you are saying

How much are word and movement connected? How would I be able to teach a contemporary dance class, which is based on discovery of the body and not on imitation of movements, without a translator? My translator, english name: Gary is great. I'm depending on him. My eyes are getting very sharp in observation the dancers’ motion. I'm able to see on the dancers movement when Gary interpreted my content in another direction then I wanted. English is not my native language. Maybe I choose English words that a native English speaker would not use. Maybe I create my own meanings. I have a lot of hands-on working to do on the bodies to re-direct them into the movement direction in which I ask them to go.

GO OBAMA!

I'm walking around my neighborhood: downtown Chengdu near Zouma Street... I hear and see nothing about the American election. People shop. I don't expect the Chinese to take too much of an interest. Just like people in the U.S. didn't notice when Hu Jintao took over from Jiang Zemin. How much is the political direction of a country relevant for developing new dance forms?

focus on the ordinary - focus on the virtuosic

Five days ago: Li Yan (dancer Jessey of the Sichuan Modern Dance Company) and I posed in front of the SICHUAN SONG AND DANCE ENSEMBLE ART SCHOOL. I sat with my eyes closed - she took a virtuosic pose. Simplicity against Complexity. Can an ordinary minimalist movement be virtuosic to a viewer if it is placed in a certain context on stage?

exposing their flesh

Interaction with yours and the other partner 's skin - Dancers pinching and pulling their own skin...the individual dancer gives a false name to a body part ...their dance partner gives the honest name to the body part ...WHO TO BELIEVE?

So they told me: in the old asian philosophy they believed the sky is round and the earth is square

Six days ago: Contemporary technique class: the body + architecture + mind...We create an "Asian" sky on the square floor: Who is Who? All their names sound the same for me at this moment. I can only remember the few who have adopted English names: Jessy and Tiger... In the circle lying down: after each dancer describes their breath aloud, they softly rock back and forth with head and limbs...their response to that experience: We never before were that close to each other. Nose to Nose. Ear to Ear. Mouth to Mouth. Hair to Hair. Shoulder to Shoulder. Knee to Knee. Toe to Toe.