Jerome Bel’s “Disabled Theater” provided an outlet for both the performers and those in the audience to either release their inner personalities or remove the barrier that society created that stands between us and the disabled. The performance was freeing and entertaining. It was a treat for both the actors and the audience to get to spend an hour and half together to learn about the performers and to see the solos that each one prepared.

During the beginning of the performance, I thought that it would have a more serious and sullen mood because of the mellow tone that the translator spoke in. She spoke very calmly and steadily and referred to each performer very slowly when she told them what part of the performance was going to be next. That impression was soon proved wrong however when the performers showcased their solos one by one. Each 3-5 minute piece was short but sweet. This theater piece suited our class agenda perfectly because since we all have the upcoming final presentation, we were all able to learn from the performers on how to encapsulate a small amount of ideas into one performance rather than bombard the audience with a million different ones. Although our presentations obviously hold different subjects of interests, it was still helpful to see how a short dance can capture a part of what the performer wants to express but at the same time, not have the dance be “all over the place”.

In all honesty, I thought that the separation of the dance solos (first, the best seven, and then the originally rejected three) was unnecessary and unfair. I understood that in the end, all ten dances were shown, so no one was excluded; however, I felt like the additional division between the performances provided a possible barrier and division along the performers themselves, which was absolutely pointless. “Disabled Theater” had, as Prima wrote, a similar structure as “Véronique Doisneau” because it showed the contrast between the “better” dancers and those that were outcast into the background. I remember one of the last three performers had played an instrument during one of the first seven performances. Even though she took part in the earlier performances, there still obviously hung a sense of departure between the worse three and the rest of the group during the time when the audience thought that they would not be performing. In a sense, it was relieving to see that Bel didn’t exclude them in the end and allowed them to perform too.

I think that the most touching but heart-wrenching part of the performance was when the performers spoke about their feelings on the piece. One said that, “I get to be no one else but myself.” Another said, “My sister cried because she said we were like a freak show at the circus.” Obviously, Jerome Bel’s piece comes off as extremely controversial in terms of the responsibility he takes on now with the performers and the messages that comes with the performance. I have to say that although I do not agree with his most probable attitude of just moving on to the next piece after the showing of “Disabled Theater” is over and leaving the performers behind, I do think that his decision to attack this controversial idea and to make this piece was extremely brave and respected. Given the societal boundaries that are present between the different “groups” present in our lives, Jerome Bel not only knocked those boundaries down in this performance but also allowed the audience to gain insight on what it means to be free and to truly be comfortable.The camaraderie present between the ten performers was also so sweet – the way they sang and danced in the background as the solos went on showed how supportive they were of one another and how genuinely happy and excited they were to perform together.

I loved the performance not because we were able to see disabled people perform. I loved the performance so much because we were able to see performers act out their own selves and incorporate music and movements they loved into their performance to make the final piece truly personal and enjoyable.

-Winnie Yu (Blog A)

As my first opera, Two Boys turned out to be much different than what I had pictured an opera to be like. Even though it is a contemporary piece, with the use of less classical music and traditional sets and costumes, I still had gone into the Metropolitan Opera with the mindset that I would probably end up not really enjoying the performance. Contrary to my expectations, I had a great time – one because of the atmosphere of the opera house and two, because it was more modern so it was easier to relate to and understand the characters.

Each successive new generation now grows up surrounded by developed forms of technology where cell phones, computers and music devices are integrated into their daily lives. As opposed to the Detective Inspector Anne Strewson who didn’t own a computer and barely knew how to use one, it is nearly impossible for someone to accomplish anything work related now without using technology. It was interesting for this opera to take place in 2001 because it was at the turn of the century when people were just starting to test out computers and the Internet. For our class to go to this opera, we each had to step back and put ourselves back in time for more than a decade so that we could be in the mindset of the characters of the opera.

I loved how the gauze walls were used in the set. Not only were they somewhat transparent so the audience could see the people with the computers who were sitting inside, but it also served as a screen for the projection of the chat room conversations to be shown. This part of the performance made me think about Benjamin, Barthes, Auslander and Phelan’s references to “liveness”. As each character sang out their part of the conversation in the chat, the same line would appear behind them on the screen. This contrast of actually hearing the characters say their lines and thoughts and just seeing it on a screen goes well with Benjamin and Auslander’s views in how mediatized events are “secondary” to the live events. Even though the chat conversations copied showed exactly what the characters were saying and even how they were feeling through the use of emoticons and punctuation signs, we were not able to sense the emotions in the text as we did when the characters sang it.

This play of emotions in a live conversation versus an online chat room conversation shows how even the best reproduction lacks the presence of time and space of the actual event. Some people may have sided with Phelan and Barthe in believing photography, videos or recordings have the presence of the live body or actual event, and that they are “references” to the real event, I still think this opera shows us that this is not the case. In this crime mystery, the tape recordings of Brian and Jake by the shopping center are the perfect example for Barthe, Benjamin, Phelan and Auslander’s views on “liveness” because the videotaped version of the actual event proved to be only a surface image to what was really happening.

-Winnie Yu (Blog A)

Pascal Rambert’s A (micro) history of world economics, danced was the first dance performance I have ever seen. I went into the La Mama Theater in the dark, not really knowing what to expect for this performance. I walked in curious, excited to see how Rambert would compact the “collective economic history over centuries” into a 90-minute piece.

As perceived by the title, there was a decent amount of information about economics taught to us by philosopher Méchoulan. His lectures usually took place with the same music playing in the background and the mass of dancers moving about around him as they acted out activities that they would do within their daily lives. I listened and focused on Méchoulan during his his first few lectures but by the middle half of the performance, I couldn’t help but drown out his voice with the music and the movements of the dancers. I’m not exactly sure if Rambert purposely put Méchoulan’s lecture within the collection of movements to show the population throughout the world that continues on with their lives without really understanding the current economy, but I feel like doing so might have had the counter effect because I ended up getting distracted by the dancers whenever Méchoulan would talk. “Lecture” is probably the only proper word to describe Méchoulan’s spew of information; all the talking took away from the “dance” quality of the piece – I felt like I was sitting in class more than watching a performance.

Among the eventually dreary speeches, I did appreciate the dancers that comprised the background scene. I loved the diversity among the dancers, from the little girl to the older woman who lead the choir, from the young Asian man who wore a dress shirt and slacks to the middle aged woman with bleached blonde hair and sparkly leggings. These contrasts among the dancers made the environment much more unique. One of my favorite parts of the performance was when the dancers, who were originally all individuals, found another dancer to pair with and hold for a moment before continuing on. After this, a series of performers came up one by one to the microphone to reveal to us what they had been writing on their papers earlier on in the performance. I remember one woman said, “I do not call myself an artist. That is a name I will let others put upon me if they wish. Artist – it’s a big place, perhaps I am always traveling towards it.” That line struck me because I realized that these performers themselves were moving out of their usual comfort zones themselves. They might each have different artistic talents but for this piece, a good handful of them might have been doing this type of “experimental dance” for the first time. These short readings made the performance much “softer” and personable, very different than the atmosphere created earlier by the impersonations by the 3 French performers and the lectures by Méchoulan.

Although I did not find the overall piece very cohesive or interesting, I feel like the choir helped make up for many of the downfalls. The organized singing and timings of the choir helped balance back out the distractions and somewhat “chaotic” qualities of the piece. Rambert’s piece was different than what I would’ve thought a dance performance would’ve been, it seemed more like a theater piece than a dance. In the end, I will still say I left La Mama with a smile because I really enjoyed the addition of the choir and the varied population of dancers.

-Winnie Yu (Blog A)

Something in Andre Kertesz’s “New York 1966” caught my eye when I was looking through the photographs in the gallery of his work. In this photograph, it is as if we are peering through a gate to watch the boys on the other side. A sense of curiosity is evoked because it is not really clear what the boys are doing – are they fighting or are they playing catch? We also wonder about the boys because they are hidden from us behind the bars of the gate; we are only allowed to see the side profile of one of the four boys.

I chose this photo because it could be open to different interpretations. Unlike the other pictures, our subjects are not blatantly open to view; instead, we, as the audience, are prompted to try and look past the gates to view who our subjects are. I also like the monochrome quality of the photo because it seems as though the picture was taken amidst the action between the boys – it looks like at any moment, the boys may start moving right in front of us. The black, white and gray contrasts that are seen in on the floor pavement, the brick walls, the concrete wall and the bars of the gate highlight the contrast between the skin colors of the different boys. The difference in clothing choices and patterns are also emphasized by the bland black and white colors.

The choice of color and positioning in the photograph makes it compositionally strong.  The monochrome coloring not only produces sharp contrasts in the photograph, it also adds to the texture of each object. We can feel the rough jagged bumps on the brick wall; we can see the more smooth surfaces of the right walls and the concrete floor, and we can almost feel the cold metal bars of the gate that separates us from the boys in the alley. Kertesz’s choice of positioning adds an additional dimension to the photograph by taking the picture behind the gates: he creates a sense of separation and removal from the subjects and draws us into the piece by making us want to look at each part of the photograph more closely.

At first, I couldn’t really see how Rule of Thirds or the Golden Ratio was applied here because the subjects seem relatively close to the center of the shot. After careful reexamination, I noticed that after I imagined the photograph to be broken down into vertical and horizontal thirds that most of the action took place in the upper two-thirds of the picture, and the lower third remains still. The only visible face is in the first third of the vertical divisions, but there is enough room given to the boy so that he does not appear to be running out of the photo yet (although he seems to want to escape from the other boy).

I plan on framing my shot so that if I am taking a photograph with no specific human subject focus, I will not have the streets right in the middle of the picture. Instead, I will have them higher up so it gives room for the sky and the buildings so the taller buildings will not seem like they are abruptly cut off. If I take shots of human subjects, I probably avoid having them concentrated in the center of the photo like I used to do. The readings actually taught me a lot about how even the slightest shift in positioning can change the framing and focus of the picture.

-Winnie Yu (Blog A)

Viewing dancers on stage during a performance sometimes muddles our consciousness of their human qualities. We may forget that the performers too are people, just like us. As they move effortlessly on stage in rhythmic perfection, we forget that they too have flaws, that they can make mistakes and that they laugh and joke around too. It was such a luxury to be able to sit in on John Jasperse’s rehearsal for his upcoming performance in May.

During the hour long rehearsal, we watched the two dancers repeat sections of the piece that needed to be corrected and adjusted. Each need for a change in the dancers’ movements was foreshadowed by Jasperse’s flailing arm gestures in the corner. As the choreographer, Jasparse was very particular and precise about each little detail of the dance. While he was kneeling to my right, I noticed that he would let his arms sway to the movement of the dance, as if he was practicing the dance himself. For certain parts of the dance, he would lean forward, as if he was holding his breath in anticipation and go “Pah!” or mutter in French after the dancers had finished the specific part (depending on if he liked it or not). It was honestly entertaining to watch Jasperse himself during the rehearsal, not only because he was so mesmerized in each round of practice, but also because he held a connection with the dancers that the audience couldn’t break in to.

For most of the rehearsal, it seemed as if the dancers shared a special mindset with Jasperse that we, as the audience, could not understand. If Jasperse seemed bothered by a certain movement, the dancers would be able to provide alternate ways of doing the movement so that it would connect and flow better before Jasperse could make any full changes himself. Although Jasperse did have some moments when he seemed dissatisfied with what the dancers just did, he was always open to their suggestions and input on how to better the piece. After the rehearsal, Jasperse had said that he often wondered, “Is it possible to make something that looks like something I didn’t make?” He wanted to subvert his own influences and impulses and to make the piece a combination of random choices, but he admitted that he has the tendency to be very “didactic” with his dancers. As someone who rarely watches dance performances, the changes they made seemed so minute to my eyes but so grand of a change when Jasperse and the dancers discussed how they would fix the certain part.

This quality about Jasperse only taught me more about how much skill and effort that is required to finesse a finished dance or any other work of art. I learned from Simone and Stewart that although collaboration is needed to coordinate a dance, individual style and technique is also an essential part into really making the performance something of their own. With Simone’s more structured and fluid dance techniques (more like ballet) and Stewart’s heavier body frame, the partnering of the two individuals added an extra flair to the dance.

By watching the rehearsal, we got to see the dancers and choreographer in their most vulnerable stage. We saw when they were off pace from one another, we saw when they couldn’t seem to get the dance right and we saw when they all laughed together as they watched an old recording of them dancing. Being exposed to the dancers in this way made the rehearsal a performance itself, one in which we got to learn about the process and time it takes into creating a piece that stands as presentable to the choreographer, especially one like Jasperse who would probably not showcase a piece until it is perfect and exactly the way he and his dancers have finalized it to be.

-Winnie Yu (Blog A)

http://www.nytimes.com/2013/09/21/arts/dance/liz-gerring-dance-offers-mirrorlike-illusions-in-glacier.html?ref=dance&_r=0

Alastair Macaulay’s “Icy White Synapses in a Crackling Heat” is a dance review on the dance work, “Glacier” by Liza Gerring. Macaulay introduces the work by describing the motions of the dancers during the work and the mood it gives off throughout its 60-minute duration. She uses verbs like “hurl, skim, shimmer” and adjectives and phrases like “impetuous slides, nimble footwork and bobbing jumps” to depict the images she saw during the performance.

Oliver mentions in “Dance Critiques” the Feldman Model of Criticism, which uses “description, analysis, interpretation and evaluation” to formulate a critique. I noticed that Macaulay follows this format and provides for us, a perfect example of how Oliver’s suggestions can be carried out. Macaulay’s introduction paragraph includes both a general thesis and a general “movement moment” for the readers to get an idea of what the performance is like before she dives in to the rest of her review. As Oliver says, this description provides a basis for the other aspects of criticism to develop upon.

I saw in this dance review, that as a writer, you get to incorporate your own interpretation, emotions, associations and opinions on the performance because you do not have to prove a point in the critique like, for example, a persuasive essay does. This is why the thesis sentence for the introduction can also be much more much more general and simple than that of other writings.
In her next section, she moves onto giving the “who, what, where, when” of the dance. This differs from the “general structure” that Oliver provides for us to use for a review because Oliver suggests for beginner writers to include these details in the first paragraph. We can tell from Macaulay’s writing that she is more professional because she has developed her own critiquing style by the way her review varies slightly from this general structure.

Macaulay continues with explaining how “Glacier” is similar to Gerring’s past works because of the similar style that it uses and backs up this statement by further describing the dancers (addressing some by name) and the way they move with the other dancers on stage. You can tell that Macaulay has studied Gerring’s works before because she is able to point out a certain dancer (Mr. Neidenbach) within the performance and the impact he has on the work. As we move on to the end of the review, we go through her analysis and interpretation of the dance, the music used with the performance and the sequencing and placements of the dancers throughout the work. She closes off with a short evaluation of “Glacier” by stating that it “deepens and grows in texture” and that it “proves not only absorbing but also moving”.

I was honestly surprised by how closely Macaulay’s dance review followed the suggestions that Oliver gave in her “Dance Critiques” chapter. Not only did Macaulay follow the Feldman Model, but she also the “movement moment” that Oliver described. In this dance review, Macaulay recreated several scenes of the performance for the readers by using a varied choice of verbs and phrases within her “movement moment”.

I just wanted to point out that in the reading, Oliver also provided for me a new way of observing. She says that professional critics “suggest that in observing, you should start with a clean slate”. I find it a common habit for many, to enter a performance with not only prior knowledge on the creator or performers, but also with pre-conceived knowledge on how the performance will be before it is even finished. I like that she points out this action and emphasizes the fact that “premature analysis and judgment” can change our actual experience of observation because most people do not realize that their opinion of the performance has been altered.

-Winnie Yu (Blog A)

In my previous post about my pre-MOMA thoughts and ideas, I wrote about how Berger and Barnet teach us to examine art from more than one perspective. I wrote about how, at the MOMA, I would look at not only the art’s subjects but also at the structure of the piece as well, as the story of the artist behind the artwork.

To be honest, I had not visited an art gallery or art museum since middle school and frankly, I do not find much excitement in visiting art exhibitions. For the purpose of this class and assignment however, I put away those thoughts and entered the MOMA with a genuine curiosity for seeing the exhibitions because I wanted to know if Berger and Barnet’s writings would actually change the way I view art. After reading through my research about Impressionism (its time period and the artists who were associated with the movement) I felt like I had a pretty good idea of what type of pieces I needed to focus on when I got to the MOMA – paintings with brighter colors, shorter strokes, unblended colors, and more depictions of the rural and suburban landscapes.

When I arrived to the 5th floor of the museum, I was greeted by wall that was covered by the Campbell’s Soup Art that stood at the entrance of the Café. I then noticed, as I stood in front of the Campbell’s Soup, that to my left, there was a painting that must have been as long as me that was hanging on the empty white wall by the elevators. I knew then and there, before I had even looked at anything else, that the painting would stand out to me and that I would choose that piece to analyze. That painting there was Hide-and-Seek by Pavel Tchelitchew, created in 1940-1942. The other painting that I chose to analyze was Evening, Honfleur, painted by Georges-Pierre Seurat in 1886.

For each piece that I looked at, I purposely chose not to look at the description for the artwork until I had analyzed it and had come up with a story for the work myself. I did this so I would look at the painting in itself since “painting are reproduced with words around them”, as Berger says in his Ways of Seeing. Words that came to my mind when I stood back from the Hide-and-Seek painting all had dark connotations, like hellish, fire, burning, children, horror story, ghostly, distorted, twisted, helpless. Something about the juxtaposition of the bright yellows, oranges and greens against the sullen browns, moldy greens and bloody reds prompted me to walk closer to the painting and examine each of the colors in detail. When I closed my distance from the piece, I noticed images that I previously was not able to see. In the “leaves” and branches of the tree, there were numerous faded faces of children; from the thinner branches, it appears as if a colony of babies were climbing from the blur of leaves, into the mist of the lighter blue background. In the veins of one child’s face, there was a faint dandelion that served as a pedestal for another child. In the mud-colored trunk, by the girl who seemed to be clinging on to the base of the tree, I spotted the fingers of another child, which were defined by a mix of pale green, blue, red and orange. After reading the description about how the painting “presents an apocalyptic vision of the childhood game of Hide-and-Seek during World War II”, I thought back about Berger’s line; he was right, my interpretation and analysis fit the description and purpose of the piece, but knowing that the painting depicted the time of World War II opened up my understanding of the piece so much more.

In Evening, Honfleur, the colors used were completely different from those of Hide-and-Seek. The scene shown was a lot more calm, relaxed, dreamy and soothing. What amazed me about this painting was how Seurat put together the piece. He must have used millions of little dots in both the actual painting and the frame itself. Rather than thinking about the scene depicted, I actually thought more about Seurat and the time he spent on creating the piece; I could imagine him sitting at his desk carefully placing the specks of color onto the empty canvas. Standing up close, I noticed the different textures of paint strokes and how you could tell which parts of the piece he painted first because some dots were thicker from the heavier clumps of paint than the others. Up close, you could also see the pattern of yellow, orange, blue and white in the sky that seemed to just be light blue from afar.

My reading of Barnet and Berger’s writings definitely affected my viewing of the MOMA exhibition. I allowed myself to look at the pieces of artworks from a few distances to see them from different angles because I’ve learned that analyzing the picture from ten feet away and analyzing a small section of the piece from a few inches away changes the entire feel of the artwork. I chose these two pieces because of their perfect fit to the descriptions and because they both held so many details that would be hidden if you only looked at them from afar. After my trip to the MOMA, I realized that my “non-existing” understandings for paintings and sculptures actually did exist – it was a matter of learning to think beyond the painting itself that allowed me to better interpret and appreciate art.

-Winnie Yu (Blog A)