Author: Glenn Collaku

Analytic Post-Modern Dance is a movement that wanted to revolutionize the meaning of what dance truly is. This is similar to the purpose of just about any movement in art forms. The movement wanted to take away the belief that the beauty in dance is in the meaning. Merce was an artist that began to challenge this belief, and he believed that the choreography itself is a story as opposed to a story having to be told through the dance. A part of Analytic Post-Modernism that was promoted by Rainer in Trio A is the insertion of dance moves that are part of the casual and amateur moves into this new ideal (Banes XXI). The movement wanted to isolate dance motions in an almost scientific way, a way that intellectualized the movements of the body. Analytic Post-Modern Dance focused on the movements of the artists as the dance and minimized the importance of finding a meaning or story in the pieces.The movement originally was not too intermeshed, but became more combined through the work of the Grand Union with one another.

Steve Paxton was the artist who came up with Contact Improvisation in 1973, and this form of dance was the embodiment of the choreography being the story. The movements of the dancers in Contact Improvisation are largely based on the reactions of one dancer with another. Paxton’s dance form consisted of fluid and nearly random movements. As I saw in the Contact Improvisation class as well as the video, the dance form allowed for an expression of the individual artist and for expression for the group dynamic. Paxton incorporated the ideas of Analytic Post-Modern Dance that someone who is not a dance enthusiast can get involved with his dance from. I found this out for myself, even though I was only observing the class I can see how anyone willing to get involved could have, and is a testament to why the Contact Improvisation has stuck around.

Glenn Collaku

Brassai (Gyula Halasz)
Prostitute at angle of Rue de la Reynie and Rue Quincampoix
From “Paris by Night”
1933

I chose this photograph because it can portray many emotions to the viewer, especially if the title was not provided. Without the title, the picture can produce a serene environment, in which a woman is traveling at night. It has a wintery feel for me, mostly because of the coat and beret. The woman looks as if she might have just gone for a walk. The insight that the title gives us, however, gives her identity way. To me, the photograph becomes more somber, as this is now a woman who isn’t simply going for a walk or waiting for a cab. She is now a woman who has no choice other than to sell her body in order to make ends meet. It is also intriguing how the photographer gave the address of the streets, and makes it seem as if the woman is there eternally, her real struggle barely being shown in a photograph.

The picture strictly adheres to the Golden Ratio, therefore the woman is not centered perfectly. The woman lies on the right third line of the photograph which provides for a more dynamic setting, as per the readings. The photographer gave enough room for the woman to “move” through the picture instead of enclosing her and making the picture appear still. The one issue with the placement that the photographer chose is that the sidewalk of the opposite street appears to cut through her body.

I plan on taking my snapshot with a new way of seeing pictures, now that I have learned a few things about the aesthetic positioning of offsetting images. I generally just take a picture and don’t really put into perspective any of these ideas. I didn’t realize how many aspects can truly affect the way that a picture looks, and a poor positioning can waste a great opportunity for a photo.

Glenn Collaku

I am analyzing the review by Siobhan Burke about the “Zero One” performance. Reading through the review, it is clear to see that the writer has had some experience in analyzing dance performances. To a certain extent a lot of the techniques that were in the reading steps were present in the review by Siobhan Burke. The technique that is evident from first sight is the eloquent language that helps burn an image into the mind of the review reader. From the description alone, one could get an overall picture of what the show itself is supposed to look like, even without having seen it.

Due to its brevity, the review also fails to go into too much analysis about the dance itself, but a decent amount of context about the man who would “safely hang himself” is provided. The review is relatively short, but it gets the point across to the reader who may be considering watching the performance without putting them to sleep with a winding response.

Glenn Collaku

“Agapanthus” by Claude Monet and the painting “Abstract Portrait of Marcel Duchamp” create a rift in the ways of viewing art, with “Agapanthus” being a painting which can be appreciated in its beauty due to its visual appeal as a painting as opposed “Abstract Portrait of Marcel Duchamp” which requires a more interactive mind and understanding of time period. This need to understand context in the painting may alienate a viewer from its true beauty.The painting “Agapanthus” by Claude Monet has a rudimentary yet naturally explicit appearance due to its impressionistic painting style. This piece is created with a majority of cool hues, predominantly blue. This is contrasted greatly by the crisp technically linear yet abstract appearance in “Abstract Portrait of Marcel Duchamp” by Katherine Sophie Drier. This painting has a mix of all different hues, varying from cool to warm and of various intensities.

Glenn Collaku

When I have previously visited museums, which mind you has been very rarely, I never knew quite what to look for and generally just cruised through the floors without paying much attention. This Friday, I went with a mind full of purpose. For one, I had to be very vigilant when it came to the paintings because our grade depends on it for our future essay. I also looked at the paintings differently however, in part because I wanted to recruit the new skills that I had read about in our weekly assignment. The first chapter in Ways of Seeing introduces the reader to the conception of relative perception, which I found very interesting because it intuitively made sense. To test this, I asked my friends what they thought of certain paintings and realizing that they looked at things differently than I did.

On the other side of observation, the online reading introduced a very objective way of thinking about art. The online reading promoted thinking about the time period that the art piece was created, as well as trying to find an objective way to determine the definition of art. I wasn’t too successful in understanding how the time period affected the paintings that I observed, but I was able to look at some of the exhibits differently by realizing that they are considered artistic depictions in one form or another at a particular time.

Glenn Collaku

My first thoughts involving having to attend the show were that this could be a hit or miss performance for me. I am the farthest thing possible from being fond of dance, but I can also appreciate passion despite not being able to comprehend what is actually going on with the dancing. Despite these thoughts, the context of the “overview effect” is something that I found very intriguing while reading into the pamphlet and hearing Sara introduce it to us. This was what was going through my mind before the show began, and with no idea of what was to come.

When the performance started, I was expecting a form of dance which might have been more fluid, but the first dancer came out to an eery beat and started to contort her body in ways that were frankly uncomfortable. I realized at this point how abstract the dance was really going to be. I do not think that the dance would have been as powerful to those who did not read the pamphlet before the show, because without context the performance looked essentially spastic. I did not like the beginning of the performance much, but the end really appealed to me. The part where the two dancers were circling each other and naming countries was the moment where I began to piece together the elements of the overview effect. The most profound part was when the dancers slowly changed their tones while saying Germany. A few repetitions later the audience heard the word harmony and I thought that would have served as a nice ending to the performance. While the dancers were rotating, there was also a point where the lights were aimed from a position under them and it created an very impressive display on the white wall on my right. All in all I feel guilty for not being able to fully appreciate the choreography itself but I did enjoy the passion and the story that the dancers gave.