reflection - 200907

thoughts emerging from Renaud Barbaras’s Desire and Distance and his discussion of Bergson’s critique of the metaphysics of nothingness (related ideas from Yves-Alain Bois and Rosalind Kraus in their book Formless and their examination of works of art that explore the theme of ‘formlessness’ also have a floating influence)

o as Barbaras states, paraphrasing Bergson, objects don’t come out of ‘nothing’ because ‘nothing’ as a reality is an impossibility, so objects come out of the objective ‘all’ – an existence that is full of ‘not empty’
o there is only ‘substance’, which has not appeared out of nothing, but is background, source, and outcome all at once
o this is a flattening to an irremovable one-ness that merges all effects into primary causes that loop or double back onto themselves at an essential level – i.e. matter is self generating
o this removes ‘nothing’ from the role of reality’s ‘other’
o it removes materiality from the idea of an ultimate genesis and makes it an un-made constant (there was no ‘big bang’, no ultimate beginning to everything – such concepts are an impossibility on the level of experiential or known reality)
o materiality is the un-made maker of all that is made and un-made
o materiality is a permanent, ontological ‘static’ ceaselessly fluctuating with activity of one sort or another (nothing is free of it, there is always movement somewhere within a thing or place)
o materiality actualises non-nothingness as indestructible in a continuum that is self-given
o “from dust to dust” means there is only dust (Duchamp grew dust piles, he called it ‘dust breeding’, and deliberately incorporated it as a ‘painting’ layer in his work – Bois, Y. & Krauss, R. Formless, a user's guide. New York: Zone Books, 1997. p.226, & note 2, p.284)
o framed in this way, movement in the everyday takes on a different shade – things are forever bubbling and brewing in the present – a present that never goes away – the changes are in a location’s self-changing processes – this takes action that is normally thought of and perceived as linear and directional in a spatio-temporal sense, its ‘passing-through’ quality, and fixes or cements it in place so that it can’t move in or out of the static ever-present moment – all it is doing is self-altering itself while remaining glued against the ongoing surrounding moment
o as perpetual fluctuations in and of the constancy of the moment-location, movement becomes part of locations that change partially in an illusory way, or more accurately perhaps, in a partial way, in that materiality never goes away and neither does the moment and neither does ‘location’ – this reveals a conceptual split – because moving bodies move into new locations, backgrounds and locations change around them and are continually replaced, but the phenomena of ‘background’ or ‘location’ never goes away, body’s not only ‘pass through’ these, they also ‘carry’ locations around them as a physical constant which they can never shed – so on one level movement can be seen as the kaleidoscopic changing of a fixed reality – and in this sense, people are always attached to location and are of it as embedded aspects - no matter where they are, people are always embedded in environments because they can’t be anywhere else at the same time
o conventional understandings of space and movement are based on the experience of being able to move from one location to another – this understanding acknowledges a separateness between figure and ground that allows the moving bit to relocate itself in space – this ‘separating’ ability is the basis of object-hood, which imbues a thing with existential independence – but this independence gets over-inflated and bestowed as a condition of material reality itself, i.e. material reality has an independence that separates it from the backdrop of space conceived as a blank emptiness, as ‘nothing’ – but when ‘nothingness’ is removed, material reality, or object-ness, immediately gets swallowed into a background of its own kind, therefore losing total independence as it merges back into a sea of materiality and becomes part of sticky existential textures and patterns that are responsible for forming and sustaining it
o in this way it seems to me that ‘separateness’ has the same illusory quality as ‘nothingness’ – separateness is a slither that surrounds a thing and allows mobility within environments – like some kind of invisible lubricant surrounding every distinct thing, contributing to movement in the world – of course a sliver of invisible lubricant between things doesn’t exist, but either way objects are bestowed with an existential power to break boundaries in space, which is an ability to exert freedom from space – but the independence of objects to break boundaries within locations is always within the context that they can’t break out of the backdrop and frame of materiality which in this sense becomes a sea which not only immerses every single THING but is completely self-immersing and pinpointed in the unchanging constancy of ‘now-time’ – which is another slither with an illusory slipperiness
o there is no frame surrounding BIG reality on the outside of which is empty space – there is no elsewhere outside of reality, only somewhere else boundlessly within it – there are no boundaries and divides separating things within reality, these are all infinitesimally intricate parts of its organisational immediacy and its reality as a dynamic, systemic ‘organism’ (dangerously close here to hylozoism!)
o movement is now no longer about the ‘space-between’ (which, as a non-existent slither, has thinned away to join the non-existence of nothing-ness) and is now about the ‘space-against’
o movement is now both changing, sequential, linear, evaporational, conditional, temporary, transitional, transitory, temporal, procedural, etc as well as permanent, present, non-destructive, fixed, unconditional, immoveable, substantive, etc
o the distinction between presence and process is removed by expanding a way of viewing that sees each of these as the other
o this seems to locate and spiral the mechanics of what I am observing more into a location rather than simply across its surface – it’s a burrowing device that peels back a surface never to find ‘nothing’ underneath, but instead finds structural-organic pulsations and integrated patterns of activity and interaction whose idiosyncrasies belie completeness – the productive exchange between the universal particle (the speck of dust) and the idiosyncratic particular
______________________________________________

reflection - 270907

theme of control

"People typically feel in control in their normal surroundings and less in control in strange places."

(Lakoff and Johnson, Philosophy in the flesh. New York: Basic Books. 1999. p. 276)

there is a relationship between self control and environmental familiarity - also between controlling one's actions and controlling oneself

control = self-control / ease / comfort / security / well being / assuredness / etc

What do environments do to help people maximise self-control (and not), whilst also controlling them? (Banks, for instance, may be more controlling, while malls less so in respect to directing movement and allowing/disallowing activities)

Self-control vs environmental control - when and why do people willingly give control over to environments? - when they want something - and when they have no choice, i.e. when they are forced

Being in one's normal places of residing compared to new locations - in normal places of residing, the space is an extension of body and self - not so in new and unfamiliar places (until, that is, these become familiar) - the feeling is of being 'inside' own space, and an 'outsider' in unfamiliar space (paralleled to being inside and outside of one's own body - i.e. varying states of self control - e.g. the 'stoner' is 'out of it' or 'off their face')

key themes - inside and outside (insider and outsider) / ratios and relationships of control between self and environment (when and how do these align and when are they misaligned?) - these are all about movements adjusting to and being adjusted by spatial factors that generate states of being willingly or unwillingly a part of the environment, where self control and identity/independence is facilitated (enhanced, encouraged, modified, influenced, maximised) or thwarted

____________________________________________________________

how movement is helping my reflective processes

~ when I am typing I often give myself a structure where I do 5 minutes at the keyboard broken up by 5 minutes improvised movement in the small space of my room – I am religious with it, I watch the clock for both activities, and alternate between them – my rationale for doing this is because I want to access contributions that my moving body can make to my investigation – because the theme is ‘embodied meaning’, I want total body movement to make an equal contribution and have equal status to my concentrated thought processes and typing hands – I also want to make sure that everything I am writing can be tested, explored, understood, and applied to movement, particularly as I’m working on choreographic outcomes further down the track – so when I get up to improvise, sometimes what I am writing about directs the movement and gives it intention and meaningful-ness – by making it meaningful I am looking for more meaning – which is a demand I am making on my moving self, a demand that at times gets a bit demanding in forcing movement to provide or supply its hidden gems – surprisingly however, the pressures of expectation (the pressures of pressure – the oppressions of pressure – the demands of pressure – the pressures of demand), don’t interfere and movement often (seemingly nonchalantly and in its own unhurried self-contained way) delivers, even if inside itself it may find the methodical regularity of the demands unspontaneous, forced, and tiresome – this is about a relationship of control where the mind is placing prescriptive demands on the body for it to deliver some appropriately insightful response – sometimes it pre-attaches value to movement, by specifying its focus, and restricts or conditions movement’s discovery of its own response values to a question – it’s an area where the body’s wisdom is doubted somewhat – however if moving is its own kind of thought, then it doesn’t need the accompaniment, rationale, guidance (like a blind person being led), or direction (or doubts) from the mind, ALL THE TIME – the difference, in me, between moving from a thought-centred way and in a non-thought centred way mostly affects my spine and pelvis – vertical spinal equilibrium, which is a natural state, comes into play when I don’t think – if I want my spine to move more I have to activate thought and remember to use it – this is about equilibrium’s connection to thought-led movement vs un-thought-led movement (movement thinking itself) – this also applies to the way my pelvis anchors itself spatially and has to be ‘remembered’ and freed of its habitual functionality and stillness in respect to balance and as the base point or ground of spinal verticality – thought-produced off-centred movement and un-thinking equilibrial movement have completely different energy/effort states, the first is more extreme than the second I find –– of course ‘thinking’ movement in order to free it is often only an initial stage, the process is like taking a toboggan up a hill and then giving it a push, after that the effort is taken over by the sled’s own momentum and minimised to responding to the contours of the slope – the same with movement, after the initial push, it freely transgresses its own confines of its own accord – un-restricted by prescriptive conditions, non-directed movement responding to its own preferential mechanisms, is at times minimal and to my mind initially uninteresting and banal, but this lack of interest disappears when unexpected insights are invariably elicited and produced – an example is the young ‘flapping arms’ man from my Chichester street footage – I was doing non-directed movement after I had been writing earlier in the day about Lakoff and Johnson’s statement that controlling one’s actions equates with self-control in its widest sense, and about environmental familiarity and unfamiliarity producing ‘insider/outsider’ feelings, and my movement was very banal and simplistic – I was just in a low energy vertical state flapping my arms and kicking my feet when the image of the ‘flapping boy’ floated into my mind and my body instantly showed me how to understand his action in respect to the location and the discussion about control (which I’ve now added to my analytical sociokinetic data), and how prescribed activity in this particular public environment is flexible in what it allows, but is monitored carefully – so thank you moving-self – the organic eyes of onlookers become environmental eyes that insert themselves into the masonry (and quite literally too with the growing numbers of inconspicuous surveillance cameras) – embodying architecture by giving it sight

___________________________________________________________

reflection - 220907

more thoughts on care

"...in order to protect oneself from what one fears — this is the strategic achievement of anxiety, which arms the subject, in advance, against the onslaught of trauma, the blow that takes one by surprise."

(Rosalind Kraus, in Formless: a user's guide. New York: Zone Books, 1997. p. 196)

o what are accidents? they disrupt action – in big and small ways
o but what are they? and why are they hard to fit into the scheme of things?
o they obviously have causes – so one aspect is very apparent – but they’re not planned – so the cause sits both outside of and within a chosen, undertaken piece of action – they show up a moment of flaw in the deliberation and consciousness of the doing of an act by revealing that awareness levels had been thresholded too low – to a point where attentiveness had been minimalised to a blur and an element of blindness and inattention allowed to emerge and cause harm
o the automatic doing of habitual acts still require an amount of attention, so attention levels are an adjustable factor, they are lifted or lowered, but most of the time they are lowered to levels that push the edge of what we can get away with
o lowering attention levels conserves energy – this is an energy efficiency mechanism – allowing energy to be directed at new or specific areas of the moment
o habitual tasks, like chores that are repeated frequently, may be done semi-automatically because they have lost interest or new-ness value, so learnt behaviour takes over to which the least amount of monitoring attention is given – however too much daydreaming when driving the car can produce a level of attention deficit with catastrophic consequences – or stubbing a toe going into the bathroom through distractedly and hurriedly misjudging the distance between your foot and the door is the consequence of a lower attentiveness level with irritating results
o all of this is about accidents that are the direct outcome of misjudged attention threshold levels
o what is significant is the relationship between attention and habit in everyday movement and the existence of attention levels that are monitored and that are continually changing and adjusting
o attention is a radar that needs monitoring – go off for a quick coffee and you might miss the enemy boat, the UFO, or the distress signal
o further to this – attention IS monitoring – not just something that is monitored (otherwise all you have is ‘monitoring the monitor’ and ‘aware of awareness’)
o awareness of ‘attention as a monitor’ changes its tactility and reveals/amplifies the physicality of consciousness
o what does monitoring do?
o it scans – it measures – it alerts – it evaluates – it judges – it’s a gatekeeper – it assesses – it sums up – it orientates – it signals – it scouts – it informs – it’s wary – it’s suspicious – it questions – it’s cautious – it’s exact – it’s selective – it tests – it stabilises (hmmm… instinctive self-care attached to attentiveness sounds very paranoid! - self-care is deeply connected to the 'structure of anxiety' Krauss talks about in the quote above)

reflection - 210907

random thoughts

o care is about ‘not-to-destroy’ things – it is about preservation – preserving the security of a thing – care is the basis of all movement – and it has come from coordinating skills – and learning how to become coordinated
o with my in-built attitude of care, I have respect for objects in the world and in my immediate environments (although I might heirarchicise these using preference criteria and importance) – generally speaking, I want to keep the world intact and leave objects alone so that they can peacefully go about their duty servicing my and others’ needs – everything sits in a state of readiness and availability – waiting to be used according to melodies and patterns of movement that choose or determine where physicalities alight (Gins and Arakawa’s ‘landing sites’)
o nature provides examples of things we can learn to duplicate - built environments duplicate ourselves
o dance movement is about rearranging body parts in different configurations and relations to each other - they're about manipulating self materiality for the sake of it
o I’m so surrounded by where I can’t go, I get used to it and instead focus on and accept the ‘where I can go’s’, most of the time I completely ignore and forget all the ‘where I can’t go’s’
o big wild movement is an aggression (perhaps all movement has the seeds of aggression) – it is a war against barriers – in open space it intimidates barriers and dares them to come near – in enclosed or narrow space, it is unhappy that it is forced towards stillness – it hates being dominated – movement is a dominator
o the difference between small and big space is the difference between the dark oppression of defeat and the open sunny light of victory
o open space smiles on abandonment
o the mechanical repetition of walking is built around straight lines and right angles which are established in the body locomotive as natural and primary – this is a stiffness and ploddy-plod digitisation that creates flow, evenness, and continuity through the disrupting effect of punctuated repetition – dance breaks and falls through walking’s barriers to catch itself in flow as a departure from the confined mechanistics of walking – flow brings in circularity that right angles and straight lines in the natural walk, postural, and sitting states of the body deny
o when dance is in empty space (like a studio), it has itself to explore, i.e. raw movement, or the architectural planes, designs, and surfaces of other dancers – the ground is a constant that is used maximally to compensate for the lack of other fixed objects
o when environmental factors/structures are introduced and impede open space – these alter and affect movement and immediately invite/attract/enforce interaction
o why straight lines and right angles are more natural for the body and movement is because they dominate the structural mechanics of the body itself – this is the basis for their predominance in built environments – the dominant angularity of built environments not only furnish movement economically, they mirror the body and are customised to its mechanistic form and dynamic (like sculptural moulds) – squares, rectangles, straight lines, etc are not un-organic when it comes to the human body – they are reflections of its dominant construction principles and features
o the body may have curved surfaces that themselves are identified as organic, but the breaks at the joints render it angular
o in movement, the body traces circles more freely than it can make them – the body is predominantly angular in its breaks and construction – the major exception is the spine, which can curve, twist, and become rounded – we can also curve the feet (with good arches) and rotate the forearm – the tongue is very good at circular shapes – but the joint-angled being that we are has no difficulty tracing curves and circles in many different movement ways in the immediate space surrounding the body – this allows us to experience circularity in ways that extend beyond the body’s physical capacity – we vacuum these traced curves back into ourselves as though they were of us and not of the air around us – this is a kind of kinaesthetic reversal – proprioceptive appropriation – we are insect-limbed with snaky torsos – we are climbers more than slitherers

___________________________________________________________________

reflection - 150907

directions matter

o in empty boundless space, directions have no meaning because there’s nothing to create direction
o in the bounded real spaces of the world, all directions matter
o I can go down the same stretch of road to and from where I live and the importance of each of those directions is inversely proportional to whichever way I am going
o the importance of whether I am going towards or away always favours the direction I am heading
o in one moment, when I am facing and heading towards the destination of where I live, that direction has no rival in importance and significance, but in the next moment, if I have to turn around and go the other way (or any other way for that matter), the importance of the direction I had been going immediately dissolves and disappears
o I create the importance of any direction relative to my purpose
o not only do I establish direction in choosing what to do and where to go, I also elevate its importance
o I thicken it and it becomes paramount above all other directions
o I extract it from anonymity and the deep and cosy companionship of its friends and singularise it in stature above the rest
o but I am fickle, its elevation is always short-lived and totally tailored to my needs – once I reach my destination and I have no need of the direction and route that got me there, it is immediately dismissed and forgotten – or remembered fondly if something interesting worth noting happened (like snapshots from holidays and adventure memorabilia)
o from differentiation and distinction it is discarded and merged once more into multidirectional surround-space – the porridge of non-distinction
o this is one of the deep body grammars that Morris talks about to do with facing and orientation
o directional space is a narrow groove – body width wide and conceptual
o it is also a linking element in the structure of spatial mobility
o direction stretches space together linking points and locations
o linking spaces are measured and quantified by time, distance, and effort
o they are physicalised and personalised to individuals and use
o by facilitating movement through space, directions extend the physicality of the body
o distance is a form of diminishing inconvenience – its inconvenience diminishes the closer the destination becomes

more on ‘avoidance’
o I can move because I have nothing to avoid OR I move freely when I have nothing to avoid
o so I choose to move in the places where avoidance is minimalised
o this defines ‘open’ space
o open spaces are merely spaces that have been enclosed in particular ways – they are defined and consequent on configurational and design elements

reflection - 100907

MOTION – E/MOTION (this is never absent) – QUALITY OF ANIMATION (go together)

SPACE – TOPOLOGIES (unimpeded – impeded)

- corners
- open places / enclosures (receptacles)
- ascending / descending
- gaps and openings in barriers (glass transparencies and empty)
- barriers and walls, obstacles
- indicators and signs (function enhancers / assists)
- passages and pathways
- compression points
- contact points
ground (feet, lower extremities)
hand operated
proximity triggers
furniture (posture altering)
- textures (smooth, frictional, soft, hard) & colours (dark, highlighted, muted, attractive, distinctive) (also signitive & triggers)
- movement regulators (control flow, speed & density)
- segregating elements (road & pedestrian walkway)
- sound – distance & proximity, direction & orientation, discourse/discursive, sound is a form of touch and an emotion accompaniment (e/motion) signalling (controlling, allowing & disallowing movement)


How much of these are in a choreography?
Kinetic snapshots can dissect an environment mechanically in respect to all of the above – but nothing is arbitrary, everything is driven by intentionality, purpose, and collective/personal narrative(s)
- how do I connect the arbitrary/independent fragments ‘snapshots’ to narrative?
- AND (considering narratives are generated unconsciously in dream and reverie – i.e. they’re a natural psychological/somatic function) connect narrative to inner landscapes as either its biological/psychic outcome/imperative or the reverse – i.e. inner narratives mirror life narratives
- ultimately, this research is all about me getting to know something my way that other people already know about in other ways


so one thing that is emerging from watching the footage of everyday movement is a language that describes the action and the attitudes/intentions that surround or underpin it – there are presently 5 clear factors that I am observing:
- avoidance
- detours
- making space
- violation & approval of touch (touch is sanctified)
- equilibrium

there is an equilibrium state in the body – and in street movement – in the street, the direct route is the equilibrium state – the detour/deviation is a departure from the equilibrium state – in the body, posture has an equilibrium state – movement that takes the body away from its postural equilibrium is a detour or deviation

o a lot of the business of moving is space-making – avoiding is making space – rather than denying and claiming space, it is about relinquishing space to others – deferring – what makes one person defer to another?
o creating space is self-removal
o proximity to structural supports is a blending with that support – an increase in mass, volume, and security to create greater personal security and stability – there is a blending and an adopting of the qualities and strengths of the support
o built environments are designed to calculate and provide as much (meaning as little) space as is needed for the purposes and function of the location


WHAT MAKES A GROUP RECOGNISABLE AS A GROUP?

o it’s to do with a connection that’s visually set up between the members or people in the group
o so this is a connection that merges their mutual spaces
o holding hands is a physical linking device
o but when there is no physical contact, proximity and a matching of physical momentum – matching feet and a maintained closeness – aided of course by talking to each other, or turning towards each other
o do groups have to detour less because they force single bodies to go round them?
o holding hands is quite frequent in partnerships – is this just an affection connection? Or is pragmatic in busy places because they don’t have to detour as much? People that are connected are impossible to walk between so, as a couple, they don’t have to give up as much space as they may as individuals – but couples and groups don’t have as much momentum in more crowded areas as individuals, so they sacrifice space for speed in some circumstances
o you are aware when you go between people who are in groups that you are breaking or passing through connected space – like they own it – the space between them becomes territorial
o connected space is a definite spatial state


socialised groups are about connected spaces – and connecting the space between people

in a mass activity, like a lot of people going through a small doorway, people blend their individual spaces to make or form a large collectively-connected space in which individuals adjust their momentum to that of the people around them

reflection - 290807

290807
o larger groups displace smaller groups
o groups of equal size displace each other equally
o movement and environment interact – can’t have one without the other
o there are countless obvious things about how they interact
o so what am I looking for that is not already obvious?
o phenomenologists are right in their enclosing-folded-enveloped appraisal of reality
o context and culture stand out
o the security of the fixedness of environments enables greater secured-ness in the fragility that movement is – movement is inherently fragile
o demarcating and apportioning space to facilitate particular types of movement – i.e. walking goes here, cars go there, etc
o there are obvious things about when movement encounters other movement – orientations, distances, configurational relationships, displacements…
o all these can be studied but are obvious and don’t reveal anything startling or new
o is there nothing else to see?
o I am looking at something in which there are no revelations…
o and why connect this to choreography?
o how does the dance of the street inform the dance of the stage? – they are already related – they are both about people so will utilise shared laws…
o like economics, there are limitations in space that are designed to maximise utility through restriction not excess – the purpose of the city street environment is for maximum human occupation – not emptiness
o everything is flattened and at right angles – edges are softened (made safer) with curves
o sociokinetic laws – what are they?


if the inanimate and the animate are dancing with each other – one silently and in the background, and the other actively and on the surface – what kind of partnering is this? – it is the stable hand that allows the twirling form – the back across which one can roll – the arms to catch the falling body

environment is the watchful supporting partner – dormant and timeless in its role – slumbering in the immobility of it – like a prison sentence from which it cannot escape – endlessly yawning in the subservience of its duty – laying and spreading itself out just ahead and all around so that what is on offer can readily be seen – like competing shopkeepers waving their wares at prospective buyers – “here I am, a bit of road, walk on me” – “no, look over here, I’m a doorway, come inside” – “ignore them, I’m the footpath, faithfully catching and anchoring your every step”

o kinetic laws operate between silent and blind partners – between the subservient and the pampered – the trapped and the mobile – between attack and a resistance that never falters – or, like a door, falters intentionally – accidents are unintentional falterings (faults)
o of course movement in the world is purpose driven – instrumental – goal directed…


the woman with the umbrella
is carrying her space

protected from the rain
she replaces where it is falling
with a down-pouring of rain-less space

a horizontal blot of moving shadow
her umbrella impotently re-fabricates the darkness overhead
and mocks it with its rain-less exertions



o all this stuff in the street may be purposeful and clear (transparent) in respect to what is happening
o but it is clumsy
o people avoid collisions with others and objects
o it is not smooth
o choices have to be made with care
o it is about constant adjustment
o things avoiding other things constantly
o objects are positioned to be avoided
o avoidance is the dominant physical objective on a moment by moment level – there is constant vigilance about what needs to be avoided – anticipation of calamity relegated to the highly active semiconscious goings on of instinct and peripheral vision
o people steer themselves along paths that open to non-collision
o this avoidance is an avoidance of touch – it keeps the boundary of skin sacred and available only by permission – this keeps ownership of self intact – anything else is violation (violence)
o public movement is about carefully and skilfully controlling violation
o is there a difference between the violation of the animate and the inanimate?
o necessity in the fulfilment of purpose selects/allows the violation of the inanimate
o we will touch buttons, open doors, give or take objects, and do a thousand other things that permit and neutralise the violation of touch
o the ground remains an unavoidable constant – but for the feet alone – other body parts are less comfortable on the ground
o so different parts become accustomed or adapt themselves to violations associated with them, thereby allowing and permitting them, even claiming them – chairs for backsides – numerous implements for hands – clothing, but allocated to specific parts of the body – is clothing a violation of touch? – a pseudo-skin blocking real skin from the violation of the public gaze – what the body allows to touch it becomes a sanctioned violation
o violation of the social code would be walking into other people and bumping, crashing into them, colliding, knocking over, pushing
o social space is full of the absence of violational activity – an ordered constraint is imposed, sanctioned, and understood in physical languages that become very skilled in adhering to and mastering the weaves and intricacies of complex spatial manoeuvrability and motion with and amongst/amidst others [EXAMINE THE FOOTAGE OF THE HEAVILY POPULATED AND CRAMPED CHICHESTER MARKETS IN RELATION TO THIS]
o obviously there is the practical consideration of harm-to-self and self-preservational priorities and instincts at work in all of this – reflecting the presence of CARE that begins with SELF and becomes communal through commonality (Morris) – the evidence/basis in movement of an ETHOS/ETHIC
o the ETHOLOGY OF CHOREOGRAPHY – is still an intriguing concept/term that is pulling me but as yet I don’t know why
o choreography and dance is rife with avoidances
o every curve is an avoidance of the space in its immediate proximity
o a curve is never a directional path – it is always semi- or indirect-ional (also in-directional – it is avoiding what is on the ‘in’-side of its curve – even if something isn’t there – all curves demarcate an inside and an outside, otherwise they wouldn’t be curved)
o but a choice or sacrifice is being made here – a preference to avoid one area of space is to simultaneously exercise preference for proximity with a less problematic location/vicinity
o every movement that is over, around, circular, curved is possible only from the basis of avoidance – you can feel this physically when you do curved or circular movement – it is probably the basis for most dance movement in the body, and the accounting/determining factor for its stylisation – because I can avoid, I can embellish – because I can avoid, I can abstract – because I can avoid, I can go beyond – because I can avoid, I can repeat – because I can avoid, I can flourish -
o in movement, dance takes the longer route (the detour) because it enjoys the journey as much as, if not more so, than the arrival (the goal) – it is a delayed arrival – and sometimes, a delay without arrival – making it just a delay - it is a hedonistic indulgence in the physical act of avoiding that allows greater proximity and access to things that have to be detoured to, to be experienced
o what is avoidance? – it is the next most direct route
o and this is what is seen in the street in the pathways mapped by social movement
o YAY! – now I’ve just done my first reversal – looking at dance through the lens of everyday movement
o every solid in architectural and other environments are there as avoidances, guiding and confining people through the laws of non-contact to the gaps and openings leading to things


this is like treasure hunts – structures gesturing politely through their don’t-touch-me-I’m-contaminated personas to the treasures they protect (24/7) devotedly and tirelessly (dutifully) (they have no choice) and allow visitation to through doors (traps) (lures) – “come buy the treasure, taste the treasure, take some of it away – but leave something behind – you can’t steal it – and we have a never-ending supply – which is why we make it available and easy for you to find – look at our BIG SIGNS – and our BIG WINDOWS - see!”


POETIC LITERATURE is part of the process of this research because it is all heading towards ARTISTIC OUTCOMES as the primary goal – this is not just academic research, which is where my head and focus has been till now – the now prior to this realisation that is – little poetic moments have popped out, but I’ve sidelined them and been uncomfortable with their frivolity – but this is wrong – I am going to make choreographic work that is going be equally engaged with as art (it is already an overstatement to call choreography art – I am stating the obvious - tautologising) - so the mix is equal portions of academic and artistic/personal (because the artistic is personal) – so now my note-keeping can be organised into 3 categories:

- THEORY / ACADEMIC formal / traditional

- REFLECTIVE personal / revelatory / ‘meandatory’ (that’s a nice new word! meandering & predatory)

- ARTISTIC interpretive / creative / unconstrained & uncensored / poly-vocal / imag(in)istic

F O O T P A T H scenario

avoiding is interchangeable with favouring

subject is walking along the footpath
subject favours a small distance on this side
subject favours this side (means avoiding the other curb)

______________________
subject favours a bigger space on this side
subject is avoiding this side

______________________

a volume of space
a volume is not a volume without parameters – in a moving world of envelopes within envelopes, spatial volumes can only be established by avoiding & favouring surrounding parameters


o in dance movement in the body in open space the parameters that are being avoided are invisible
o this is why dance can be made in empty studios and be stand-alone in its application and occupancy of any suitable open/empty space
o the invisible presence of volumetric parameters being avoided in stylised dance movement (– this of course is what Forsyth understands and manipulates/demonstrates so masterfully and so complexly in his IMPROVISATIONAL TECHNOLOGIES)
o this is not a new thing about dance – it has been there the whole time – just never articulated so clearly, overtly, consciously, and intricately in the way that Forsyth has specialised and researched
o this is a contextualisation strategy that famously underpins modernism – the removal of immediate visible socio-cultural parameters in order to make the art object seem out (or ahead) of time


too much is coming out now – I stare and stare at the obvious and see nothing and I despair – what I see is not interesting, and I suddenly doubt what I’m doing – and then I see it – it has been staring at me the whole time, but completely invisibly – it is all about avoidance – this is so obvious – yet it is also not obvious – it is an obviousness buried and forgotten (at least to me – obviously!) – but when seen again, it opens up strong realisations, perceptions, and explanations – it is a resurgence of energy – from a barren familiar uninspiring landscape, suddenly a perceived (and felt) overflow of meaning, insight, and possibility – things sprouting out in all directions completely out of control – it is 1.23 pm – I’ve been trying to sleep for the last one-and-a-half-hours – but have to keep getting up and turning on the lamp to write down the next thought that won’t let me sleep – I want to exhaust the flow because I want to go to sleep – I would actually prefer to go to sleep – but I know from experience that if I don’t write these thoughts down, the subtleties, distinctions, energy, nuance, specificity, whatever, will be lost tomorrow – memory failure will erase two-thirds of my semi-sleeping realisations – I guess this is REFLECTIVE PRACTICE in action – now I will sleep – PLEASE! [nothing comes after this line tonight]


WRONG
I keep lying down in my bed, facing the wall, with my back to the writing pad (avoidance), but I had to get back up to write this…



o so environments are jam-packed full of ‘avoid me’ and ‘don’t avoid me’ signs – similarly, so is dancing
o dance is continually structured around the avoidance of invisible volumetric spatialities – or rather, the complex physical circumnavigating of these, produces it as art
o a dancing figure at full flight and in full splendour is all about ‘get out of my way’
o this thinking of dance in terms of ‘avoidance’ and ‘getting out of the way’ reminds me of a classic anecdote that an actor friend told me – he was an extra in an Australian ballet company’s version of Petroushka many many years ago – he had a very small part as a costumed bear in the crowd scenes – he was standing one night in the wings watching the action on stage when a thickly accented voice behind him said “Get out of the way cunt!” – he turned and it was Rudolf Nureyev, who was the company’s megastar guest artist, in full splendour about to make his entrance, but the costumed bear was in the way – I feel apologetic quoting an extremely objectionable expletive, which, coming out of the mouth of someone whose god-like stature at the time represented the very soul and spirit of dance, not to mention the implications associated with his choice of body part to denigrate in respect to dance as a feminised art form (– all of this is a very fertile essay in itself that has a lot of stuff that could be unpacked) – the story re-enforces a structural requisite/determinant/preoccupation/enjoyment of dance that this discussion of avoidance highlights – the words “get out of the way” by this famous dancer just before his entrance also speaks to dance’s destructive kinetic momentum (not just hierarchical prejudices and misogyny), an art form built around complex physical understandings of how to manipulate and play with the laws of avoidance