Tag: contemporary dance

Turning Social Media into Creative Media

Turning Social Media into Creative Media

Today we ran our Turning Social Media into Creative Media workshop alongside the Plan d school of Dance, Barcelona with the help of Twitter, Skype and some great ideas!

 

‘Hoy, junto a Joumana Mourad dictando un workshop entre Barcelona y Londres en simultáneo..! IJAD Dance Company junto a Pland Centre de Dansa. Que buena experiencia!!!’ Juan Leiba

 

The collaberation between the two countries would not have been possible without the support of technology. And what we’re seeing is the potential of the use of technology to create artwork that is accessible. Creative director, Joumana is working with cross platform dance performers, aiming for the creation of transparency between virtual & real: ‘today we managed to incapsulate two countries and different groups of dancers in a bubble of time where sharing was crucial. I’m excited that we’re starting to explore the migration between physical spaces and virtual maps.

Thanks to everyone who made it today and look out for our next social media project!

Diary of a dancer: Sally Marie

Diary of a dancer: Sally Marie

‘So first rehearsal today. Joumana wants me to be beautiful, or at least to stand up straight and not be angst ridden and  overly dramatic! It was slightly a shock, yet an interesting challenge. So I put on my corps de ballet face and she looked a bit happier. Then she had me eating lots of peanuts whilst I danced, which apparently helped my jaw relax. I felt like Eliza Dolittle.

New people, new studios I thought as I walked into the O2 centre today. Love it. Robert was there. Smashing bloke. All swoosh and verve. And then Shanti, the costume designer came in to measure me and I spent the afternoon in a crinoline asking Robert at one point, ‘does my bum look big in this!?’

Its tricky because I feel entirely unable to give up the secrets of the present. Everyone else has. And its been something that has lead to big steps forward for the work. But I cannot and could not. And so this is the point of tension that we are working with just now. I told Joumana I felt awful about it, because I always want to be able to give everything. And yet I just cannot say these things. They are too much to let out into the air. They are the reason I often sob myself to sleep and wake up feeling sick. I simply could not say them.

Still I hope that I can say a great deal else in the show and talk of other people’s secret which are fascinating, funny and tragic in equal measure.

Anyway, ten days and counting and tomo we all meet for lunch time on our day of rest no rest. Can’t wait!’

 

Sally trained at Central School of Ballet and has since performed a great deal with Protein Dance, performing ‘B for Body,’ in the Place Prize final, as well as the following full-length touring production of ‘Dear Body.’ She recently completed a world tour of their critically acclaimed show, LOL.
Sally has also worked with Sean Tuan John, Jasmin Vardimon, Tilited Productions, Duckie at The Barbican, Deja Donne in Italy, Rajni Shah, Gary Stevens, Lulus’ Living Room, Frauke Requart, H2, and Ridiculussmuss at The National Theatre, as well more recently working at St Thomas’s hospital alongside the physios there, developing dance for children.
Her first group work ‘Dulce et Decorum’ was performed two years running at Spring Loaded, The Place and lead to her company Sweetshop Revolution and a newly created work entitled Tree. Other choreographic credits include The Extra, a solo performed at The Linbury, Royal Opera House, ‘Reasons to be Cheerful,’ a musical by Graeae at Theatre Royal Stratford, ‘Nerve,’ a play by Prestige Theatre Company and ‘Violet Smile,’ a short circus solo about a vampire waitress.
She has been twice voted Best Female performer by Dance Europe and twice nominated as Best Female Performer, as well as New Talent by the National Critics Dance Circle. 
Bio: Alice Gaspari

Bio: Alice Gaspari

Alice has been taking exams in ballet since she was 6. Alice trained in Italy, studying at the northern school of contemporary dance and winning her postgraduate diploma with Phoenix dance theatre. She is also training to be a yoga teacher.Recent projects include work with the choreographer Janine Harringhton (Millennium Bridge dance) in June 2012, Big Dance  at Opera Holland Park, organized by the English National Ballet, with Romanian choreographer Arcadie Rusu, projects with C-12 dance theatre and Era dance theatre.
 

‘As soon as we started working on secrets, from the very beginning at the audition, I thought it was the kind of project that I’d love to work on. Just the word secret brings so much – it’s scary, intriguing, it’s the unknown and yet it will always exist – it is infinite! Everyone has secrets, big or small or less important. Why is that? It’s fascinating.

I thought the project was a clever idea – especially being able to interact with the audience and the people following us online. It is an honour to be the instrument for other people to see their secrets taking shape, creating meaning and adding movement, but at the same time respecting their privacy and anonymity.

I always remember my best friend once told me ‘you’re unable to keep secrets…I can read it on your face…but I’m glad you always share them with me.’ She was right – I was unable to keep secrets for myself, but I was always sharing them with her, and her alone. Thinking about it now – I had secrets myself too, ones that I didn’t even share with my best friend. I was afraid of being judged, scared of the consequences. They felt too strong to be told, they could have influenced too much, too many people would have opinions about me.

So why do I love working with other peoples’ secrects? It’s not because I want to know everything about everyone or because I want to put myself into other people’s lives, it’s because I’m attracted by this huge world that seems to exist behind us all. Something my own experiences, my own secrets, my own confessions can only begin to relate to. Secrets are secret for a reason and I feel really honoured to be part of a project that tries to look into that world.’

In-Finite comes to Rich Mix on 8th March 2013. For bookings click here.
Bio: Reynir Hutber

Bio: Reynir Hutber

 
 
 
Reynir Hutber is a London-based artist working with emerging technology. Reynir is collaborating with IJAD as an ‘Experience Designer’, filmmaker and media researcher.

 

 

 

How would you best describe your work? 

‘I am a London based artist working with emerging technology. I combine performance and technology to create immersive installations that often invite the participation of the audience.’

 

What’s your role with IJAD?

I am collaborating with IJAD as an ‘Experience Designer’, filmmaker and media researcher.

 

What attracted you to In-Finite?

‘I was attracted by the opportunity to research and explore potential relationships between dance and technology. I was also interested in the way in which social media could be used as a tool to include people in the development of a performance.’

 

Tell us something about your secret…

‘Sometimes I find it amusing and other times frightening.’ Read more on Reynir’s work with IJAD and the In-Finite project in his post, Art and Technology. He also tweets: @reynirhutber

 

 
In-Finite comes to Rich Mix, London on 8th March. Bookings here.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Bio: Héléna Casari

Bio: Héléna Casari

Héléna began dancing at the age of 5 at the conservatoire of Cergy and went on to join the contemporary section of the Paris Conservatoire (director Mrs Moreno) where she was taught by Catherine Vesque and Sabine Ricou, ‘who really inspired me’. In London, she did her Bachelor in Dance Theatre at the Laban Conservatoire and regularly took part in the Laban’s Events, such as “Common Bodies in a Space of Difference” by Zoi Dimirtiou (tour in London and Athens), repertoire pieces (Scramble by Cunningham) and her own choreographies.
After a placement in the Carolyn Carlson dance company during the creation of her new work “Synchronicity”, Héléna joined the IJAD dance company as a dancer (December 2012). She tweets at @hlnac
 
Photo by Yves Kossi
 
 

What attracted you to In-Finite?

The way Joumana uses the self to connect the dancers and the audiance. I believe in this creation process. the self plays an integral part in human motivation, affect, and social identity and sharing a secret can change your self-perception and your relationship with others. So, it could totally interest everybody and have an impact beyond coming to see the performance.


What’s the most exciting part of the project?

First working on my secrets was really exciting but at the same time scary: How can you approach such a personal subject, it’s not something you want to spend time on, you just want to lock it somewhere and that’s it. The idea of showing my secret to an audience is scary I get afraid that somebody will get what it is and will judge me. But finally, when I saw all the other dancers and people on IJAD’s website sharing their secrets, I felt much more comfortable to realease my stress and feel OK to open myself to others. Being more comfortable with myself and my secret will end in me being much more tolerant with my past and my old choices.

I hope we can find the best way to make people feel comfortable to share their secrets and find use in this process and maybe even apply it to their future.

So what has sharing your own secret meant for you?

My secret started when I was a child I didn’t wanted to hurt my family and so I kept it to myself for a long time. Now as a young adult I realise that it had an impact on my life and maybe if I was able to share it in a more free way with people, my life would have been very different. Sometimes for family or society reasons or even my own self-conscious I have been ashamed of myself but now I just want to free myself and make a step forward, accepting my past. As a process it works beyond interpretations. It’s a very honest, intense, challenging experience.

In-Finite comes to Rich Mix on 8th March 2013. For bookings click here.

 

 

 

 

Performing secrets – the process

Performing secrets – the process

I set out choreographing for In-Finite by asking dancers to interpret their own secrets. We had lengthy discussions about the impact of a secret on our lives and the kinds of feelings we might be putting to movement. We talked about the experience of keeping a secret, the associated emotions, the overwhelming impact secrets can have on our daily lives and the possibility of forgetting a secret completely. What we didn’t talk about was the secrets themselves.

Because the word secret has taken pride of place for this project. We must have used it a million times by now, in rehearsals, in our online discussions, in our everyday chats. We’re twisting it round and turning it inside out and inspecting, exploring and interrogating it as inspirational tools and choreographic elements. But the word itself can only go so far. If words are signs then secret is the perfect word – it’s purely a symbol.  Any creative response to a symbol is going to be detached, to lack authenticity.

As we’ve been writing, talking, dancing and tweeting about secrets, it has become clear that it’s a pretty hush hush area. This area where me as a choreographer will not invade as a sign of respect to the dancers privacy; this hush hush area became problematic a stumbling block, as I was unable to push the choreography further.  There is a secrets comfort zone and no matter what you happen to be talking about, one major thing is true – you’ll not divulge the actual secret. The secret is the unsaid thing. The secret elephant in the room. We could talk for hours about the sheer devastation caused by a secret or about the empowered feelings of owning one – we’re happy to dance around it, explore the feelings related to it – but we’ll not word the secret itself. I worked with the dancers on their secrets but we worked on the associated feelings and the words surrounding the secret. Imagine 8 dancers in different parts of a room. Moving separately with their own secret, like satellites of secrets. In the first 2 weeks of rehearsals, not a single secret was told.

So I started to think about the ingredients needed to take the dance from a floating concept of individual journeys, to a collaboration.

Lou Cope, the dramaturg collaborating on this project, suggested what I think we’d all forgotten, our own secrets. While this part of the performance involved interpreting our own secrets, the next stage would be interpreting others. Lou was right, how could I ask my audiences to open up for the first time about something so deeply personal and not offer my end of the bargain. How could we expect engagement when we weren’t prepared to put ourselves on the line too?

What followed was perhaps the hardest part of this process, for all of us. As a choreographer I felt this tremendous burden – would my dancers be willing to share? What responsibility do I have towards them and the audience? Would I be willing to share my secret in return? This was last Thursday and the change to the rehearsing space was intense. I’ve always promoted transparency in our rehearsals and processes but this was more, we were equal, together. We all had secrets but instead of keeping them to the silent movement space in our areas of the room – we owned each others. We shared. As a result the movement became more vulnerable, more honest and less dramatised.  It was as if, in sharing our secrets, we’d reattached to honest emotions…

Now our job turns to the audiences and how far we share our secrets with them. As independent and personal a secret might be, sharing is not a one way street. If you’ve followed our progress over the last couple of weeks, you’ve seen us ask audiences for secrets. We’re now seeing how many people want to share but don’t quite feel able to. The word secret teases us, it gets us wondering what it might be like to not keep it a secret anymore, it tickles our need for truce. What does it take to put it into words?

Joumana Mourad is a Dancer, Choreographer and the Artistic Director at IJAD Dance Company. The In-Finite project comes to London on March 8th and tickets can be booked here. Joumana tweets at @JouDance.

Feed Me!

Feed Me!

Feedback is nice. Dreaded, sometimes, but always good to have.

I prefer the word ‘feedback’ to ‘review’ or ‘critique’ because it connotes a two-way partnership between the audience and performer. The dancer feeds you with their art, you feed them back with your opinions.

Because you do have them.

Somewhere in history – perhaps even instinctively – we started feeling there was a right and a wrong response to art. Shakespeare wrote knowing he had to appeal to a diverse audience in one show – and if the groundlings didn’t like it, they would heckle, throw things and perhaps brawl out of boredom. The seated, richer classes would just chat amongst themselves and ignore you if your Falstaff faltered or fell flat.

We go to see performances because they make us feel or think differently. And we go because we like to share those responses. When was the last time you went on your own?

So why are we comfortable keeping these ideas to ourselves? Speak to any type of artist of any discipline (like cooking) and they’ll want to know what you think, but we feel awkward if we don’t give it 5 stars. We think that the fault was ours or we just don’t like sharing a negative opinion. We’re so British!

This is why the new Feedback Wall at The Place is great. During the interval and at the end of the show you can literally take a pen and write what you think. No awkward hands-up Q&A.

This was my experience on the 29th and it worked brilliantly. I must admit I was a bit confused at first. I didn’t think they actually meant the wall. I was looking for some type of board and there was no sign of anyone writing anything so I sipped my lemon tea instead.

What was I waiting for?

Permission. Even those who work in the arts feel that unsolicited opinions are unwelcome. At the end of the show the concept was pretty clear (they were wipe-pens) so away I scrawled.

Were any of the comments meaningful or helpful? You’ll have to ask The Place, but looking at dancer Casandra Stelea’s Facebook page, I could see that she appreciated it.

This brings us on to social media. Whatever you buy these days, there are reams of reviews, although for performance it is rare to find (easily!) an audience review.

The Place has embraced social media (it’s hard to miss the encouragement at the bar, on the programme and before the show) and this should be the home of feedback.

It takes away the awkwardness and allows for genuine responses. This allows the performers to respond and create more meaningful artwork.

What’s more interesting is that it is live – like theatre. Instead of replacing that unique quality of physical attendance that the digital sometimes threatens, it opens a discussion in real time – if everyone is unified with one time and one hashtag after the show. It encourages people to attend so they can join in because guess what? You can’t download it and catch up on your way to work.

How great is that? We’re creating a unique experience upon which it is not possible to compromise. If you want to try out this new type of response come to In-Finite on March 8th.

We look forward to @ing you there 🙂

What is In-Finite?

What is In-Finite?

ShhhLed by Artistic Director, Joumana Mourad, the In-Finite project explores the different realities of the physical and virtual platforms.

 

In light of the revolutionary way communication has changed, In-Finite was born in 2011 to present new ways for the performance world to adapt.

Following people like you and me, IJAD set out to understand how we use technology in our daily lives and integrate this into every element of performance.

Secrets were chosen because everyone around the globe has one. We all keep them for the same reasons and they affect us in the same ways. The content changes depending on your culture, religion, gender, age, identity, job and so forth. This creates amazing commentary socially, politically, economically and personally.

As actor Mark Rylance says:
“If you’re an artist, a really useful thing to do is to look for secrets – things that are forbidden to be said. Maybe people are frightened of something, maybe they don’t have the words to express it, but those are the things that need to be said by theatre. That’s what it’s here for. Look for those secrets in society and inside yourself and give them a voice. That’s the role of an artist in our society.”

We received that quote from one of our followers on Facebook who saw it, thought of us, and shared it on our wall. This illustrates perfectly how technology can flower into a tool of artistic collaboration. We’re not just stopping there though – the relationship between creativity and technology goes much deeper…

·        From starting with user-generated content, asking for secrets from people around the globe in a way not possible a couple of decades ago

·        Using technology as part of the creative process, utilising how we interpret ideas through different lenses/mediums

·        Documenting the creative process so audiences can see how performance is developed from conception to completion

·        During a performance, showing live streaming from other parts of the world with other performers

·        Showing pre-edited film which captures another time, feeling and place – which affects this one

·        Asking the audience to get their smartphones, camera and tablets out to interpret what they are seeing and to share it across the web

·        Streaming the performance to a global audience – who can interact with each other and those present

·        Which enables people to view the whole process later, at their convenience.


This is part of sensography, a practice developed by IJAD which gives a 360 view of dancers performing without loss of emotional intensity. If you’ve ever filmed a band or a school play, you’ll know it’s not the same – we’re changing that.

The Arts Council has supported both our research and our launch alongside a range of projects nationwide which shows how performance can benefit as many people as possible through technology.

Dcms digital strategy
Digital giving in the arts

In-Finite. This describes both the limitless inside of the self where secrets hide. It describes the limitless potential for sharing the self with the world.

In. Finite.
Infinite.
In-Finite.

So how can you get involved?

We’ll be collecting secrets over the next few months. Donate your secret by tweeting to @shhh2013, right here, or by commenting on the blog below!

Dance meets technology

Dance meets technology

IJAD dance company has been looking at the role of technology in the dance world since 1999.  The company constantly poses questions about the best way to move forward with technology and dance and whether this could help to blur the boundaries between audience and performance.

Working with scientists, researchers, animators and technology companies over the years IJAD has worked with sensors, film and audio-visual technology. Here are just a few of our projects.

 

Labyrinth of the Senses


Here IJAD worked closely with multimedia experts to shape a new relationship between live performance and film. Multimedia projections provided a visual, virtual city – much more than a backdrop to the performance. The multimedia artists created computer generated graphics that responded and reacted to movement, in a true integration of technology, theatricality and raw physicality.

 

Little Red Riding Wolf


This was a site-specific performance held in a Japanese winery in Hwalian, combining machines and movement.
The derelict building came to life with music created by electrical saws, and lighting emitted from car headlights. In this piece time took another form, and space took another meaning – both lost their habitual references.

We continue to work closely with research and development in technology to push the parameters even further.  The current project looks at social media and the changing world of communication and interaction. Now more than ever, the lines between public and private, between audience and performance can be blurred, imagined and explored.

Can dance inform technology? How can this empower audiences? Join the conversation and find out how you can get involved in our next project (in just a couple of minutes!) over on Twitter @IJADdance.

MORE POP UP COLLECTION!

MORE POP UP COLLECTION!

 

This time it was the South Bank that hosted the IJADteam on a sunny Saturday.

Our Shhh gets bigger and bigger as more punters get curiously closer to our little corner of hidden stories – now equipped with lemonade and a coffee table!

We discovered that Saturdays and the Thames attract a quieter crowd that prefers writing rather than talking so our In-FInite webpage is now filled with new generous stories…

Our stand is only beginning its journey and maybe the next time you’ll be able to see it overseas… but it’s a big hush-hush for now, SHHH!

Follow us for more, pictures on Facebook and Twitter!