The Impetus

Lizzi Kew Ross and Rosemary Brandt have entered into a choreographic dialogue. At first glance, it could seem an unlikely conversation. As a teacher of choreography, Lizzi works from a more intuitive place, not a wishy-washy flight of fancy though, but an informed intuition that she couples with trained, skilled improvisation. Nevertheless, its her spontaneous response that she goes for; it's a spontaneous sight that she cultivates.

Rosemarys choreological approach, on the other hand, is more structural and analytical, with movement as the raw material of dance and language derived, not from steps or positions, images or analogies, but from movement. In her Rosemary Brandt Practice, we are to look and look and look; we learn to identify, name and, above all else, to observe the precise and specific details of dance.

At second glance, what might seem an unlikely conversation isnt. Lizzis ethos is to plunge herself into challenging places. She likes to engage with what she doesnt know about, savours the risk of it. And she considers that 60, 70, maybe even 80% of choreography is about people, dancers are people. Were not dealing with paint; were not sitting at home with a painting or clay or words on a computer screen, and so, initiating a conversation almost comes with the territory. Of course, Lizzi knows that for choreographers, the actual act of talking about their choreography is not an easy place. There is a fear that if you talk too much about it, what is true in what you do is dissipated. Thats its a mystery and if you start to dissemble it, you wont be able to put it back. But after seeing Rosemary demonstrate her choreological work, Lizzi was impressed, by the rigour and depth and, also, what Lizzi knows about the nature of movement and what she does almost subliminally, in terms of investigating movement, Rosemary was making overt, was making crystal clear.

As for Rosemary? She was open to Lizzis invitation to establish a dialogue, partly because her students often say, often tell her that her choreological approach helps them with their choreography. Yet rarely do the two teachers meet. So here was an opportunity to step into the gap between the students two experiences and, as well, to show that its not choreography or choreology, not one thing or the other, but that the two approaches with their respective activities are dealing with movement and dance and they lead to dialogue. In that meeting point, there could be, perhaps, a further illumination.

There was, though, an added aspect. Rosemary and the choreographer Athina Vahla had piloted and previously taught joint choreography/choreology short courses and so she knew this kind of dialogue could work. But more than that, every choreographer, every artist is different. My work with Athina; that was one meeting dialogue. But each meeting dialogue is unique and so when Lizzi approached me about taking a dialogue/our dialogue into workshops, I was keen.

Examples/Samples

Their first two workshops were about rhythm. Rosemary explains: Each time we plan, its always Lizzis idea. By that I mean the workshop should go with the choreographic idea, the choreographers idea. I feed into it as opposed to say, Im the primary impulse here. So shes initiating and Im absolutely happy to follow, to look, to be open.

Lizzi opted for rhythm as the first dialogue because, in her view, unless people naturally move in a rhythmic way or have a natural sense of phrasing, it can become the least considered element. And also, sound supports motion and so, as soon as youve got a sound rhythm, it readily helps to generate the finding of material. Which set the stage for Rosemarys work to come in. To Rosemary, in music, rhythm is sound, but in dance, rhythm is what we see. The implication is that by understanding (not imitating but understanding) how we make the rhythms visible and by understanding that musicality is about making accent, musicality neednt be left to the vagaries of what is natural, but can be taught and/or made explicit. And from this explicit place, we can launch back to our original material, re-freshing, re-fashioning, re-looking at it. And so, in this workshop, what could have been a creative/analytical tussle became an overlap, one approach knitting into the other.

Taking this sense of overlap further, they fed it directly into the first of the dialogues on space as well. Lizzi uses other art forms a lot drawings, paintings, sculpture, music, poetry. She chose two pieces of music as a starting point. The exercise was to draw a response -- an emotional or analytical response while listening to the music and, then, listening again, drawing the other response. The emotional and analytical drawings were astonishingly different. The next step was to translate the 2-D drawings into 3-D space. For some, the pattern on the paper became the pattern on the floor. For others, because the act of drawing is deeply physical, it was about continuing the drawing movements, extending, magnifying and eliding them into 3-D shapes in the space.

For Rosemary, this sort of process is ripe for questioning, with a self-reflection as the aim. What was your method? Why did you translate this 2-D drawing into this 3-D space that way? What was your thinking? What was your link? Did you take the spatial aspect of it? Did you take the feeling aspect? And let us speak in movement terms about it. Why that movement? Is it just because you like moving like that? What purpose does it serve? What do you think we see when you do that?

That process is about being, as Rosemary says, . . . reflective, experimental, experiential and analytical, all of it and in the studio. Its about observing, identifying and naming, not for namings sake, but to reveal and inform, to add more choices. And its about, in this instance, articulating. Non-articulation can be overrated.

A Benign Equivalent of a Rubicon

Now, more accustomed to each others approaches and working styles, they add time to their space dialogue, space and time and their tangential links. Lizzi sets out several warm-up improvisations re. space and time, space being where we are or not; time being how long and at what pace. We can separate time and space in language, but not so in dance.

Her improvisation directs the group to the edges of their movements, to those risk places, extreme places, speed, range of speeds, into the middle, to slowness, increasing the movement range, juxtaposing what the edges are with bringing the space inwards. After which, she moves to laterality. She asks everyone to imagine a Jackson Pollock painting that stretches across the length of the wall and, as if our centre is a hand, the centre is to shift with the paint coming out of our sides and, two by two, rushing forward towards the imagined canvas, we are to paint it all.

Once warmed-up, three people are to work together, the first setting up a rhythm; the second entering and responding rhythmically; the third, like a counterpoint, is to engage spatially. Then, in reverse, two space people, followed by a rhythmic person. Except for those of us looking, we cant distinguish between who is doing space and who is doing rhythm. The boundaries are blurred, flaccid. Its a problem. Here emerges for Lizzi and Rosemary, a benign equivalent of a Rubicon: which approach to proceed with?

Lizzis urge is to divide the group into two, with one of the groups standing outside, looking closely as the others redo it. And then, in reverse, redoing the improvisation, keeping to the same parameters. Shed encourage them to walk around the space, taking in different perspectives. She might enter into it and spur on a clarification of intention; she might illustrate by changing it this way or that way Rosemarys urge would be to stop there and say, there isnt a difference or what difference do you see and what are those differences, lets name those and lets work with them and lets find some more and now weve got a list of things. So lets take that and go for an improv with those explicit things. Then step-by-step, clarity, finding and seeing the significant details and if you want to make time more visible, you have to exaggerate that along with that because time and space are not separable, they belong together and theres an affinity. But . . . and . . . what happens if we break the affinity.

What approach do they opt for?

Lizzi: Im aware that when Rosemary is teaching, Im participating and when Im teaching, Rosemary is making notes. This probably means shes more reflective at the point of delivery than I am. Because of the nature of how she works. Whereas when shes teaching, Im part of it, involved in it; I could of course stand outside and take notes, but I am such a doer.

Rosemary: When I see Lizzi working, I get the feeling that somethings festering inside of her; its like this thing that festers, like she cant name it, she cant get it, but she knows it, she feels it, shes got to get there, muck about with it. This festering its a very genuine feeling, idea, desire to go somewhere. And I think that place of Lizzis is a place of chaos, and I say that as a true place because its in that chaotic, creative, impulsive place in the moment where articulation is not possible that sometimes you discover something.

Which then to opt for? Its a judgement call.

Taking Stock
Five workshops into their process and two more scheduled in their diaries is enough for taking a first stock of whats changed, if anything, in their teaching or choreography and choreology practices.

Rosemary finds herself saying more often in choreology class This is not choreography. I am not asking you to choreograph. She identifies more often the differences between systematic activities/improvisations for discovering information about movement, structure and its language and activities for the sole purpose of creating material.

As for Lizzi, shes more vocal about making connections. She articulates more.

Rosemary, again. She sees a subject emerging from the fact that their particular dialogue slides from inside the dancer (or choreographer) to what is looked at. She reflects. How to articulate that the me of the dancer relates to the you? This is what it feels like, the sensation. This is arm. Im supposed to make a swing. But I didnt control it that time, so I know if it didnt feel right, if I didnt control it, it doesnt look right either. I have to control that because I know I understand -- what you see. And thats what relates me to you.

While for Lizzi, a little flag goes up when she borrows or hears analogous language, analogies like massaging your feet into the floor or arms going over and coming back like stroking a mermaids hair. She thinks Rosemarys got a point about how, for example, in music, you learn to talk about harmony, melody, counterpoint totally in music terms, while we in dance borrow.

Rosemarys thinking about a palette of choices, thinking about what is original, what is originality and what is formulaic, and how a choreographer treats the relationship between idea and medium.

Lizzis thinking about having people come in to talk to the choreographer about his or her work. The practice of reflecting back to the choreographer what theyre seeing, feeding in a quality you dont necessarily see, making sense of your responses. That as a useful, helpful practice and as a practice within the art form.

The dialogue continues.