DECO Project Blog

Photos from Fall and Swell, performed at the University of Northampton Open Studio on 12th December 2014

A short video of footage from Fall and Swell, performed at the University of Northampton Open Studio on 12th December 2014

Filming by Tim Halliday

Preparing for and being at the Digital Echoes symposium gave me the opportunity to consider my research so far in to my own practice, through critical reflection and documentation, and how this might provide ideas for the DECO resource. 

So much of the impetus for the project was my frustration with existing texts and resources on choreographic practice that either focus on the specific processes or practices of a particular artist, or generic processes and methodologies (more in project information here). I decided to consider the flip side of this to begin considering the form and content of the DECO resource – what texts or resources exist that I find useful in terms of choreographic practice? The answers in terms of my practice are Jonathan Burrows A Choreographer’s Handbook (2011) and Twyla Tharps’ The Creative Habit (2007). Both texts approach practice from a (semi) philosophical standpoint, and don’t try to dictate a way of working but rather provide advice and questions/tasks for reflection. 

A Choreographer’s Handbook is frustrating to students because Burrows’ refuses to offer fixed answers or solutions to problems – in his section on habits, for examples, he encourages readers to be aware of what their habit are, and to make a conscious choice either to work with them or against them (Burrows, 2011: 7). The overall ethos of the text is that there are multiple ways of working, and that there is no ‘right way’. In the epilogue to the text, he asks readers to ‘forget all this’ and not to work too consciously with the ideas presented in the book. To do so would mean a regurgitation, he says ‘[w]hen you have forgotten these ideas they will have become yours and ready to use.’ (Burrows, 2011: 209) Find the usefulness in the text when it is not regurgitation – when it is a considered response to a situation in your own practice. 

Tharp’s tome deals with creativity more generally rather then choreographic practice specifically, and provides a variety of different reflections and practical strategies for working creatively – including how to ‘scratch’ for ideas and how to deal with creative blocks. I blogged about the text last summer on my website, focusing in part on insecurities and vulnerabilities of making creative work. I found her own questioning of the value of her work hugely comforting – even the most prolific and experienced choreographers are scared. Some of the practical strategies for collecting ideas and inspirations, of establishing rituals of practice, were also hugely beneficial and have informed development of my won practice this year. 

The qualities I want the DECO resource to reflect are to: 

• Provide advice and guidance 

• Contain reflection on what it means to make choreographic work and to have a practice 

• To present multiple options and strategies So…to content. I want nuggets of material from texts such as those by Burrows and Tharp (appropriately referenced), and I am already beginning to collate some of these on the project blog. In terms of other content, I have begun a list of ‘ideas’ for posts and/or content sections… 

• You can learn from dancing in other people’s work – pay attention to how you are asked to engage to what you are asked to engage with, as this gives you more insight in to process. Don’t just copy and mimic other people’s working processes, consider the purpose or why they are used. • Make material that challenges you and your dancers. 

• When approaching structuring your work - don’t imagine, do. You have to try things out to see if they work, and to see possibilities. Try multiple options. 

• Identify how you move and how to engage with your dancers with/in this. 

• Identify the skills needed to engage in your practice (identifying how you move will help here) and how to facilitate your dancers skill development or engagement. In making Fall and Swell, I paid little attention to improvisation skills, as the work contained no improvisation. However, the skills involved in improvising were crucial to the performance of the work. William Forsythe and improvisation technologies is a well established example from professional practice. 

• Watch your dancers as they dance and make, observe how they learn and problem solve – this will help you help them to navigate your work. 

• Present options for structuring and patterning based on Matt’s blog post – but be clear about the use of these for particularly performative or thematic purposes, not as a get out of a) making a volume of (interesting) material or b) for the sake of it. 

3. What did you use the blog for? 

-Gain insight into Kellys intentions for choreography 

-Read rehearsal notes for practice -Remind myself of material/patterns when writing portfolio -Look at posts that have been posted prior 

-Enjoyed reading about session reflections -Gained further understanding of the piece 

-Writing screendance posts 

-Reading interesting blogs 

-Broaden writing skills 

-Gain a deeper understanding of the material 

-Gain more information on “Fall and Swell” project -Help with my own blog, i.e. how to structure it 

-Helped me to understand different methods to use when choreographing 

4. Did you look at the tumblr blog to find something specific, or just to browse materials generally? 

-Looked at general notes and ideas 

-Looked for specific things to reference for portfolio 

-Browse for materials 

-General use 

-Usually specific, especially once starting the portfolio 

-Used mainly when writing portfolio 

-Looked at posts about Kellys process and the way the ideas were formulated 

-To get an idea of what Kellys ideas were when it came to picking certain music/poetry 

-When I was finding it difficult to understand class tasks 

5. If you were looking for something specific-how did you find what you were looking for? Did you just scroll through materials or use the hashtags? 

-Scrolled through but when I was looking for a starting point then I used the hashtags to be able to browse through 

-I went into archive and went down and looked at all the posts then found the one I was looking for. 

-Scrolled through however the hashtags helped me to quickly see what the post was about therefore I could judge its relevance in what I was looking for. 

-I mainly used the hashtags but because I got to know the blog quite well (because I looked at it so much) I kind of knew where certain information was. 

6. Was it updated regularly enough? 

-Yes, I always found something new 

-I rarely used it, but it had been updated the second time I used it 

-I definitely think so, each day after rehearsals the blog was being updated 

-Yes but the spontaneous updates were nice too 

-I think it was after every session, in great detail 

-No, it was not, sometimes did not have enough time to write and engage with the new post 

-I felt there was a time in which it lacked regular postings, but then the posts 

-I believe it was but I didn’t access it enough to know. 

-Yes, sometimes I found that it was updated too much and I had trouble shifting through material to find what I needed. 

7. Are there any posts/content that you would have liked to see on the tumblr blog? 

-No, I found everything on there that I needed 

-No, content however sometimes found layout could have been better, very busy often confusing 

-I found everything I needed 

-Maybe more information to the reason why this particular project was used. 

-None that I can think of, I think that it had plenty of content 

-Maybe more biographical information on John Keats and Fanny Browne 

-A bit more about what other ideas and sources she had gathered physically etc 

-No, I feel everything was covered 

-I would have preferred more video, on the blog so that we would look back and reflect on the movement that we are performing. 

-It could also be a reference for remembering the material when some people are not in lesson or they forget the material. 

8. In what ways did the tumblr blog support the studio work? 

-It wrote about how it was choreographed and why certain material was used. 

-It described what happened in lessons and Kellys opinion of it. 

-The blog allowed us some insight of what Kelly wanted in the material and how she wanted us to rehearse things for the next lesson 

-It allowed us to know what Kelly was thinking about when she made the material so we could use this to influence our performance. 

-It would help me understand and relate to the idea behind the piece and no mix up sections of the work. 

-The tutor writes a lot of notes taken from the class: discussions, students problems and questions. There are a lot notes about the dance piece, “Fall and Swell,” as well that helped me personally to write portfolio 

-Mostly in the run up to the performance I was able to see the notes from rehearsals and go over these when rehearsing independently 

-It helped me to watch more carefully and understand dance work 

-It gave improvements, insight to the choreographers intentions, any information explained that I missed or didn’t understand 

-Strongly supported my work in writing -It made me understand why certain things were done or said because the tumblr blog became evident. 

-Rehearsal notes, patterning of material 

-The tumblr blog supported the studio work in a way that is kept all the information logged so people can access it. 

-Corrections and how I should be performing the intentions of the piece 

-Critical reflections 

-Feedback 

-It gave in detail what we had done and the end results 

-Gave information on Keats and gave each section of work 

-It allowed insight into Kellys creative processes 

-Gave corrections, photo ideas 

-Critical reflections and feedback on dancers 

9. Did it provide you with any additional insights in to the choreographic process? If so, what specifically? 

-It helped me gather ideas for the intentions behind movement and narrative 

-It helped me understand background and theme of the piece 

-I provided me with different ways that I could choreograph 

-I don’t feel I looked on it enough to comment 

-Not really 

-The tumblr blog gave insight into the choreography in a sense that it had the starting point ideas and where the ideas led to as the final piece 

-It made me realize what the underlying idea was 

-It gave me plenty of additional insights 

-That the choreographer doesn’t have to share everything with their dancers -The creation of an idea and how the work can change throughout the creative process 

-Some notes inspired me and gave me more possibilities to create an interesting dance piece. 

-Background-exactly what we did 

-Why the choreographer made the choices she and her opinion on our responses. 

10. Did it provide support in preparation of the portfolio assessment? If so, what specifically? 

-Yes, knowing the structure 

-It did because I had a clue what was going on. 

-Yes because it had equal ideas per section of the piece 

-Yes, it allowed further access to the project and gave Kellys own ideas of the work. 

-The process as a whole was highlighted on the blog, as this was the aim of the portfolio 

-A lot of help 

-It would have I just didn’t use it 

-Yes, it helped me to remember everything that we did 

-Yes it helped me understand processes, and helped me back up a number of points 

-Yes, a lot of help. It gave back up on comments made in lesson, photos, videos and feedback. 

-It helped me know what the work was about and about the piece in general so I could write about what we did. 

-Yes it provided me with a lot of information of the piece and reminded me of the lessons. 

-Yes, by explaining why she did what she did 

-Providing small details of a task, I might have missed, origins of her ideas 

-Yes, aspects I had forgotten so the blog was a helpful reference when writing the portfolio 

-Patterns, the process of making material and choosing it 

-Yes, it helped me remember specific examples and used for quotes 

-I think mostly it allowed us to be comfortable with writing the portfolio because with writing the portfolio because we know all of the information that we needed was in the blog. 

-It allowed us to plan our portfolio much more as we could browse through the blog to see what we had the most knowledge in. 

11. In what ways has it contributed to your learning on the module? 

-It has helped me understand the amount of research that is carried out previously 

-Helped to understand the module better 

-It has helped me understand why certain things were done, which is helpful as this may not always be covered in class 

-It started watching dance pieces more carefully, it helped me with some assignment works etc 

-It supported me to write the portfolio, also explained the choreographic process, which taught me processes I did not know 

-It has made it easier as all notes were in the same place and kept so you could always find what you were looking for. 

-It allowed me to learn about how different people notate work and choreography. Also about where to take references from e.g. poetry and the rhyming patterns that they use. 

-It has helped me to understand how to write about a choreographic process and the detail of planning that is required 

-It has helped me understand how much work and research goes into choreography 

-It helped me to understand the piece and what it was based on 

-It helped me to make things clear and for me to understand them better 

-Not much as I didn’t use it enough 

-The choreographic process in general 

-It contributed to my learning because it gave me further ideas and reasons for the choreography and day to day updates on the rehearsals 

-It aided me by keeping track of what we did each week so I could read over it and try to keep on top of the material 

-The blog made me understand the non-understandable 

-By me being able to know what movement Kelly wanted and how I could improve 

Before presenting at Digital Echoes I had a brief conversation with Matt about choreography and documentation to clarify some of the thoughts I had in response to his presentation on Orthogonality. I wanted to get them down on the blog, as they are potentially useful in thinking about the DECO resource in terms of articulating choreographic practice, or more specifically working with performativity. For my own practice as a documenter and dramaturg for my own work, it is also useful as I am beginning (as a result of the presentation at Digital Echoes) to think about development my own documentation framework.

For Matt, the choreography is a performance provocation of the dancers, and their performative engagement with this is the work. In terms of documentation – if the choreography is not the work, why would you document it? Matt’s approach to documentation is not necessarily to record the devising tasks or movement material, but the conditions in the room when material was made – the language used, the approach, the atmosphere, as these are the circumstances of the provocation. It is these circumstances that are integral if the work is to be restaged. I would argue that even if the purpose of documentation is not for restaging, this approach is useful as it deals with process not outcomes – the how – which, with my DECO hat on, is much more useful educationally. 

In terms of my own documentation, I am interested in recording devising tasks as for me they are also a provocation to the dancers to engage generatively in the work. Some rationale for what the task was trying to facilitate would also be beneficial. 

Something else that is key for me is to record decision making processes as why choreographer’s make creative decisions – to change material, to cut it, to us certain structures, to start again – is often shrouded in mystery. This is particularly important when the documentation process is part of my teaching – like the blog for Fall and Swell. 

For me as an artist who is developing their practice, reflective posts are studio sessions are key as they provide an opportunity to reflect, learn and understand.