Choreography Workshop 11/03/14

For a second time today we had Jenny Coogan lead our lesson, which I was excited about after the morning lesson we had with her. We first of all looked at a variety of pictures out of a book that Jenny bought with her. We discussed what stood out for us all, which lead on to the discussion about space. We were in the large studio (room 221 in ET) and started to analyse what was avalible to us.





We stated where the 'strong' space was i.e. the centre, and where 'weaker' space was. We also discussed pathways and how they affect an audience e.g. diagnols cut a space, but coming towards an audience can feel intimidating for them, and circular pathways create a sense of isolation. However, this created an arguement for me as within a 'placing practise in context' lecture with Nicola, we discussed how Merce Cunningham decided that every space is important, and that not one specific space should overpower another.

After this discussion, Jenny wanted to see our duets and what we have so far. After she saw them, she gave us each some feedback on how to possibly improve or adapt our choreography:
Gabby and Lewis performed mine and Deborah's choreography based upon the impossible task, and it went really well. However, after watching it I felt as though they were too separate from eachother still, even after adding in moments of contact and unison. Jenny Coogan first suggested that we have the lights dimmed; she said that this creates a sense of mystery, similar to the mystery of the 'impossible tasks' that Gabby and Lewis are playing with. She then said how about beginning with the 'shadow' section to distinguish the sense of a duet, and then they can separate into individual interpretations of other tasks, but come back together regularly so we can establish a duet relationship between them. Me and Deborah had a discussion after this feedback and decided after originally saying we wanted to keep the lights how they were, that it did indeed look more mysterious and intriguing with the lights dimmed slightly. We then stated that Jenny was right and that the relationship between them is too distant, and that we are going to re-order the tasks so that they come together more often.

My feedback for the dancers that I noted down whilst watching included:
-Timing in some moments of unison.
-Lewis needs to use the curtain more as it is there avalible to him to take advantage of in the task based around the Sun.
-Gabby needs to embody herself further in her indiviudal tasks so we can as an audience empathise and have a better guess at what she's doing. It also then draws the audience in.
-And a final and main point was to: TRUELY BELIEVE IN THE TASK YOU ARE INTERPRETING!

 

*Above is the video from todays choreography workshop*