/

May 1 rehearsal. Outdoors. Dancing in the Garden. Our objective: discover a way that dancing at a site, is influenced specifically by that place. The movements are not “in the studio” movements photoshopped to another place. The movement choices are because of where the dancing is taking place. Easier said than done. As I worked I often had a thought, “I want to be there next” and would go there, without really paying attention to the opportunities offered by going there.
Assignment: After a summarizing of The Magician’s Elephant, I cut out quotes from the book, each on their own slip of paper. Our task – to come up with a method for selecting isolated words from the passage and then make a list of those words, separated from their meaning in the context of the quote. (For instance, I chose the number 7 because there are 7 letters in PICERAS – a scientific analysis of what makes something alive”. I circled every seventh word. That left me with: again, him, again, for, then, again.) We talked about methods for coming up with movement for a single word – including if in doubt, find a way to “spell” the word. I think I was telling myself not to limit the movement idea, to let it evolve rather than be a short representation.
Layer 2: When the movement vocabulary is formed into its phrase, or study, if longer – go back to the original text and see if allowing the narrative to peek through asks of you to add anything to the original. i.e. a clarification of focus, a tweaking of a gesture’s intent, etc.
Layer 3: Working with someone else, watch theirs and find ways to capture it on video. We had one camera, several phones, a flip and a digital camera with video capability.
Layer 4: Watching all the pieces, while someone read from The Magician’s Elephant and someone else read from the PICERAS article. (7 Pillars of Life: Program, Improvisation, Compartmentalization, Energy, Regeneration, Adaptability, Seclusion)

Discoveries, Inspirations, Curiosities:
- If the Elephant is Science
- Wow and wonder
- The Elephant in the room
- The evolution of the elephant
- Taylor’s story about her science teacher
- Damita – the subversive text
- Damita- It all started with a decision to….. story

Site Ideas: To get ourselves skilled so that we know how to discover a site that provides interesting potential, we can tweak out that potential, and we also have a collection of movement phrases, object icons and other ideas that we can layer into alternate spaces. Thinking to if we perform parts of this for Center for Chemical Evolution gathering of Scientists, that instead of trying to perform it as a “black box theatre presentation” we instead search out the locale and find a place that inspires – the end of a corridor, the turn of a wall, under an architectural detail, etc. So possibly we start meeting at other places to rehearse. And in so doing – what if we had a little sign that went with us that said what it was we were doing and what people might expect and a way for them to contribute via a box or something. Like: “Write down 6 juxtapositions that you observed, fold your paper 7 times, and then deposit it in the box.”

I will post photos and video clips when I get a second. Send me anything you shot on your phones.

A personal story to consider: a time in your life when what you intended was not the outcome. (In The Magician’s Elephant the magician “intended only lilies” but instead brought an elephant crashing through the roof.) This can be your story, or a story that you know.

Reminder – Corissa’s group Moving in the Spirit concert at the Rialto on Thursday. Blake Beckham’s work in progress, Plot, along with other choreographers at The Magnetic Theatre in Reynoldstown on Fri-Sun. The Color of Her Dreams (excellent!!! Go see!) At 7 Stages.

Yours everly evolvingly,
Celeste