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And that's what we did today. We gently murdered some stuff and some new ones appeared. Ouf of nowhere.. or rather, out of the depths. The day started with a BMC session with Karin Fisher-Potisk - we dove and dug... The rest of the day was hectic, connected to our primal brains (if there is such a thing as a primal brain), we became our own beasts, not copies of beasts we thought were right beasts. We BECAME bestial. If a cancer is an hyperactivity of a cell, an over-reaction, then today, without even trying: we reached that state of hyperactivity/hypercreativity/reproduction of life that is absurd, dangerous and scary. Oh and we learnt a song.
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First times are always fun. Anything is possible, nothing is right or wrong. Today anything was possible and nothing was right or wrong, things just were. We experimented, we improvised, we lifted, we set, we tried, we failed, we tried again, and this, until the end of the day. We became beasts, we were ugly, we became scientists, we had fun with strange tools, we became one creature, we were weird, we practiced Feldenkrais with Ruth Valensi, we were in peace. The week has beautifully started. Ici, c'est un petit coin de paradis pour les travailleurs acharnés, les créateurs qui cherchent sans cesse et qui ne s'épuisent jamais. Vivre dans le studio est le rêve. Encore mieux quand dehors il fait -12 : l'excuse parfaite pour ne pas sortir. Et puis, la pièce vous suit, dort avec vous et s'étale physiquement sur plusieurs mètres carrés (corps, cahiers, images, inspirations, sons) . TOYS prend forme, on trouve sa chair et ses contours.. JOUR-16 avant l'ouverture. Aujourd'hui il s'agissait de comprendre nos personnages, de se raconter des histoires, de se rapprocher différemment... erm.  - Feedback forms from particpants both in Newcastle and London - That’s it. Our fifth day in the studio here in London is over! And so is the week. We spent most of the morning improvising… and magic happened. We structured the beginning of the piece and we said goodbye to TOYS for a good month. Next time, we will be in Grenoble…. and it will be January 2017. Thank you to Arts Council for supporting these wonderful, creative and rich R&D sessions, and to Dance City Newcastle and The Place London for having us working in your studios! Thank you to Catherine Greenwood and Hattie Gregory for helping me thinking and producing these two weeks. AND MASSIVE thank you to the incredible dancers who threw themselves full heartedly, Rosie, Elsa, Joss, James and Lewis!  This morning was glorious; it was all about sharing and experimenting. Thank you so much to everyone who made it to the workshop (on a Saturday morning!) and who generously played the game. Some of the words that came back about this morning's session are.... playful, fun, intensity, challenging, subtle, open. The workshop was definitely a physical approach to the questions we raised on Thursday during the open discussion. Someone said this morning: "It made me wonder if pleasure is something we find within ourselves or if we need others to achieve it, and to which degree?" In the afternoon, Danilo Moroni joined us for the making of the second teaser. Our first collaboration in July was very exciting and I cannot wait to see what magical images he will come up with this time. Tomorrow is already our last day. WHAT?  Today was an other special day as we opened the door of our studio to share our experiments, our discoveries and our old affairs. One of the most beautiful feedback "The Sharing was very strong, entertaining and enjoyable, physically and emotionally" and an other one saying "I felt sensory sensations". TOYS little by little is growing... It was really really helpful for us to share few extracts. Thank you for all the thoughts, comments and questions raised! And thank you to the performers who are so committed and playing the game to perfection!! or the day we found out there is not 1 definition of Pleasure. But around 10 000. Today on top of devising more of our moving paintings and our highly jumping birds, we had the pleasure (yes) to chat with Thomas Stern (UCL) about pleasure, hedonism and the idea of performing pleasure. Taking physically the space to understand our own definitions of pleasure, we realised that all of those definitions could be criticised and thus abandoned, for an other one, which could also be criticised and thus abandoned, for an other one etc. This is what we have discussed > What is pleasure? > What is the difference between pleasure and Entertainment and THEN what is TOYS? Is it an entertainment? (= try to please) and finally, how do we get to perform pleasure? We all left the room wanting more, more food for thoughts, more time with Tom. 1h30 flies by. 1 day in a studio flies by. YES Tom and I will be back together and with you on that! > To read from Thomas Stern, Philosophy and Theatre (Routledge, 2013)  I think I am understanding that when it comes to devising; at least in my head; motion comes before emotion. I need a frame and I trust that it will be then filled with emotions/interpretation. The frame will be inhabited, coloured and will genuinely come to life. Today, we made shapes and we inhabited them. Or started to. We were lucky that Elodie Frati from Moving Dynamics gave us a wonderful yoga class this morning, we shared our souls and our sweats. The day finished with a meeting with Tom, UCL Lecturer; we talked hedonism, performance and pleasure in order to prepare together the discussion that will happen tomorrow afternoon. Yes, we had a great first day back in the studio and I cannot wait for tomorrow morning again.......... Today (well, yesterday) was the last day of a creatively very rich week. Danilo Moroni joined us for the afternoon so we could create more images and a 1 minute teaser. TOYS and more to follow. How will we develop the new BIRDS section/ how will our BALL evolve/ what will the emotional journey of the performer unfold and will the audience stand up and dance with us? Next stop is Oulu, Jojo Dance Centre, in Finland. September, be here quickly! Credit Picture: Danilo Moroni  |
