Zen Zen Zo Workshop

Our new performance all started with this the Zen Zen Zo Butoh workshop.

“Zen Zen Zo is a Brisbane-based physical theatre ensemble at the forefront of contemporary performance and training in Australia. Founded in 1992, the company has continually produced edgy, innovative theatre experiences ranging from radical interpretations of classics to original new works. These have been showcased throughout Australia and Asia.” (Retrieved from http://www.zenzenzo.com/About/Artistic-Vision April 2010).

During the workshop, I experienced a whole new type of theatre, which not only gave me new theatrical skills, but it also widened my perspective about theatre and the purpose of theatre and inspired me to develop further and learn more. 

I experienced several new types of warm ups and exercises. What I found most fascinating was the Butoh walk and faces, back exercises and partner exercises. One of the first exercises we did, after being briefed about what Butoh is and simple stretches was tracing. We worked in pairs, with one person moving his/her finger, and the other following the finger with his/her nose determinedly. I found it most interesting being the follower, as I saw it as a challenge. How accurately can I follow the finger? What can I picture the finger as to improve my performance? I also found it interesting to work in pairs with new people (there were several people I didn’t know at the workshop) and see how they would move and act like. This warm up inspired us to think about using tracing in our upcoming performance and during the following classes in school, we used this technique as one of our warm ups. I think it helps you to become more comfortable with another person, as well as to explore your own body (the person moving the finger can sometimes come up with extremely challenging moves and combinations etc.) 

Another exercise I really enjoyed was the back exercises. We worked both as pairs, and individuals were we focused on being expressive with and explore our backs. This much focus on the backs was completely new to me, and I was fascinated by how much one can actually show and see from the back. It’s something completely opposite from every-day life or movie acting, and I found it very surreal and captivating. In a way it’s harder to express a message, but it is more real as it is more open to different types of interpretation- and that’s how life really works. We don’t all view things the same, and simplifying things and telling something in a more abstract way encourages different perspectives and individuality. If you like, this is a more primitive way and during the workshop we tried to convey our messages in a way that’s more similar to what animals do than what humans what do. I’ve realized that Butoh helps you to release the inner animal in you, which is extremely relieving and captivating. I think this is one of the major reasons why I enjoyed this workshop and Butoh so much, it lets me act like a wild natural animal without being judged. 

The Butoh faces was another completely new aspect to me. At first, I was a bit self conscious about making such “ugly” and grotesque faces- it’s not everyday that someone encourages you to drool like an old man and show it to a group of people. However, after I while I relaxed and I started to enjoy it. Again, I saw this new aspect as a challenge, and I wanted to be good at it. I think the faces and the walks is a major reason why Butoh differs from other types of theatre. Greek Theatre for example, as far as I know, the faces used are inspired by the feelings experienced by the character one’s playing. Butoh is partly inspired by the character (if you’re playing a specific character), but often it’s inspired by different images. These images includes texture, animals or something physically happening to your body such as ant on face, orchestra in the head etc. They are often very extreme and not normal/beautiful images but they help to create a shocking and interesting performance. 

To conclude, I was fascinated by:

How far I can go

How far I dare to go

The power and story behind Butoh

How fast I can pick up new skills

How I can use my previous dancing skills in drama

How I can affect other people

How affecting other people affects me

How stepping out of your comfort zone feels some comfortable afterwards. 

Pride Research

The Sin of Pride

Preoccupation of oneself

“The sin of pride is the sin of sins.” It was this sin that transformed Lucifer into Satan, the devil and it was also this that first led Eve to eat of the forbidden fruit. 

Pride is all about me myself and I. It’s sinful because if one values oneself above all else, including God, one is completely contradicting God’s purpose for us, which includes serving each other in love (in a non-prideful way). Pride is often seen as the “first of all sins” as many of the other sins derive from pride. In complete admiration and love of oneself, one will ignore the well being of other and lust for what one believes one rightfully deserves. It makes one unresponsive of criticism. One will resist help and assume that one knows everything already. This leads up to lust, greed, gluttony etc. It’s also one of the earliest sins we learn about in the bible (through the story of how Lucifer, the very “seal of perfection, full of wisdom and perfect in beauty” was turned into the devil, “the father of lies” (http://www.allaboutgod.com/sin-of-pride.htm)

“In general, pride is at the bottom of all mistakes” 

(Said by John Ruskin - http://thinkexist.com/quotation/in_general-pride_is_at_the_bottom_of_all_great/146361.html). 

To me, pride is extreme overconfidence. It’s a state at which the love of oneself, destroys all the other possibilities for love and salvation. I also connect pride with divas. A diva does indeed love oneself (especially ones appearance) and being confident and gorgeous is a big part of a diva’s life. I believe divas are a milder more modern version of pride. Divas are not necessarily regarded as sinful, but they are often secretly looked down upon in society (or in some cases admired for their never ending belief in oneself and beautiful appearance). This idea of divas and pride is something I might develop in my scene.

Below are some quotes that I think describe Pride well: 

"When pride comes, then comes shame; but with the humble is wisdom." (Proverbs 11:2) 
"By pride comes nothing but strife, but with the well-advised is wisdom." (Proverbs 13:10) 
"Pride goes before destruction, and a haughty spirit before a fall." (Proverbs 16:18) 

I find the part the describes pride as a extreme love for oneself especially interesting and I plan to focus on this during my scene. I want to audience to see the performers falling in love with themselves on stage. I want them to feel the desire and lust for themselves. I want them to feel uncomfortable and like the performance intrudes their private space. 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4e2CLfq0UnU This link shows a documentary on pride from the History Channel that I found very useful. It explains what Pride is and the history behind it. It states that pride made one feel like they didn’t need God, which I think describes very well why it might be on of the most sinful sins. If one doesn’t need God, one certainly doesn’t need anyone on Earth either. One believes they are perfect and are immune to any critique. It’s from this arrogance and ignorance that I think the other sins are partly developed from. Ignoring God, and believing oneself as being equal to God (like Lucifer did and therefore became Satan) is obviously extremely disrespectful and sinful.

Narcissism

When thinking about pride as a love of oneself, one can see the connection between pride and the greek myth of Narcissism. The story behind narcissism is a story about an extremely beautiful and handsome young male, named Narcissist who falls in love with his own reflection. Throughout his youth all the people he encounters, including male and females falls in love with him- but he denies all of them. Until one day, the God Nemesis, who is the Greek goddess of retributive justice (also known as the goddess of justice), cursed Narcissist, and doomed him to fall in love with his own reflection. Soon he walks by a pool of water, and falls in love with his reflection. Some myths claims he drowned while trying to reach his reflection, other states he died of starvation for not wanting to leave his reflection. No matter the ending, the moral is always the same. He died from his arrogance and love of himself. This idea is something I wish to develop further, and probably use in the final scene. The image above shows my first stimulus. It is a picture which I believes shows narcissism well. From this picture, I will ask the performers to draw a symbol. Previously, we’ve written down words that a stimulus evoked, but I want to try if it’s possible to do this in a more visual way. I want to see if this will give more abstract results, as the performers have to simplify the concept of narcissism to a symbol before processing and working with it.  

Butoh research

Butoh

Research

For our next topic and performance, we’re doing physical theatre-or more specifically, Butoh. I’ve therefore conducted research in order to understand this type of theatre. So far, this is one of the most interesting types of theaters I’ve ever seen. And I’m excited to learn more about it. 

Butoh -The dance of darkness 

“Taking the body to pieces and putting it together again.”

 Butoh is a type of physical theatre that originated in Japan after the second World War. It was in many ways a form for the victims of the bombings in Hiroshima to express the undiscussed and horrific feelings they had, which explains the grotesque side of Butoh. However, this grotesque and realistic/naturalistic side of Butoh is what I believe makes it so fascinating and exciting to watch. It’s nothing like Greek theatre or anything I’ve studied before, but that does not make it less worthy to put on stage. It has been described as “the dance of darkness” which I believe describes it well. It is a way to express the undiscussed, the forbidden and accepted such as homosexuality, murder, sins etc. Butoh is supposed to make the audience feel uncomfortable. 

It’s physical theatre so it’s therefore based on body movements and strongly relates to modern dance. The movements are extremely slow and distorted. “When you’re body wants to go forward, go the opposite way and you have Butoh.” Many movements are centered around the idea of tension (tensing a small muscles, and then releasing it again and so on). However, it’s not a strict style so it may be purely conceptual with no movements at all. The picture above shows a butoh ensemble. I find their facial expressions especially interesting (masks) as well as the use of hands. The hands are distorted and along with the white body paint they look almost supernatural. I believe this picture clearly shows how powerful a Butoh ensemble can be, and this effect is something I wish to achieve in my scene.

The first butoh piece named Kinjiki (forbidden colours) by Tatsumi Hijikata was performed at a dance festival in 1959. Based on a novel, it explored the taboo of homosexuality and paeodophilia, it ended with “a live chicken being held between the legs of Yoshito Ohno”. This shocking act caused Hijikata to be banned from the festival. 

Botuh artists traditionally perform covered in white make up with very limited clothes and no hair. I believe this is to simplify the body so that unaccepted concepts can be explored without judgements. 

The word Butoh is made up of two japanese words. Bu and Tuh. Bu means dance and Tuh means stamping on the ground. 

Directorial Concept

Directorial Concept:

In order to link all the different scenes together, create a sense of unisys, and keep each other focused, we’ve come up with a question that we aim to answer/explore through out our performance;

WHY DO WE WANT IT SO BAD?

As a director, it’s my job to guide the actors, explore and show how this question relates to pride. I can rephrase this question so that it fits pride;

Why do we become prideful? What drives us to be self-centered, self-loving and ignorant to other people? 

The main aspect of pride I’m going to focus on is falling in love with your self. I want to explore the aspect of falling in love with your own reflection, just like the story of Narcissism. In order to do this, I will incorporate water into my scene, preferable in a pool, bucket or if possible, projection. I believe the water will make it clearer for the audience to understand what’s happening as well as add several interesting and creative movements. Some movements will be directly based on Narcissism, while some will be based on a more modern take on pride.

An example of a more modern take of pride is is Divas, and this is an aspect I wish to focus on as well. To me, a diva is a extremely prideful person who disregards the needs of others, and primarily cares about her own appearance and well being. Divas are mainly females, but I want the actors to be inspired by divas when creating their movements, no matter their gender. To emphasize this aspect, I will incorporate diva inspired music for the entrance (e.g distorted catwalk music), as well as diva inspired movements (chin up, chest out, spread and distorted fingers etc.)

Through my scene, I want the audience to feel the arrogance and self-obsessed part of pride. I want the actors to show them how much they love them selves etc. 

To conclude, the main aspects of pride I want to explore is falling in love with yourself and divas. I will do this by introducing a stimulus related to this and basing the music and props used upon these aspects. 

My role as a director

My Role as a Director

Throughout the creation of our upcoming Butoh performance, all of us are going to get the chance to direct our own scene. I’m the director for the scene based on pride.

“Ultimately, theatre needs three elements: actors, play, and audience. But for theatre to actualize its potential, a person would need to impose his or her point of view that would penetrate all aspects of the production. That person is the director.” (Debra Bruch, chapter 10) 

I need to go into this role, I need to impose my view point and use the actors and set in order to vivify my viewpoint and ideas about pride. According to Debra Bruch, the director has two main roles.

To invoke a unified vision of the final production and

To guide and lead cast members to their full potential. 

In order for me to do this, I need to

Clarify what my vision of the scene is

Explain and invoke my vision to the cast members and fellow actors

Make sure my vision works on stage, if not then conduct changes that will make it successfull

Motivate the actors to ultimate actualization. 

Unify the vision and final results of costumes, set design, make up, lighting etc.

Make it WORK. 

If we were to produce a play based on a script, my first step as a director would be to analyze and visualize the script. I would then meet with the costume designers, set manager etc. in order to make sure my visions are achievable. In these meetings, I would not impose my personal view of the play but instead listen to different interpretation. This highly creative intercourse often results in a compromised, but better vision of the production. 

The directors most time-consuming task is to rehearse the actors. It’s therefore extremely important that I remain organized and focus throughout this process, especially since I only have about a week to direct my scene. This is where the scene is choreographed, blocked and rehearsed. Even though our production does not involve any lines, this stage is crucial and time-consuming as we are devising our own butoh movements. 

Pride Scene Summary

Pride Scene Summary:

Below is a summary of what I’ve planned for my scene to look like so far. It starts with a diva inspired entrance, then moves onto the encounter of the water where the theme/aspect of Narcissism is explored. The actors then fall in love with a specific part of their body, and together (based on which body part they are focusing on) they create three different “bodies”. E.g, Ryan, Ruby and Ronn focuses on shoulders, arms and hands. They move into the shape of a torso using their bodies and together they explore different movements based on the story of Narcissism. The music climaxes, and at the end everything falls down.

Part One- Entrance “The Walk of Pride” (1 min)

This is the first part of Pride the audience will see. I want them to feel the arrogance and self-obsession part of Pride. 

Start in a line, then gradually move into the “Fishy” formation with Ronn in front. -Connect by hands-to-shoulders etc, while the walk, face and hands gets more extreme (the tension builds)

Walk: Think Diva/Macho. Chin up, Chest out. Typical “I’m better than you” attitude

Face: Butoh Mask- Extreme Happiness. Mouth open in huge smile, eyes open and excited.

Hands: Slightly distorted, but still Diva inspired. Slightly bent wrists, separated fingers.   

Part Two- Image One: Narcissism (1 min)

(Remember: the story about the man who feel in love with his own reflection with the water).

This is the first encounter with the water and where you fall in love with your own reflection.  

Move forward into a semi-circle and find your position using the “Walk of Pride”.

Once in position, move down into a seating position using Dianne’s Movement. 

Once seated, the number ones move into Ruby’s Movement. The number twos move into Gail’s Movement. Remember to keep the arms+hands distorted. Face: Completely Mesmerized: Big eyes, open mouth, like you’re  falling in love with your own reflection.

Gail dips her hair into the water. Calvin and Ronn, take the lead from Gail (when she moves her head back up, splashing the water) to know when to splash the water.

Ryan, Ruby, Dianne and Lisa: Play and interact with the water. Smear it, drip it etc. Improvise! 

Part Three- Image Two: Love and Obsession with Oneself (1 min)

This is the extreme part of Obsession with Oneself and Pride. You are in LOVE with your favorite body part and not afraid to show it. 

Find your “favorite body part”. 

Show it to the audience, and move into position for the three bodies, while emphasizing your “favorite body part”. 

Start the different movements for the three bodies. (This depends on which body you’re with, work together with your partner/partners.) 

Slowly build tension. BIGGER movements, move out to the side, even more distorted arms etc.

The music comes to a climax and everything falls. Those sitting or kneeling, fall completely to the floor. Those standing, kneel down/drop down but necessarily all the way. 

Props: 

Pool of water.

Music & Multimedia:

The music for part one will be diva/catwalk inspired, but adapted for Butoh.

For part two and three, the music will be arrogant and building in tension as the scene progresses. 

The multimedia used is Garageband. Might incorporate a projection of a still image (?)

My role as a make up director

Make Up

Beside participating in the upcoming production as a director and actor, I’m also the make up director. As this is new for me, I’m sure I will acquire several new skills and techniques. I look forward to working as the make up director, as it gives me a chance to explore the visual arts as well as to develop/improve my drawing and creative skills. The make up along with the costume is especially important in a physical theatre performance as it helps to emphasize themes and develop characters. Since there’s no dialogue, the make up can help the actor to “speak” and express the character’s view points etc. Appropriate make up will also improve and increase the visual effects of a particular movement etc. By incorporating make up into a physical theatre performance, one can develop symbolism and add several layers of meaning. E.g, washing off make up on stage can symbolize cleaning the soul etc, where as adding make up on stage can symbolize deceiving appearances and false innocent etc. I wish to bring similar effects to the performance, resulting in a more interesting, vivid and fascinating overall final performance.

Below is a short summary of the role as a make up director: 

Meet with each director in order to determined their desired effects regarding make up. 

Analyze the blocking of each scene to know if any particular scene requires a specific type of make up, or lack of. 

Acquire needed materials such as foundation, body paint, pencils, make up remover etc.

Basic knowledge of fine arts- be familiar with the technique and theory required to compose, produce and apply the acquired make up.

Basic knowledge of design- be familiar with design techniques, tools etc. required to produce a plan (drawing, model, mock up etc.) 

Researches on the above in order to produce what each director wants. 

Produce sketches for each performer/actor.

Do a mock up on these sketches to make sure they will work.

Edit and carry through any changes that might be needed.

Brief the make up assistant of what will be done on the night of the performance and make sure she and any other people that can help are familiar with the desired final outcome and techniques required. 

Scene #1 Gluttony Reflection

Reflection- Gluttony

This week we started our first scene for our upcoming performance. Ron was our director and the theme was Gluttony. It was interesting to start a new topic, and also to see how my classmates are as directors, as I soon have to take on the same role. He followed a clear structure, that was easy to follow. He introduced a stimulus (video of a snake eating a pig etc) of which we then used to device a movement. He picked some of our movements (2-3 per image) which he though would fit his scene the best, and we then put these together to eventually create a complete scene. 

The first Image is “Gluttony Turning Into An Obsession”. His main aim for this image was to make the audience connect to gluttony. The second image is “Gluttony Taking Over The Body, Mind and Soul”. Here he wants to show the body and mind all contorted and irregular, showing the obsession with gluttony totally taking over the person. The third image is “Gluttony Over-Consuming the Soul, Leading to the Fall of Gluttony”. Here he wants to show that gluttony truly is a sin by portraying the disgusting, grotesque, and wrong part of it. The scene finishes with the performers acting as if they are vomiting (black organ). In this scene, everyone except Ronn will work as an ensemble to emphasize and portray different aspects of gluttony, while Ronn  is the main character affected by gluttony to the extreme. I think this character division is affective, as it will give the audience someone’s journey to follow specifically, while the ensemble help to emphasize and accentuate certain movements and aspects of gluttony. 

Through my previous dance experience, I was fairly confident movement-wise, but I found it challenging to create a movement based on a specific theme or image etc. I also feel that I have a tendency to make my movement too modern (more like modern dance steps instead of Butoh) which is something I need to work on to change, especially when I’m directing my own scene. 

It felt unusual to have a new director, and I now see how big of an influence the director has on the final piece, as well as the rehearsal environment. I believe the fact that we will work with different directors every week will add a new dimension to our rehearsal, make more varied and unpredictable-which can be either turn out to be a  benefit or a drawback. 

Make Up Research

Make Up:

In order to work successfully as a make up artist in our upcoming production I conducted some research. During a previous dance show, I got in contact with a professional make up artist and I used this as my starting point for my research. These pictures are all taken from precious dance shows I took part in outside of school. The list of materials and techniques used are based on my own observations and memory of the process. 

Materials used:

Stencil

Fake Eyelashse

Glue

Body Paint

Basic Techniques:

Use a squared shape stencil and a sponge with moistured body paint to create the yellow square around the eye. Make sure the paint is spread evenly

Estimate and measure the fake eyelash so that it’s 

as long as the actual eyelid above the lashes. Cut it if necessarily.

 Apply glue to the fake eyelid. Then gently place it above the actual eyelashes.

Keep the eyes closed for a couple of minutes to let the glue dry.

Lastly use the same body paint to apply the lip gloss. 

Materials used:

Stencil

Green and Blue body paint

Powder glitter

Techniques:

 Place the stencil on the cheek, hold it steady.

 Use a sponge to apply the green body paint to one side of the stencil. 

 Use another sponge to apply the blue body paint to the other side of the stencil. See picture.

 Dip a moist sponge in glitter powder and use this to apply glitter around the colours on the cheek. 

The second picture required less materials and is easier to create once the stencil is made. It would therefore be easier for us to use this techniques, as it’s quick, effective and will look the same on everyone. However, it’s not very detailed and I believe one could achieve much more interesting concept and looks using body art.

The first image requires more materials and is a little trickier to recreate. However, I believe it creates a more affective and interesting overall look. I especially find the lips interesting, as they help to emphasize the colour used and it creates a more complete overall look. This technique, painting the lips as the same colour used in other areas, is something I wish to include for our final production. 

The make up artist that created these designs is called Kat (??) and for more research I looked up her website www.catscreation.co.uk. Here I found several impressive body art designs that inspired me to try out some by myself. 

I found these two particularly interesting. I’m planning to base the designs for the our final performance on similar designs as these. 

Make Up Trials

In order to see if the make up I had planned was going to work or not, I have to create a mock up.

From looking at other people's work (e.g. work- See previous journal entry regarding make up) I knew basically what type of looking I wanted.

Base for Everyone: 

White Butoh make up all over the body (except what's covered by clothes)

-Use a moist sponge to apply th

e white body paint. 

-The actors can do this themselves in the performance night in order to save time.

Details:

Depending on each person's sin (which sin they are in charge of directing, e.g mine is pride) I will create a pattern that relates to their sin.

Possible patters:

-Colours

-Symbols

-Texture (e.g b

ody paint, fake eye lashes, mud etc.)

I choose to use different colours to individualize each person based on their sin. I will also create a slightly different look/patterns in order to make it more interesting.

Together with the group, we came up with these colours for each sin. They are based on our personal perception of the sins, as well as the designated colours for each sin according to http://wiki.answers.com/Q/What_colours_are_for_the_seven_deadly_sins. 

Gluttony: Orange 

Sloth: Blue

Envy: Green

Lust: Red

Anger: Black

Greed: Yellow

Pride: Purple

From previous creative projects such as paintings, dance, poster making etc. I've learnt that I find it easier to create something creative. using the technique trial and error. In other words, you try it until it feels right! So, in order to create my designs, I tried doing body art on myself. 

I started off by trying simple patterns on my hand using a liquid eyeliner. 

I used one purple liquid eye liner and one green liquid eye liner. For this trial, I copie

d the design from another artist. (see previous post on "Make Up Research"). I wanted to make sure I could master the technique first before I went on to creating my own designs. At fist it was fairly challenging, especially to get the lines smooth, but I got soon more confident and it became easier. I'm quite pleased with

 the final look, and I wish 

to incorporate a similar feel/atmosphere to the final look.

After practicing the technique, I went on to creating my own designs using trial and error. But this time, I tried it on my face.  

Once again, I used liquid eye liner. It was a bit harder to 

draw it on my face, rather on my hand, but I think it's much more effective on the face. 

I like the ide

a of using twirls for the look of pride (e.g the one above my left eye) as I think they look aesthetically pleasing and fairly self obsessed/prideful. 

I added purple lipstick to create a bolder and more chocking look. I plan to use the same colour for the details/coloured parts and the lipsticks for each person. 

After this, I decided to try an even bolder look (seeing as this is stage body art, it really has to be extreme in order to be seen and influential). To do

 this, I added more colored parts. For the final performance, I plan to add small details/colored parts on the face, arms, neck, chest, back and hands. 

I believe this looks better. Remember- our bodies will be painted white and therefore the colored details will hopefully stand out more. 

Finally, I tried this look with a Butoh face to see how the audience would actually experience this look. 

Here one can really see the final look. I really like how the somewhat charming/smooth make up clashes with the butoh face, and this is something I believe relates well to the idea of Butoh. By not having "grotesque" make up (e.g wrinkles, eye bags etc.) the grotesqueness in the movements and faces is really emphasized. With a normal face, we will look somewhat normal (but hopefully creative), but once we start moving, the make up helps to bring out the ugliness and grotesqueness that Butoh dancer aims to arouse by providing a contrast (make up vs. ugly movements & faces).

I'm fairly pleased with the designs I came up with, and I plan to use a very similar look for pride. However, for the other sins, I plan to alternate the colored detailed parts slightly (e.g more curves, less curves, straight lines, thicker lines etc.) in order to create a more creative look. 

Scene #2 Sloth Reflection

After finishing the scene of Gluttony, we moved on to Sloth. 

Ruby started her workshop by defining sloth: 

"There are two meaning in Sloth:

-Sloth can be an attitude of procrastination; it can be the kind of laziness which shows disregard for the importance of others. Sloth is putting physical comfort before spiritual work.

-Sloth is spiritual laziness which is a way of disrespecting God. Sloth means not being diligent in spiritual matters, like neglecting daily prayers, never reading the Bible or practicing devotions, and not paying attention at church. Sloth is the act of not feeding the soul." (R. Kan 2010)

After we understood the definition, she showed us her first stimulus- a song. 

The song had a very repetitive beat and tune. It reminded me off sleepless nights, and lying in bed for hours and hours but not either, being able to go to sleep, or not being bothered to get out of bed. I found it fairly intimidating as it's so repetitive and irksome in a way- it reminded me very much of the sin sloth. 

Together we brainstormed and wrote down different words that the song evoked. We were then asked to move in a way that represented the words we came up to the music. Since I have previous dance experience from outside of school, movement is usually my strength. Despite this, I still find it fairly challenging to move in a Butoh way. In dance, several movements are fast, bold, exciting etc. and they are often 

designed mainly to look impressive/excelling etc. In Butoh it's the opposite and it's this I'm finding challenging. I often find myself wanting to do more movements bolder, faster, different etc. instead of grotesque, slow, meaningful etc. 

After the song, Ruby showed us two other stimiluses (how do you spell this?) in the form of images. 

 

I find both of these fairly provocative, disturbing and inspirational. The first image relates to struggling, fighting/battle etc. while the second image partly represents what happens to a person that commits the sin of sloth. Once again, we were asked to move in a way that related to these two images. 

Finally the director, Ruby, combined the different movements we came up with in order to finalize the blocking and eventually the whole scene.

Make Up Trials 2

To make sure everything runs smoothly on the night of the performance, and to test the designs, we conducted a make up trials with the actual make up tools and designs on the performers. 

These pictures shows ruby with parts of her make up. 

As planned, the base is white butoh make up, and then blue twirls were drawn by hand on top. I think it turned out adequate, but I want to make the design more interesting and I plan to do this by making the blue lines more “wavy” and adding more “twirls”. I also need to practice on making my hand steady when drawing the blue lines, so that they are smooth and even. 

These pictures shows parts of Calvin’s make up.

I like the green colour and I think it goes well with the white butoh make up.

However, as Calvin does a lot of  back movements (especially in the introduction scene), I’m planning to slightly change his design and only have the green patterns on the back and shoulders. I will keep a similar atmosphere of the design (green and inspired by leaves to represent his scene envy) but make it more bold and less feminine. By doing this, i hope that the make up will help to enhance and emphasize his back movements. 

These picture shows part Ryan’s make up.

I had originally planned to use a square like pattern in yellow for his body art, but during 

this trial I realized that it didn’t work. 

First of all, the colour yellow is too soft and too hard to see on the white base. I tried to solve this by adding black lines alongside the yellow line, as seen in the second picture. But I think it looks messy and too different from the other's make up. This colour needs to be changed to something bolder and darker that can be seen on top of the white base.

Secondly, the square like pattern is too modern and too divergent from the other’s

 make up. The other designs are smoother and relates more to nature, whereas this one relates more to technology and modern times. 

To solve this, I will change his body art to something that’s more similar to Calvin’s. They both use their backs a lot during the performance, and both of them will perform shirtless which makes a back tattoo/pattern a much more suitable option. 

Yoga

In order to become a Butoh dancer and put on a successful performance, I not only needed to learn how to choreograph and improvise butoh/physical theatre style movements, work as an ensemble, work as a director, work as a make up director, design and create a multi-media show complementing the movements, but I also needed to increase my physical fitness.

To do this, the drama group and I started learning Yoga. Before every rehearsal, and one time a day, we did a yoga move called the sun salutation. The picture below shows how to do the sun salutation. 

The picture above was retrieved from Gina Vivinetto's blog at http://ginavivinetto.files.wordpress.com/2009/04/sunsalutation.jpg. 

By doing Yoga I've:

- Become more flexible

- Increased my physical endurance

- Gained more knowledge and interest in Yoga

I'm now physically able to perform Butoh for 30 min straight two nights in a row to the best of my current ability. 

Pride: Changes along the way

Props: 

Original Idea: Ideally, I had planned to use a big bowl of water as a prop in my scene. The water would help to emphasize narcissism, and help the audience to understand that the actors were falling in love with their own reflection. I’d planned to use a round glass bowl with a diameter of approximately 1 meter filled with water. See the picture below for reference. 

Problem: However, I was not able to find such a bowl and therefore I had to change my plans. I had planned for the actors to interact with the water (dropping it on themselves, flicking it, smearing it on themselves etc.) and therefore I had to look for a prop the could fulfill the above functions. 

Changes/Solutions: My first thought was to use confetti. I would create a “pool” of confetti on the floor down stage, replacing the bowl of water and then the actors could interact with the confetti, just like they would have with the water. But before I went to buy the confetti, I looked at what we already had in the drama apartment. There I found a piece of silver shiny cloth from our previous production- Agamemnon. I tried it moving with it and it worked really well. The texture of the fabric is very shiny and glitters almost like water. Additionally, it’s flows and and falls very nicely. When dropping it from a height, it falls very slowly and almost promiscuous when looking at it in an abstract way. I really liked this aspect of it, and therefore I choose to incorporate it into my scene. 

The picture below shows how the prop looked on stage during the dress rehearsal. It picks up the light beautifully, it's easy to interact with and it matches with the multimedia in the background. 

Entrance:

Original Idea: I had planned for us to enter in a “V” shape, with one person in the front and the rest following behind forming a “V”.

Problem :  After stepping back and viewing the entrance, we realized that this looked a bit dull and unoriginal. 

Changes/Solution :After discussing this problem with my drama group, I decided to change the positions to the ones on the below, with one X representing one person.

 There will be 3 pairs, consisting of one boy and one girl each. The girls will walk in front pridefully, and the boys will hold them, almost as if they are pushing them forward. This part shows how pride can be caused by external factors as the boys are pushing and overpraising the girls, e.g proud parents constantly telling their kids how outstanding they are, or media portraying a person as a super star etc. 

I will enter holding the cloth without a partner. I will stretch my arms out, creating a cross with my body, and then lay the cloth over my arms so that it covers the cross. The cross is meant to symbolize religion. By putting the cloth which is used in a way to show narcissism over the cross, one of the ideas I’m hoping to make the audience aware of is that pride is partly when you put yourself above God, and believe that you are greater than everything else. So to conclude, by changing my entrance, I’ve now added two more connotations to the movements. One, pride is partly caused by external factors as seen when the boys praise and flatter the girls. Two, part of pride is when you put yourself above God, which can be seen when the cloth is placed over the cross. 

The picture below shows what the new entrance looked during the dress rehearsal. 

 

Pride: Snapshots from the Dress Rehearsal

Part One: Entrance

Here the cross is seen more clearly. By using my face, I’m trying to emphasize how prideful I am and that I’m putting myself above God. 

This movement is called “fast twitching”. We’re holding both our hands, and twitching and moving the hands up and down in a fairly chaotic way. 

This movement is called “slow twitching” and it’s just like the previous movement except much slower. The sharp contrast between the fast and slow movement adds a visual effect that helps to create a fascinating choreography. 

Part Two: Image One, Narcism 

This is a synced movement, which we all are supposed to do at the same time. We step over our hands and eventually sit down. For all these last three movements, we’ve hold our hands together. By holding our hands, we are “locked” into using only a limited amount of movements and this is meant to symbolize how one can be “locked” by his/her sin. 

Part Three: Image Two, Love and Obsession with Oneself

We are all improvising and doing different movements on the stage, however the concept behind them is all the same- Narcism. Furthermore, all our faces are the same in order to create a sense of unison and ensemble work.  

Finally we create different “bodies” depending on which body part we’ve fallen in love with. We are using different levels and partner work to make it look more interesting.