The following review is courtesy of Emily Johnson, Director of catalyst dance
I kept thinking about being on a bus. During "Daylight (for Minneapolis)" by Sarah Michelson on Sunday night, I sat on the constructed risers built on the stage. Sitting there, face forward, with more space and more audience members behind than in front felt conspicuous. Someone near me wondered outloud if the audience members on the balcony knew more than we did, he questioned whether we were supposed to use these seats at all. On a bus, you choose your seat, sit and wait. The vehicle (space) you are in moves you physically from one place to another. Riders get on, get off - and each one, as they walk or get hoisted up those couple of steps to the main bus aisle - provides those already seated with a chance to look (scrutinize? judge?). Some people get on the bus looking down, pick a seat, pull out a book and wait with the rest. Some get on and recognizing someone else already seated, shout hello and begin a distanced communication - disrupting or enhancing (depending on how you take it) the ride. Some riders are drunk and belligerent, some you hope don't pick the empty seat near you, some you get up for so they can have your seat, some strangers you begin to know by sight because the bus route doesn't change and your schedules don't that much either. As each rider chooses how they enter and act on the bus they change the fragile dynamic built amongst those who have already ridden blocks or miles together. You don't get much of a chance to relate to fellow bus riders - inhibitions or habits or shortage of time all play a role in that. And as you sit, taking in the oncoming passengers or ignoring them completely, you have the option to look out the window. You do not; however have the option to stop exactly when you want in order to take in a scene more completely. You have the few seconds it takes to pass something by - someone crying on the sidewalk, a kid running after a grown-up, a tree, a particular garden. You have a limited view, it is obstructed by other passengers and by your original choice of seat.
It was similar last night at the Walker. One audience member, growing impatient and perhaps feeling conspicuous as well - stood up, turned around and yelled to us all, "This is ridiculous. You are all sitting here, waiting for the show to start?" We could call her the belligerent bus rider. We had all made our way to these seats, passed huge drawings of people we recognized or didn't, and passed girls and a Mickey revealed along the buildings edges or crooks - or they revealed the edges and crooks - (depending on how you take it). Some of us realized there really was no official 'start,' still, we looked behind, we grew impatient, some got up to look over the big wall that was the back of our seating. Those on the balcony were restless too, I could see them and hear them. The talking was loud and I admit, I felt disloyal. I felt like turning around to catch a glimpse of one of the girls, posturing herself in a position that obscured her face and her individual identity (all girls were dressed the same, save the differing patterns printed onto their nude leotards) was disloyal to the huge effort it must have taken to design and construct the seating I was in and the wall I was facing. It is my habit, when sitting on a bus or in a theater - to sit facing forward and more or less still. Here is the crux of this particular work. I believe this piece was made to encourage us to look/experience our surroundings (in this case, the Walker and the McGuire Theater) in a more thoughtful way than we are accustomed. I believe it was made in order that we would have to face our habits. Built within this mission, however, were barriers to the exact goal. We could not sit or stand or walk as the more-or-less passive people we usually are. Even to sit and admire - really admire (or hate) the structure or the referencing of the afore mentioned girls doing the afore mentioned postures along the wall of windows facing Hennepin meant that you were missing something somewhere else. We were made to decide whether sitting still or getting up to look were our best option. It made many uncomfortable - which in fact, reassures the very habits we use to protect ourselves and increases inhibition. Partly because of this increased inhibition, “Daylight” did not encourage IMMEDIATE exploration, I think most people were perfectly settled on finding the 'stage,’ simply passing by the scenes they encountered en route. I would have liked "Daylight" to create a mad scene in which people were running about trying to catch at least a small part of everything, but the scale (those portraits were huge) and the pace (the posturing was slow) created, instead the fairly normal scene within a museum/performance space which is of a quiet politeness.
“Daylight” did completely thwart expectations - which is, of course, an exploration all its own. Coming into a theater or a gallery, we expect we will have the chance to see/experience everything that we paid for. 'Good' audience members are purposefully taking time to immerse themselves in something outside of their personal, everyday experience. This is perhaps what Sarah Michelson enjoys most - creating a place in which you cannot escape your personal, everyday habits. If some of your habits make you uncomfortable, it might be difficult to watch a performance and if you expect an easy time, perhaps Sarah Michelson’s performances are exactly what you need to watch. We are all looking for something better - better sneakers, a better job, a better place to live…and Sarah created a piece that drums up the inescapable feeling that we are missing something, that there is something better happening just over there - where we cannot get to or see. So you sit - and become obsessed with what you cannot have even while there is plenty happening right before you. You question yourself - did you pick the right seat, did you come to the right show? You get so worried about "getting enough" and to me, that points out that the self induced importance we place on what we actually see/experience is based on what we value. If we value 'getting it all' we won't ever be satisfied and if this piece is supposed to reference the architecture of Herzog and deMerron, it does it best by pointing out that we cannot take it all in at once. One has to walk the halls, ride the elevator, be on the outdoor balcony at 5am, then 5pm to note the changing light…All of this outside of the art that happens within, on and around the physical building. We are comfortable with the notion of exploring a building (even if we never actually take full initiative to do it on our own) because a building is a static thing, it does not move (of its own free will), does not sweat, does not shit. Right - the unbeautiful ways that we are human are what make us the most challenging to explore which is why the staging of the humans (rather than the staging of the building) in "Daylight (for Minneapolis)" was most intriguing.
I sat above the 'normal stage' (the risers took up maybe 3/4 of the stage space) and watched four dancers squeeze themselves and their space eating dancing onto a square footage that seemed much too small for them. Sarah Michelson had literally reduced the theater and I thought of the thousands of choreographers who, unable to afford a space to their liking or unable to be presented make use of their lofts or a storefront, or a theater that's just too small for them. I wondered why this piece called "Daylight," that utilizes both architectural findings and a very long, narrow dancing space couldn't be performed in say, an alley. I say "Daylight" would look beautiful in an alley; however, as odd as it sounds, an alley would make "Daylight" too accessible. And this is where I admire what Sarah Michelson knows about humanity and what she tries to usurp. We (ah ha) expect strange things to happen when we watch dance in an alley and we assume we might not be comfortable. Sarah Michelson needed this beautiful, fancy theater with an amazing spectrum of lighting options and sound quality to lay her base. Her base is recognizably dance but the way that the light was made to create walls, to add spectacle, to illuminate the space between the floor and ceiling and the purposefully empty seats is how she generates a new form. The way she took a recognizable theater and changed where the walls were and where we sat is how she stirred our brains into seeing that dance and performance is vital - on stage, on sidewalks, and in alleys. The concept of seeing, the concept of perception, the concept of want, the concept of beauty and functionality - they are all placed in your hands during "Daylight" and you either hold them preciously as though they were fragile, form them into something useful for you, or drop them on your way out the door.
All this concept and what delighted me the most was a Mickey coming onto the stage and holding her big, oversized head in her hands. The Mickey made sense. As on a bus, or in this piece, the characters make sense just by being there. It would be the weirdest thing to be on a bus and have no characters enter, have no one ride it with you. Mickey entering made it seem as though this piece were no longer confined to either the 'stage,' the inside of the Walker, or Minneapolis itself. "Daylight" suddenly occupied a larger space in our minds. And maybe because in actuality I know the image of Mickey more so than I do any of the dancers, I felt acknowledged and I felt a tenderness - both toward the Mickey with her face in her hands and from the piece "Daylight" itself.
The dancing. The fancy and beautifully executed rigorous, often violent dancing of the main quartet allowed the last solo to be one of the sweetest moments in theater I have ever seen. When "Daylight" seemed over enough to warrant the resumed chatter and exiting of many audience members, one woman, in the dark, back corner of the 'stage' began referencing the dancing the quartet had executed the past hour. I truly thought she was a dancer in the audience who felt compelled to get up and show off for the friends she was with - repeating movement she remembered because she was inspired or because she wanted to make fun of it (I have friends who do this). But no, in an unglorified way (the most unglorified of the whole evening) she made dancing make sense. She took what we had experienced through the movement of the quartet and saudered it down to the essential. Combined with one of the sweetest songs you may ever hear, it's like it illuminated within you every opportunity you have ever missed - in a way that made you think - "I will never again miss the opportunity to run, arms outstretched in a field! " or "I will never again miss the opportunity to let what I happen to have the fortune/misfortune to see/experience/catch in this life affect me to my deepest core!" When I had arrived to my seat an hour before I noted the built in doorless doorway in this constructed makeshift wall and I thought, "they must have left that open for a reason." When that space, that wall, and that light emanating from it literally engulfed that dancer - it made me think that we really can reimagine places and reimagine each other. The home you grew up in can hold a beautiful memory perfectly intact, a lone brick wall from a knocked down factory can offer you a place to lean against, a newly redesigned museum and newly built theater can offer a million opportunities just by existing and the next person that walks up those stairs onto the bus is much more than a stranger to you - we are all much more than we seem at initial glance (in real life or portrait).
I went to Sarah’s performance 9/16 and found it boring and miserable. I love art and am open to just about everything, but the repetiveness of the songs before the show in the art gallery was TOO much and interesting for about five minutes. The performance itself was the same thing over and over and over again, with very little deviance from the dance or song. I won’t go into much detail because the comments after the show and the scowls on the faces told me enough. We spoke with at least ten other couples/groups, none of which gave a positive comment. Many were shaking their heads while walking out and other mocked the performace. I found this opening performance for the new theater more of a desperation act. The only benefit I found from going to the Walker that evening was the gen of a new resturant with a killer view. So inspite of my aggitation with the whole performance before, during and after, the drink at the bar and the walk out on the patio was worth the hour of boredom in the theatre.
Comment by Terri — 9/21/2005 @ 11:11 am
I enjoyed hearing your experience of the performance Emily. I appreciate how you bring your conceptual flights, and those of Michelson’s, back to bodily experience. “I will never again miss the opportunity to run, arms outstretched in a field!” I am glad that you were able to make this connection between thought and feeling. Perhaps I would have been able to had I another chance to view the work. As I related in my response to Gulgun my experience was unfortunately more like Terri’s above.
Thanks for your reply as well Terri. I think we are often afraid to relate that we did not enjoy a work because we fear we will seem unsophisticated. I too talked with many after the show who were less than impressed. I’ll repeat what I said to Gulgun. We need to address a schism. On one side we have a few aesthetic olympians who, like Emily, have the desire to reach way out to grab a work, while on the other side we have, I assume a majority, who had wished they stayed home. Aren’t we back to some of problems we had with Ballet? There are those who can perform the complicated, in this case intellectual steps, and those who cannot. How do we balance the need to experiment, to push boundaries way out to the breaking point, without actually breaking our relationship with our audiences. These people who attend the Walker events are as sophisticated as we are going to find. And if they can’t reach the piece? Well if anyone has any thoughts on how to address this problem of balancing experimentation with accessibility leave a comment.
Comment by MO — 9/22/2005 @ 11:00 am
Terri and Mo -
I am happy to have the chance to discuss this work - and this issue of accessibility/meaning/sophistication. I think not liking a work is as valid and as sophisticated as liking one. Especially, of course, if the reasons for dislike are strong, purposeful, thought-out and articulated. The reasons for pure dislike are as essential to define as pure joy (in watching a performance piece anyway).
I know when I make dances I hope everyone likes them. Absolutely. Of course, I can’t control that and can only stick to my vision with as much integrity as I can; absolutely taking into account audience and meaning.
I believe the choreographer of “Daylight” stuck to her intentions and vision - and she did make a sticky work that resulted in alot of divergent reactions. I’m glad it wasn’t easy to watch - and I don't mean to say that I think accessibility is equal to ease. I do think a few more clues to audiences during "Daylight" would have lessened confusion/boredom/dislike; but maybe lessening that confusion/boredom/dislike wasn’t this choreographer’s goal. I enjoyed trying to find out what her goal was.
As far as "aesthetic olympianism" - here are a couple of things that kept me engaged during the show (whether I liked it or not): watching other audience members; trying to see or imagine what was behind me; trying to determine when and where architecture was referenced; wondering how she made up her movement; wondering why the dancers looked angry; wondering how much building the set cost; trying to find out why the first song was 15 minutes instead of 4; waiting to see if the movement dynamics would change; trying to determine why the lighting equipment was set up the way it was; trying to find out where the music was coming from. It seems to me that these are all simple, kind of mundane things to be wondering about during a dance piece - but rather than taking this as distraction or boredom - the fact that I was curious or confused about so many things as I watched made me think deeper and deeper about what it was I was watching and why. I enjoyed that process and based on that, look forward to seeing more of Michelson's work.
Comment by Emily — 9/22/2005 @ 10:30 pm
This divide in the audience that several people are commenting on--between those who “get it” and those who don’t--interests me. Isn’t this an odd way to talk about art? Imagine using these phrases in front of a painting by Constable (for example). No one would refer to “getting” a Constable. You would simply talk about whether you liked it or not. It's also difficult to imagine viewers competing in their ability to "get" Constable. Yet this is how we act in front of contemporary art. Certainly, a lot of contemporary art is informed by concepts, but art--for me, anyway--must have something to do with the unconscious, must escape from being "gotten," must affect an organ other than the brain. Why, then, do we spend so much time discussing whether we "got" the art or not? Emily may be an aesthetic Olympian, but her review is very personal, all about what she perceived and how she felt--not about what she "got."
On a related subject, Gulgun writes that "like is not a relative term" for "Daylight"; MO goes on to rephrase "like" as "enjoy." I think there's a difference. Gulgun's talking about the multiplicity of viewpoints and paths through "Daylight"--or, as Judith Brin Ingber put it, the lack of a "queenly" view. Simply, there is no angle from which to definitively judge "Daylight"; this judgment is the "liking" Gulgun refers to (correct me if I'm wrong, Gulgun). The lack of a "correct" viewpoint disarms criticism, and this frustration may be what Joan Acocella is feeling. Read her review of Sarah Michelson's performance and you'll see that she's been stifled and doesn't like it one bit; the work's inherent resistance to judgment makes it, in her opinion, hostile to the audience and impervious to the critic.
Yet if the destruction of the illusion of the queenly view is all it takes to invalidate criticism, then the critical profession is in serious trouble. I say illusion because even when there is one correct way to look at what's on stage, everyone in the audience has a different experience. Critics need to cope with postmodernism and move on; this is what Tere O'Connor means, I think, in his attack on Acocella. So we are not the center of the universe; what now? How can we continue to be relevant?
This applies to audiences as well. So we can't see God's own view of the stage; we'll just have to live with what we can see. Not that I think Sarah Michelson's piece was unambiguously enjoyable. I liked it partly because I was in a playful mood at the time and because audience members around me were saying funny things. But let me suggest that unambiguously enjoyable might not be what Michelson is aiming for. Michelson's prepared for some of the audience to be frustrated. Along with critics and audiences, performers must get used to the destruction of old paradigms, which means that the performers no longer pretend they can control our reactions, our moods. No, MO, the emperor is not wearing any clothes, but at least the emperor knows that.
All this theoretical la-ti-da won't convince anyone who didn't enjoy the performance that it was a good performance. I liked it--and I mean that in the most personal and capricious sense. I appreciated that, while Michelson thwarted the usual theatrical expectations, she didn't then attempt to impose another order on us; Michelson let us be ourselves, without, I think, judging our paths through the experience. More than that, though, I enjoyed the movement. Like Vanessa, I was fascinated by all the effort on stage, by the gold chains on the women's dresses, by the swooping arms, the precise positions. If Michelson were a charlatan (as some seem to suggest), she wouldn't bother with all that.
As Vanessa, Gulgun, and Emily point out, "Daylight" animated the new Walker with movement and intention. Here's an experiment to try. Go back to the Walker tomorrow and look for the girls, the Mickeys, the women in gold chains, the giant portraits, the sweating men. You'll find them in corners, staring out or in windows, standing still or dancing quietly. The performance is still going on.
Lightsey
Comment by Lightsey — 9/23/2005 @ 7:22 am
I enjoy how Lightsey differentiates between criticism and judgment. One is crucial, the other stifling. While "like" and "dislike"( and the people who are attaching those words to their experience) each aim to be the more correct stance (look at how those who disliked "Daylight" claim others' dislike as proof of their own and look at how those of us who 'liked' it are going to great lengths to explain why) the thought that there is a "lack of a correct viewpoint" should be liberating rather than threatening or frustrating as Lightsey suggests it may be to Joan Acocella. Afterall, defining a piece through perception and feeling (I think) is an excellent way to go (and SO much more interesting to read as a piece of 'criticism' than a recounted re-view of what happened on or off stage, as many reviews tend to be). And when I say "defining dislike is as essential as defining pure joy" I mean that even if you use the words "I hated it" or "I don’t get it" or "I didn't like it" as your path to a deeper determination of what kinds of feelings, thoughts or neural pathways the experience triggered for you, then you get somewhere in terms of your relationship to experiences and the contemporary dance field actually gets somewhere in terms of its relevance to life. Let's use this as a way to find our criticisms!
On Sept. 20 John Rockwell reviewed "Breaking Ground, A Dance Charrette" in the NY Times It was a performance last weekend in Brooklyn involving 5 different choreographers, one outdoor public space and five days for each respective choreographer to create a 5-10 minute dance piece. I was at the same performance Rockwell was at.
In his review, after noting that he had received word from the publicist for "Breaking Ground" that though the performers would "welcome a dialogue on their discoveries," due to the experimental nature of the event that it "doesn't lend itself to traditional review" he stated "There are events in all disciplines all over town that are clearly works in progress. But to court enormous journalistic attention and then to flinch is not playing by the rules. So too late, guys: here comes your usual hardheaded, profoundly unsympathetic New York Times dance review."
While I completely agree that any public work of art is open to criticism, (hopefully, the kind of criticism I describe above), I do not understand this stance of 'critic vs. art maker,' or as MO and Terri suggest 'artist vs audience member'. We all obviously rely on each other. (The review he went on to write wasn't really criticism or a description of his experience, it very plainly and simply explained what happened. Somehow this made me think of Lightsey's comment that "the critical profession is seriously in trouble.")
As in Michelson's piece, we (audiences, critics, presenters, performers, funders) need to assume that the artist is making the piece they intend to (whether they spend 1 year or 1 day on it; intentions, of course then, varying greatly). It is then that the piece can be critiqued, seen and interpreted (by all above populations) with respect. It is with this respect and knowledge then that audiences, critics etc. need not be frustrated with 'not getting it' or 'not liking it.' Instead, they can see their experience as a valid part of a work, it's viewing, and it's life - no not only valid, but crucial - and use their experience to critique, talk of, and engage with that same work.
Comment by Emily — 9/23/2005 @ 1:38 pm
Hi, thanks for the replies Emily and Lightsey. I apologize if my language is heated or accusatory. I get worked up about this stuff. I respect your opinions as I respect Michelson as a seeking artist. Almost always it is I who am trying to get friends and relatives to engage with art and to think about it beyond stereotypical reactions. More times than I can count I have gone to a concert and had a deeply moving experience while those who I am with simply discard the experience as baffling, inaccessible, or just plain bad. The reason I may sound harsh is because I am desperately seeking an answer to some questions.
Why would anyone, who is not a professional artist or critic, care to engage with a work that seems to have no relevance to their lived experience? What is in it for them?
We ask of our audiences, as Emily states:
“As in Michelson's piece, we (audiences, critics, presenters, performers, funders) need to assume that the artist is making the piece they intend to (whether they spend 1 year or 1 day on it; intentions, of course then, varying greatly). It is then that the piece can be critiqued, seen and interpreted (by all above populations) with respect. It is with this respect and knowledge then that audiences, critics etc. need not be frustrated with 'not getting it' or 'not liking it.' Instead, they can see their experience as a valid part of a work, it's viewing, and it's life - no not only valid, but crucial - and use their experience to critique, talk of, and engage with that same work.”
My god I couldn’t agree more. I wish people would do this with art. But the reality is that, in general, they don’t. We don’t ask this of other professions. We don’t ask the patient who is a victem of malpractice to try to respect the intentions of the doctor. If we go to a restaurant and the food is rotten, we complain, rather than engage with what the artist, or the cook, was trying to do. If the cook comes out and explains that he intended it that way and we should trust him then we leave the restaurant never to return. Which is what I’m afraid has already happened to contemporary art.
So again:
Why would anyone, who is not a professional artist or critic, care to engage with a work that seems to have no relevance to their lived experience? What is in it for them?
Respectfully
MO
Comment by MO — 9/24/2005 @ 11:05 am
a dance of words. emily wants to dance and mo does not. emily is in and mo is out. they are both in. mo in her outness is in. she is living a different genre from emily. emily thinks that there is no out, only many ways to be in. they are passing trains in the night. mo is a guardian. mo holds sacred the contracts of social life. mo hears that the audience must respect the artists intention and wonders how the artist respects audience intention. mo is afraid that michelson means disintegration, the end of cooperation and commerce, the end of artist and viewer, the end of art. we dance in the dark after some people have left. unable to see each other. unable to view the whole picture. only bits and pieces put together… emily is a guardian of the individual viewpoint. it is valid that people walk away skulking quietly through the shadows carefully avoiding the dancing. valid even if none can see validity. a coda. if all viewpoints are good and mo’s viewpoint is that mo has a bad viewpoint does this make her viewpoint bad or good?
Comment by jesusO — 9/25/2005 @ 3:54 pm
experience was great, conventions/anticonventions were great, walkouts were great, addressing the female body was great,
the gaze was great; who’s gaze? the audience, the audience after the show the audience to the ‘other place they could not see’ the audience looking at girls bodies objectified, and then dead, the girls who were not gazing at us, the curator of the walker gazing at sarah michelson (x200?), also great.
the posh ‘have you been swimming,’ the posh mickey, the posh theatre space, the posh cocktail dresses and loose/wet button downs, the posh audience members, the mad posh audience members, were great.
the interrogation of young ladies and their constructed selves via mickey[media], via an audience, via lindsay lohan and the long saddened mickey of the 1950s (see line about the woman below) was great
the post show was great
the women in the main walker hallway in a dress that revealed her belly button and she was gazing off and she was 70 after the show was great
the conversations since have been great.
oh yeah and the pause of their big posh dancing, then they slowly looked back, was great,
when the audience was tricked into looking away from the dancers because the lights went down and the dancers were hugging, because it was not worth looking through the dark to see two men hugging, was great.
oh yeah dancing, alright, but in the surroundings very great
how many senses do you use to see dance? how many senses do you use to eat? or have sex? or feel alive?
why restrict them to visual senses of movement? you have to go about 30 more steps here, but start with that, then sound, then taste, then your long term, short term memory, then your sense of irony.. .. . .. .. .. or economy.
Comment by elliott — 10/4/2005 @ 2:17 am