another sensation

Response to MOS by Ioanna Paraskevopoulou 

@Pavlos Vrionides

Dear Contemporary Dance,

Thank you for the space you provided me yesterday. Thank you for offering something that I don’t need to think of. Something that I don’t need to process further.  And don’t get me wrong I believe the force that contemporary dance has of making one think, process, digest, associate, reverberate, connect, re-imagine is one of the biggest values of it. And there is a reason for it. Both individually and as a collective. I believe in the space that contemporary dance makes us contemplate in and the effects of it. But this time I left the theater room with a sense of lightness that I don’t feel often. This is also contemporary dance. Or what is it even? Profoundly with contemporary dance I experience the requirement as an audience to process a lot. Even though sensing and experiencing is one of the key elements of contemporary dance and making. I find that often the performances require a lot more from the audience. I find that contemporary dance gives space but it also requires a lot from its experiencers. Because I feel that there is a sense of contemporary dance that wants to be understood… and maybe understood in a specific logic of understanding or making sense. But yesterday’s performance had something else. The ‘else’ came from not only what was happening but how it was made. 

I was left with a choreography that was not representing a statement, issue or a narrative which made me just watch, just follow. It created another sensation. I knew exactly what I was watching, with ease. Yet I was feeling many things, many different things, but I was not stuck analyzing. I find myself enjoying this refreshing after-feeling and I appreciate it. I appreciate the lightness in the theme which actually required a heavy concentration and skill to be able to conduct what was happening on stage. I find this contrast delightfully interesting. The enjoyment of the piece was also in the choreography. My expectations were constantly but smoothly and repetitively dismissed. The logic in my sense making was changed which freed me. The narrative was made in another sense.

I thank you for that. (But I also thank you for all the work that makes me think, struggle and process. ((Thank you for everything.)) One last thing I was thinking about during this festival. Since I realized, this work was also a piece according to the theme of the festival made by a female artist, a work that didn’t represent womanhood itself or the oppressions of women. Which was almost the only one in this festival… I found myself thinking. How does it actually support women to make a festival only for female makers? Or is the intention to support women? Or offer a perspective? Which perspective? Why only female festival? Why is it necessary and how are women presented, what about women and by whom’s choices? This is actually for the Dear Curator of the festival, but maybe you are also reading…

Thank you again

Sincerely,

Viivi