"What is the question?"

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The first Performing Arts Relay Pilot was hosted by the Dance Atelier in Reykjavik in September 2017. Under the headline, "What is the question?", the lab was an investigation to discover what kinds of questions dance and movement can answer, and what kinds of questions emerge from dance and movement. What is the connection, and the difference, between artistic and scientific questions? How does dance as an art form and as practice produce knowledge, and what kind of knowledge can be found or explored through dance?

 

At the same time, for the participating artists the lab was an opportunity to bring the subconscious methods of creation into a process where reflections can be shared, practice can be exchanged, and conscious methodology can be developed.

 

Participants:

Choreographers/dancers Silje Solheim Johnsen (N), Margunn Kilde (N), Sveinbjörg Thorhallsdóttir (IS) and Snaedis Ingadóttir (IS).

Documentation team: Kathrine Lund (DK) and Fabienne Pauly-Tanski (DK).

Relay partners: Ólof Ingolfsdóttir (IS), Susanne Næss Nielsen (N), Brian Quirt (CAN), Anita Bjørgli (N)

Director of the lab: Barbara Simonsen (DK)

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At the beginning of the lab the choreographers were taken through a mapping process – a Seachange Lab method developed by Simonsen – which is a tool to help each artist to articulate and define his or her work process and to reflect on their own methods as well as exchanging methods with others.

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The mapping process was followed by an investigation of the questions that the artist had put to herself and to the work during a specific creative process, and the answers or new questions that the work had generated. The mapping method is a fundamental tool for discussing practical artistic work processes and methods, and it can be used as a base to focus on different themes.

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In the second part of the lab, the participants worked in smaller teams, exchanging methods in practice.

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The lab was rounded up by a session with the Reykjavik dance community.

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Deltagerkommentarer:

Silje Solheim Olsen (koreograf, N): "Dagene i Reykjavik fikk meg også til å se sider ved min egen produksjon og prosess som, siden de er så selvfølgelige for meg, jeg ikke hadde identifisert som suksessfaktorer eller viktige elementer i den koreografiske prosessen."

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Margunn Kilde: "Det å utveksle arbeidsform med kunstnere fra andre land opplevdes veldig givende, meningsfullt og naturlig på en måte fordi vi lever i en globalisert verden hvor alle mennesker deler følgende av den moderne tid. En tid som daglig forsterkes av markedskrefter og digital teknologi. Vi, derimot, ble kjent gjennom sterke kunstneriske møter ute "på gulvet" og nært knyttet gjennom disse møtene! Performing Arts Relay representerer for meg i dag et nettverk som knytter mennesker nærmere sammen på tvers av landegrenser og bidrar til økt kunnskap, toleranse, utveksling og forståelse."