Excerpts from Douglas Rosenberg's address at ADF Screendance 2008

(WITH COMMENTS AND OBSERVATIONS BY Dance and Film IN RESPONSE TO YET MORE INTERMINABLE NEOCOLLOQUIAL PSEUDO-ACADEMIC BOLLOQUIALISTIC SOLIPSISMS).


From Douglas Rosenberg's lecture: 'Curating The Practice'

There are multiple strands apparent in screendance production,
And, as is often the case, one can identify a pendulum swing away from the dominant paradigm of the moment toward another model. One reaction to the ubiquity of spectacle and virtuosity as well as the trends that currently dominate dominant festivals, takes form in work that is intimate, socially conscious, humble and thought provoking. This is work that at its core comes from a conceptual impulse and is antithetical to spectacle.
(WHY CANNOT IT BE BOTH - SAVE FOR THE INABILITY TO FIND THE NECESSARY TALENT OR APPLICATION SO TO BE?)
This body of work often trades the veneer of polished surfaces for the more difficult gestalt
(THOSE PESKY GERMANISMS, THEY DO CREEP IN, DON'T THEY...?)of content and form.
(ONE THING LESS INSTRUCTIVE THAN POLISHING A BRICK AND THAT’S TRYING TO FIND BRICK POLISH )
In doing so, it raises question important questions about the very form it inhabits. (ER………….YES?...........ANY MORE ON THIS………..NO?.....OK, MOVING ON….)

The programmed festival model is one in which we usually find the most recent screendance creations being shown and rarely do we see a body of work by a single artist created over time.
(POSSIBLY BECAUSE THE KIND OF DISPOSABLE ONE-OFF ART CREATED BY THE PARVENUE TENDS NOT TO LEND ITSELF TO AMASSING ANYTHING WHICH MIGHT BE DIGNIFIED WITH THE DESCRIPTION “BODY OF WORK”)

While the festival model currently dominates the exhibition of screendance, (OPEN A CINEMA DEDICATED TO ONLY SHOWING CONCEPTUAL SCREEN DANCE ON A DAILY PROGRAMMED BASIS AND I WILL SHOW YOU A WORLD-CLASS TUMBLEWEED FACTORY) I would note here that this was not always the case, at least here in the states. Seminal exhibitions of screendance work took place on both coasts. (BOY WERE THEY BIG THAT TUESDAY NIGHT, SEMINAL! SEMINAL!!! THEY STILL TALK ABOUT THESE EVENTS IN THE SAME HUSHED TONES AS “THE LAST NIGHT AT PHILMORE EAST AND “JUDY GARLAND AT CARNEGIE HALL”) One of the earliest media collectives, Video Free America in San Francisco both produced and curated work from the late 60’s through the eighties. The Pacific Film Archive in Berkeley, California screened curated programs, as did independent curators on both coasts in makeshift venues, underground cinemas and later in dance spaces such as The Dance Theater Workshop in New York.

Hans Breder, Professor of Art, created the Intermedia Area in the School of Art and Art
History at The University of Iowa in 1968, with which Elaine Summers was affiliated
and where she created some of her early dance film work. Summers was a member of the Judson Dance Theater in New York, the seminal group largely considered to be the founders of post-modern dance in the early 1960s. The group, which grew out of a dance composition class with Robert Dunn, included such luminaries

(THESE PEOPLE HAVE LIGHTED A STELLAR PATH FROM SOHO LOFT TO VILLAGE SALON, CREATING INCOMPREHENSION AND INTELLECTUAL INFERIORITY COMPLEXES AT EVERY CONTRACTON AND HIGH RELEASE. AT NO POINT IN THE LAST 40 YEARS HAS ANYONE OUTSIDE THE COGNOSCENTI SO MUCH AS HAD THEM PASS, EVEN MOMENTARILY, ACROSS THEIR CREATIVE RADAR SCREENS. WHILE DOUBTLESS BEING PEERLESS, COMMITTED AND TALENTED,SURELY "LUMINARY" IS KINDA PUSHING THE ENVELOPE OF CREDIBILITY FOR ALL BUT THE TINIEST OF TIPPY-TOED COZY COTERIES)

as Trisha Brown, Steve Paxton, and David Gordon. The Judson group questioned the very nature of dance and its practice,
(PLEASE SEND ME A COPY OF "THE LIST OF QUESTIONS ON THE NATURE OF DANCE" UNDER PLAIN COVER BY RETURN OF POST)

opening the door to a new set of possibilities,
(HOW, NEW, NO DANCE ON FILM UNTIL THEN, OH I SEEEE, NOT REAL DANCE – ONLY THE FAKE CLASSICAL, MARTHA GRAHAM, AGNES DE MILLE, FOKINE, PETIPA, FOSSE, ASTAIRE, KELLY KIND OF STUFF EH?)

including dance on film and video, and dance in a mediated environment. Summers worked extensively with projected film and images in a dance environment,
(COME AGAIN, MEDIATED ENVIR...)
beginning as early as the first Judson concert in 1962. She also made freestanding dance films.
(AS OPPOSED TO THE SORT THAT NEEDED SUPPORT STRUCTURES?)

She founded the Experimental Intermedia Foundation in New York as well as her own dance/intermedia company, the Elaine Summers Dance and Film Company, which toured experimental multi-media works from the 1970s forward. Summers’s work in multi-media, from its earliest stages, made dance an element in a kind of gesamkunstwerk
(ENOUGH ALREADY ...WITH THE ERSATZ GERMANERUDITIONISINGWERKENWORDEN)
of imagery that became a model for generations of other artists whose work involved synthesizing dancing bodies into an electronic field of activity.
( ACHTUNG...HANDE HOCHE TOMMY ENGLANDER SWINE - VE HAF ZE ZERIOUS KOMISCHLUSTIGERSATZENWERDEN COMINGZE UPPEN INDER NEXTE FEW ZENTENCENGERSTRUMPFEN....

Her films, including In the Absence and the Presence, (AKA – ALL OVER THE SHOP), Iowa Blizzard,(A CRITICAL SUCCES D’ESTIME) and Two Girls Downtown Iowa, 1973,(. “…BEG, BORROW, STEAL A TICKET FOR THIS ONE…” ROLLING STONE )deconstruct dance and re-present it as often formalist, abstract imagery that suggests, but does not demonstrate, dance. Summers’s use of movement in those seminal films was often excruciatingly slow and asked the viewer to forego expectations of more traditional elements of “choreography” in favor of a gestalt
(ICH WARNE DICH!!…….)
of cinematic motion. The resonance of her approach is evident in many subsequent dance films, and even more so in the very idea of intermedia or multi-media dance activity through the present. Yvonne Rainer is often cited as a seminal
(MORE OF THIS SEMEN, GET A GRIP YOU CONCEPTUALIST ONANISTS YOU…ON 2ND THOUGHTS, PERHAPS DON’T GRIP SO TIGHT……)
figure in screendance, which she clearly is.
(CLEARLY? I THOUGHT SHE ABSOLUTELY MAINTAINED THE NO TO PERSONALITY, NO TO...OH HANG ON, THE SHOOTING IN THE FOOT THING FOLLOWS...))
However, it is in her famous manifesto that she articulates a position regarding a theory of dance that is overlooked for its significance to the screendance debate. In Yvonne Rainer’s NO Manifesto of 1965, the choreographer/filmmaker states:

No to spectacle no to virtuosity no to transformations and magic and make believe no to glamour and transcendency of the star image no to the heroic no to the anti-heroic no to trash imagery no to involvement of performer or spectator no to style no to camp no to seduction of spectator by the wiles of the performer no to eccentricity no to moving or being moved.
(….ER….WHICH BIT ARE WE ACTUALLY ALLOWED TO DO……?)
Amy Greenfield reifies
(HMM, I HAVE A WEE PROBLEM IN "REIFYING" THAT WHICH IS MILITANTLY AND SO PALPABLY ANTI OBJECTIFICATION. CAN WE DISCUSS THIS AS A SEPARATE PHD STRAND?)
Yvonne Ranier’s manifesto in films such as Encounter (l970), For God While Sleeping (l970), Transport [1971], Dirt (l97l), and Element (l973). For Greenfield, technical dancing is irrelevant,
(OF COURSE IT IS, PARTICULARLY IF YOU CAN’T DO IT)
rather, the mise-en-scène of bodies in real, physical – as well as traumatic and repetitive – motion lies at the core of her cinematic exploration. In Transport, for instance, we see a group of people, not performers or dancers, but individuals who can only be immediately identified as humans engaged in a very visceral set of tasks, undertaken with deeply-felt conviction. In other words, there is no artifice and little evidence of the camera’s alteration of reality
(CRUSHING DULLNESS IS THE ONLY GUARANTOR OF A DIRECT AND APT DEPICTION OF REALITY. BUT WAIT...WHAT DO WE MAKE OF DOGME?)
as we see the group carrying a member aloft over rugged terrain, until exhaustion sets in and then another member is lifted above their heads and the process repeats.
( AT LAST! THE PERFECT INSOMNIA CURE!)
As in Ranier’s manifesto, there is no cinematic magic in these early films, no glamour and certainly no transformation. It is what it is and nothing else.
(INTRINSICALLY ANTI-ART, ANTI-EXPERTISE, ANTI INTERESTING)
Neither the movers nor the film are virtuosic.
(THAT IS PATENTLY APPARENT TO EVEN THE LEAST EXPERT OF VOYEUR)
The film is, rather, a moment in time, (WHEN IS IT NOT?) an intervention of camera and recording device into a mindful but seemingly meaningless version of what Allan Kaprow might call “child’s play.”
(MISSED IT! THE ONE TIME A GERMANISM SUCH AS KINDERSPIEL MIGHT EVEN HAVE BEEN HALFWAY APPROPRIATE...)
This work breaks down expectations of both performance and the art of filmmaking.
(IF ALL ELSE FAILS, BREAKDOWN EXPECTATIONS AND WHATEVER YOU DO, LOWER STANDARDS)
In Greenfield’s early work, nothing and everything happens simultaneously.
(NOW THAT QUITE A TRICK, ONLY ACHIEVED SO FAR BY THE HEADQUARTERS OF THE EUROPEAN PARLIAMENT, THE EX- UNION OF SOVIET SOCIALIST REPUBLICS….REMEMBER THOSE GUYS….? AND IT WOULD SEEM MS GREENFIELD)
Her work is a connective thread from dance to what would later become known
(BY WHOM EXACTLY)
as performance art;
( I REPEAT, BY WHOM?)
it also connects to conceptual and minimal art
(ONE MUST DEFY ANY PUNDIT NO MATTER HOW ELOQUENT OR VERBOSE THE RIGHT TO DEFINE ANYTHING AS NEBULOUS, FREE-RANGE OR INHERENTLY ELASTIC IN DEFINITION AS CONCEPTUAL ART. ALL ART IS CONCEPTUAL BY DEFINITION.NO CONCEPT, NO ART, NO DEFINITION) Greenfield’s films are a flashpoint for hybridity
(WHOA THERE TIGER – FLASHPOINT – HYBRIDITY….?)
within the context of an evolving esthetic of screendance in a time of great change in the art world in general
(WHEN EXACTLY WAS THE ART WORLD NOT IN A TIME OF GREAT CHANGE, OR DO WE MEAN MERELY THE LATEST PAROXYSM OF ISM..ER..ISMS….ER……..) .
They are not dance, nor can one argue successfully that they are not not dance.
(SO NOT DANCE AND NOW NOT NOT DANCE ALREADY? PERHAPS THEY ARE NOT NOT STOP GO STOP NOT DANCE – THERE NOW - THAT SHOULD DO THE TRICK….)
They are exhortations to reconsider the nature of dance, community, and cinema. (EXHORTING WHOM EXACTLY EXCEPT FOR A TINY COTERIE OF SIMILARLY MINDED N.E.A. FUNDED LEGENDS IN A GREENWICH VILLAGE SUNDAY LUNCHTIME)
In 1983, Amy Greenfield and Elaine Summers curated and produced the important Filmdance Festival
( IMPORTANTLY PRODUCED ACRES OF MATERIAL FOR THE DENIZENS OF IVY-CLAD BOON-DOCK UNIVERSITIES TO PONTIFICATE WINDILY WITH THEIR DIGI-DANCE GURUS FOR YEARS AND YEARS AND YEARS – HELL WE EVEN FUND A UNIVERSITY TENURE CHAIR IN THIS IMPORTANT FESTIVAL ALONE – IT’S THE CULTURE SEE?)
which took place over two weeks at the Public Theater in New York, with more than one hundred films and filmed sequences scheduled in twenty-one different programs. .
(I SMELL AT LEAST THREE PHD’S FOCUSED EXCLUSIVELY ON THIS LITTLE GET-TOGETHER ALONE) They also produced a slim black catalog,
(CERTAINLY A TAD SLIMMER THAN THE MASSIVE EGOS WHICH MUST HAVE PONTIFICATED ENDLESSLY INTO THE NIGHTS TO PRODUCE IT….) which contains essays by both filmmakers and choreographers and is a highly prized document among students and scholars of the genre (OH THOSE PESKY STUDENTS AND SCHOLARS, SO MOVING, SO SHAKING - NEVER IN THE HISTORY OF THE PHD IN PHOTOCOPYING TECHNIQUES - HAS SO MUCH OF SO LITTLE CONSEQUENCE, BEEN REHASHED AND REHEATED, BY SO MANY…)

Both Summers and Greenfield as well as James Byrne who curated the 1989 series at Dance Theater Workshop were artists first, though artists that were interdisciplinary and often worked outside of the discipline of dance. Byrne’s notes for “Eyes Wide Open” at DTW state,
“Featured in this program are dance films and videos that demonstrate bracingly innovative approached to constructing cinematic choreography (AS DISTINCT FROM CHOREOGRAPHIC CINEMATOGRAPHY AND OF COURSE THE VERY LATEST IN GRAPHICHALISED CINEMINIMILISTOGRPAHY) from disparate and minimal movement sources. (SAY WHAT BOY?) All of these works strive to create new forms and structures for the presentation of a screen reality dealing with the human figure and movement. None of the films deal with a traditional approach to filming dance…(OH HEY, EVERYONE, LETS MAKE A DANCE FILM BUT NOT USE A CAMERA!!OR ER DANCERS, OR ANY IDEAS – YEAH, COOOOOLLLL!) This fascinating selection of new works presents a range of possibilities that push and expand the edges of dance video.”
(FORTUNATELY THOUGH, TAKING UP VERY LITTLE ROOM IN THE MIDDLE, SUCH A BADLY OVERLOOKED AREA WHEN THE PUSHING AND ENVELOPES AND ER, EXPANDING GETS SERIOUSLY UNDERWAY AND THE GARDE BEGINS TO GET REALLY DOWN AND ER … AVANT)
This curator’s statement puts his agenda out front of the work and creates a context for viewing. It makes evident that the selection of work both troubles and questions the nature of the form.(THERE’S TROUBLE…RIGHT HERE IN THE NATURE OF THE FORM…) It also operates as a kind of challenge to both makers and curators to answer by way of further exhibitions. (ONE ANSWERS QUESTIONS. ONE FACES CHALLENGES, …I THINK…)

In the catalog for Filmdance 1890’s-1983 Amy Greenfield notes:
“This catalog sets out to discuss the nature of filmdance. Each writer in the catalog was free to choose his or her own subject. No writer knew the specific viewpoints of the others. Therefore, the articles present varying, sometimes opposing, definitions, theories, and discussions on the nature of Filmdance…( CONTROVERSY IS THE SINGLE WORD WHICH SHOULD MORE OR LESS COVER THE ABOVE WAFFLE). The artists who responded to the invitation to write have made statements either on their own films or on their theories of filmdance. In setting down their thoughts, they further help to articulate the varying and changing nature of filmdance. (CHANGING AND VARYING IN THE INTENSITY OF THE OBSCURITY AND INACCESSIBILITY OR MERELY IN THE LEVEL OF THE MILITANT PATRONISING OF AN INCREASINGLY BEFUDDLED AUDIENCE BASE?)

James Byrne and Amy Greenfield each make their case for curatorial prerogative, but both point to the larger needs and desires of the field in general in their statements. The curator’s statements articulate a methodology for how the work might circulate conceptually, as a whole made up of individual voices. Likewise, the festival model creates a context for viewing and also sets parameters for discourse. However, the festival model, often lacking a thesis and leaning more toward an entertainment model is less clear in regard to a desired outcome. So, the gap between those two approaches has led me to a series of rhetorical questions around which this conference is built:

• What responsibilities do programmers and directors of screendance festivals have in regard to defining the field?(FIND SOME FILMS WORTH FORCING PEOPLE OUT OF THEIR HOMES TO COME AND SEE)

• Can curating function as a kind of critical thinking?(IS THERE ANY OTHER KIND OF THINKING IN RELATION TO CURATORIAL PRACTICE?)

• What part might curators play in creating intelligent and thoughtful programming that articulates a distinct point of view that sets one festival apart from another?
(THEY HAD BETTER START AND SOON. AT THE MOMENT THERE IS VERY LITTLE TO DISTINGUISH ANY ONE OF THESE DESPERATE EXERCISES IN WASTING ARTS SUBSIDY FROM ANY OTHER AND FRANKLY A PERILOUSLY DIMINISHING DEMOGRAPHIC ACTUALLY CARE.)

• What does it mean to curate a program of dances for the screen?
(OH BOY! NOW HERE'S A SERIOUS STROKEY BEARDY MOMENT.)

• What historical precedents are there to be found in fine art or experimental cinema models? (WELL LET’S DO THE FINE ART ONE FIRST – RECKON GAINSBOROUGH WAS A MAJOR INFLUENCE ON CONCEPTO-POST MODERN UN-CHOREOGRAPHIC PLASMA OUTCOME SCREEN WORK, BUT HE TRIED TO PLAY DOWN THIS INFLUENCE IN FAVOUR OF HIS POSH-PEOPLES’ PORTRAIT WORK, AND OF COURSE THERE ARE THE FAMOUS DA VINCI STORYBOARDS FOR DEAD DREAMS OF MONOCHROME MEN HOWEVER LLOYD NEWSON FOUND THEM A LITTLE TRITE AND UNDERPOWERED FOR HIS VISION OF THE PIECE.)

• How might curating function as historical documentation? (NOTE TO SELF, WHEN CURATING, KEEP A DIARY – HISTORY OF WHAT, PRAY?)

• Curating as writing: does an articulately curated program function as a text for understanding the form? (NAH! JUST SHOW THE MOVIES, ITS NON-VERBAL COMMUNICATION. CREATIVE WRITING CLASS NEXT DOOR LOVE, AND ASK THEM TO KEEP IT DOWN IN THERE, WE ARE TRYING TO SHOW SOME FILMS IN HERE!)

• How might curating shape a dialog about entertainment and the relationship of media to dance?(DIALOGUE KIND OF PRESUPPOSES THE EXISTENCE OF INTERLOCUTORS. UM…..ER…AM I THE FIRST HERE?....SHOULD I GO AND HAVE A COFFEE DOWNSTAIRS UNTIL THE OTHERS GET HERE…..?...ER HELLO …)

• What might curated programs allow for that programs chosen by other means might not? (WELL IT’S A LOT LESS MESSY THAN GETTING YOUR MATES ROUND TO READ CHICKEN ENTRAILS, IF THAT’S WHAT YOU MEAN.)

• Can curating define a model for criticality? (THINK I NEED A BREATHER AT THIS POINT WHICH MIGHT BE A GOOD MOMENT TO QUESTION THE ACTUAL WORD “CRITICALITY”.

UNLESS I AM MUCH MISTAKEN CRITICALITY DESCRIBES THE BEHAVIOURS OF SUB-ATOMIC PARTICLES WHEN IN THE PRESENCE OF FISSILE MATERIAL – DANCEFILM, MOVING IMAGE, CONCEPTUALISM, PARTICLE PHYSICS?...... OOOOHHHH! I SEE THE CONNECTIONS NOW. MORE IMPORTANTLY, I BEGIN TO UNDERSTAND WHY SO MANY DANCEFILM AUDIENCES BEGIN TO LOOK AND FEEL AS ALIENATED AS THE JEWS OF LINZ DURING THE EARLY HOURS OF KRISTALLNACHT IN MANY OF THE AUDITORIA I SHARE WITH THEM.)

• What kind of topics might be suggested as curated programs and what might those topical programs address? (DEAR DOCTOR OF MEEJUH STUDIES AND THAT AND EVERYTHING AND EVERYTHING. YOU ARE SO CLEVER AND ME LITTLE CURATOR HAVE NO IDEA WHAT'S WRONG WITH MY CREATIVE CHOICES. CAN YOU HELP ME DOCTOR…PLEASE?)

• How might curating help to enunciate genres in the field?(CAREFULLY NOW CHILDREN, ROUND MOUTHS AND E..N..U..N..C..I..A..T..E.. G.E.N.R.E.S…YES THAT’S GOOD, AGAIN…. GENRES, NOW LETS GO INDOORS AND TRY THIS AGAIN…..)

With curating or any sort of selection process in which some are chosen, others not, comes the question of elitism.

In other words, who gets to choose and why?

(I DO!!!! I, THE CURATOR!!! NO QUESTION. I AM THAT ELITE OF ONE. WHY? BECAUSE I GET MYSELF UP EARLY AND GO TO BED VERY LATE EVERY DAY, AND IN BETWEEN, PLOUGH THROUGH HOURS AND HOURS OF EARNEST, WELL MEANT, IF UNUTTERABLE DULLNESS, JUST TO WINKLE OUT THE OCCASIONAL FIVE MINUTES OF WELL MADE FILM IN ANY G.E.N.R.E.)

Curating is not however, simply about choosing. (BLIND, AHHHH I’M BLINDED BY THE LIGHT GIVEN OFF BY THIS PARTICULAR INSIGHT, AAHHH – YOU BET IT AINT!
MAYBE WE SHOULD MENTION IN THE PROCESS THE VENUE HIRE, THE LICENSES, THE RECALCITRANT AND GREEDY DISTRIBUTORS, THE MARKETING, THE TICKET OFFICE, THE LATE DELIVERY OF FLYERS AND THIRTY FIVE TYPOS IN THE THE BROCHURE PROOFS, ALL THE WHILE WATCHING EVERY POST FOR THE CHEQUE FROM YOUR MAIN SPONSOR WHO IS BUSILY GOING BUST JUST BEFORE THEY DESPATCH THE CASH…ETC, ETC, ETC....?)

It is a pro-active practice which by its very nature contains in equal parts, academic/pedantic/scholarly and teaching components.( WHATEVER IT IS IS IS NOT THE PEDANTIC BLAH OF PEDAGOGOPUNDITS, DREAMING OF INTERNATIONAL TRAVEL, AND THE UNDIVIDED ATTENTION OF TINY, SLEEPY AUDIENCES OF THE TERMINALLY UNDISTINGUISHED TUCKED AWAY IN DUTCH ARTS CENTRES.
YEEEEEHAAAAH, EUROPE AT LAST!!!!.AND ON AN N.E.A. GRANT NO LESS!!!)

There is in fact a high degree of responsibility that one undertakes as a curator,(YOU DON'T SAY!!) not only to the work, but also to the culture of the art form in general, its historical provenance, its way forward and its venous flow of inter-related tributaries often located outside of its own discipline.
(HIGH RESPONSIBILITY……. VENOUS……..TRIBUTARY…….. OUTSIDE OF ITS OWN DISCIPLINE.

IS THIS A BADLY BUILT SOVIET ERA DAM PROJECT OR A FEW DVD’S MADE BY SOME CONTEMPORARY DANCE STUDENTS WITH ILL-DEFINED AND UNUSUALLY MALEVOLENT DYSFUNCTIONAL ATTITUDES TO THEIR FATHERS WE HAVE HERE? FROM WHICH A BENIGHTED CURATORIAL SOUL IS ATTEMPTING TO WREST SOME SEMBLANCE OF A PATTERN, THEME OR PROGRAMMATIC INTEGRITY ONTO WHICH THEY MIGHT HANG THEIR WELL-INTENTIONED AND DESPERATELY UNDERSUPPORTED EVENT?

(ONE COULD GO ON, BUT ...........WHY?)
etc,etc,etc,etc,etc,etc


To represent fully this windy and occasionally tautological tract in a full version of the Rosenberg paper go here:
http://www.videodance.org.uk/pages/curating_the_practice_edited.doc