Bubblegum Club

Tag: choreography

  • ANY BODY ZINE // writings on dance, movement and embodied politics

    ANY BODY ZINE // writings on dance, movement and embodied politics

    “I think it’s high time we start to address that dance, movement and embodied politics all form part of re-imagining and re-defining where, how and why bodies can occupy space.”

    This quote is from an interview with co-founder of ANY BODY ZINE (ABZ), Nicola van Straaten. She, along with Kopano Maroga and Julia de Rosenwerth, started the online and print publication with the desire to bring more cultural and social attention to artistic work that is rooted in the body, “but also a desire to expand ideas around what kind of bodies are dancing bodies.” The intention is to emphasize that every body is a potential site for “creative self-actualization” and “open understandings of dance”.

    Having met during their time at the then UCT School of Dance, Nicola proposed the idea of the publication to Kopano and Julia. Since then they have released 10 issues, all dealing with varied aspects of dance, choreography, movement, and bodies through written contributions and interviews with people from different aspects of their industry. Every issue has a central theme that offers guidance to contributors, and a direction for the curation of each issue. Kopnano explains that the themes are based on their interests at different moments, making each issue a reflection a way of thinking at a particular moment in time. Volume 2, comprised of four issues so far, is focused on verbs that relate to dance and movement – Marching, Falling, Jumping and Hanging. Nicola explains that they chose verbs because they were interested in the intersection between language and movement, action and motion.

    Previous issues from Volume 1 have included conversations about semantics, emotions, body politics and taboo subjects, offering a wide variety of entry points for conversations. The issue titled “Space/Place” tackles the semantic and political differences invoked in the use of “space” versus “place”, and connects to the act of curation and place making. The issue, “Rhythm” looks at sound and music makers within their community, and includes features on the Phillipi Music Project, a computer engineered rhythm making program by Mohato Lekena and performer and musician Coila-Leah Enderstein who features a lot in their issues, and who Kopano describes as a “kind of ad hoc, fourth member of ABZ”. The issue, “Sex”, arose from an interest in interrogating perceptions of the naked body in performance, specifically how it is always read through sexual references even when the intention of a performance has nothing to do with this. Other issues have explored topics such as race, colour, subjectivity, objectivity, the personal and the political.

    “There are so few opportunities for people to share their creative work that isn’t easily consumable or sellable, which I think is why folks are always really keen to contribute,” Kopano explains while reflecting on how they ask people in their community to contribute to the publication. The publication is also a platform to bolster the profile of practitioners who are a large part of the growth and development of dance and movement and related practices in Southern Africa. They have conducted interviews with dancer and choreographer Rudi Smit, strange and intellectual performance artist Gavin Krastin and filmmaker Jenna Bass just to mention a few.

    Julia, Kopano and Nicola each contribute in different and important ways to the project. “Julia’s incredible choreographic eye for detail (and the fact that she basically taught herself web design) make her the boss of the website. Kopano’s amazing relational qualities and ability to hold spaces have resulted in him doing a lot of the liasioning with our contributors, stockists and general public, lately he’s also been directing the kind of ‘business’ development of the zine. And my passion for books and print mean I head up the layout and printing aspect of the work. We all edit together, make decisions together, essentially ‘lead’ the project together,” Nicola explains.

    Connected to the online and print publication is the third wing of ABZ, the performative platforms. ANY BODY ZINE has collaborated with NEW DANCE LAB, to create the ANY BODY DANCE LAB – a 6 week dance and performance residency for Cape Town-based artists. Teaming up with Theatre Arts Admin Collective and the Goethe-Institut Johannesburg, the residency comprises of a series of dance, composition, writing and performance workshops that culminate in a series of public performances by the 10 participants on the residency. The content from the writing workshops will be compiled to form a publication produced by ANY BODY ZINE. “We wanted to include a writing component to the ANY BODY DANCE LAB and thought that it would be very special if we curated a publication to contextualise and archive the project, but that also provides a platform for the residents to publish some of their work. As ANY BODY ZINE, we are also interested in the processes of content creation and saw this as a good opportunity to explore that question further,” Julia explains. What connects all three aspects of their work is the desire to make space for and to support independent artists.

    Julia also informed me that after a fantastic Thundafund Campaign [Thundafund is a crowdfunding platform in South Africa], they were able to print their 2016 and 2017 content which will be available at the Book Lounge in Cape Town on Roeland street and Bibliophilia in Woodstock. ANY BODY ZINE will also be available for purchase at the Association for Visual Arts (35 Church street, Cape Town) during their Comics Focus zine and comics festival taking place from the 21st of June to the 19th of July.

    Reflecting on their intentions for the publication, Nicola expressed that they hope it will allow people to think about their bodies differently and perhaps see dance as a more accessible medium. The publication presents itself as an archive of South African performance and movement practices, showcasing an image of the contemporary history of dance and beginning the documentation of SA’s dance lineage. The platform also offers validation for those already deeply involved in the industry and the possibility for opportunities for emerging artists.

    Check out their website to find out more about their upcoming projects.

    “In our current neoliberal context, dance really doesn’t get as much support as fine art or even film, because it isn’t necessarily a ‘sellable’ product. But that’s also why it’s such a powerful tool, because dance is an experience and has the potential to be internally transformative in that way.” – Nicola van Straaten

    2016’s Vol 1 content (Photo by Nicola van Straaten)

  • South Africa, What’s Up? Residency at ANTiGEL Festival

    Over the last 8 years ANTiGEL Festival has grown to become one of the largest cultural events in Geneva. By bringing artistic experience to parts of the city that are detached from this kind of engagement, the festival aims to be a reminder of the importance of making spaces for arts and culture. Africa What’s Up is a residency that falls within the festival. Artists from South Africa and Egypt have been invited to put together an evening dedicated to cultural music and cultural production on their countries.

    Photography by Chris Saunders

    Throughout the week-long residency, South African and Egyptian artist have been interacting with cultural producers from Mali, Nigeria and Switzerland. It has also provided a moment of pause and refection. In addition to the time spent networking and teasing out performance plans, artists have been able to engage with one another and the residency organisers in daily roundtable discussions. This expands the purpose of the residency to that of a space for conversations that directly affect artists. These include conversations around womxn’s access to performance time and how this is connected to networks, resources and development. Discussions also included the larger question of access for artists in general with regards to visa applications and funding to sustain their practices.

    Photography by Viviane Sassen

    Even though the residency has a focus on music, it also embraces the importance of cross-disciplinary pollination. This can be seen by the performance element.

    South Africa’s CUSS Group and the Swiss cultural organisation Shap Shap co-curated the South Africa What’s Up lineup, which includes performances by FAKA, DJ Prie Nkosazana, Dirty Paraffin and DJ Lag. Choreographer Manthe Ribane and Swiss electro-soul duo Kami Awori will be presenting their collaborative effort. Having met in Johannesburg, they have combined music, choreography and a visual display to present a full sensory experience.

    Photography by Kent Andreasen

    What is particularly important about the residency is how it encourages cross-disciplinary pollination and has opened up discussion around what it necessary to facilitate easier access to gigs and spaces for African artists. It has also provided a space to draw out how these kinds of conversations need to be translated into pragmatic steps for action.

    Photography by Chris Saunders
  •  Anaka– The Healing Energies of Creative Expression

     Anaka– The Healing Energies of Creative Expression

    Anaka is a creative with a magnetic portfolio and project repertoire to her name. The visual impression of her work is one of sublime distinctiveness. In her photographic world, off-centeredness reigns, non-traditional cropping (such as the metaphorical decapitating of heads) takes prevalence, and where there seems to be a thought given to the rule of thirds – the edges of the images bleed – a clear and intentional stylistic choice.

    Other defining factors to Anaka’s photographic work are the layering of imagery as well as the selection of models that draw on one another, strengthening each image that make up her selections. Her portfolio currently features work for Refinery 29, Ossé, Tony Gum, images of Cape Town based photographer and creative director Imraan Christian as well as images of musician Luca Williams, to name a few.

    Describing herself, Anaka states on her website that “I channel through the mediums of analogue and digital photography, film direction & editing; choreography and movement meditation; collage; & archival documentation in order to contribute to the healing energies that creation brings into this realm.”

    Identifying as a healer first, she expresses that she is a dancer second and a visual artist third. Utilizing her creative virtues in order to sustain the way in which Spirit lives within the creative process. With a multitude of clients and impressive likenesses captured by her lens, Anaka continues her message of healing in other ways with projects such as the ‘Silient Zine’ –  a physical and online archive of artists and their creations within a specific moment intended towards healing.

    Looking at Spirit and healing energies it is easy to mentally create an image of Anaka practicing meditational movement – and she does – for not only personal healing but for communal healing. A dancing child grew into the healer, dancer and artist Anaka is at present. Movement is an integral part of her being. It is a source of positive energy that she pours out onto the world, into her art and into her vision.

    Anaka’s portraits of artists such as Luca Williams and Imraan Christian indicate another interest – to archive African artists and artists working within the African Diaspora. An act that reminds me of an argument made by Susan Sontag in ‘On Photography’ where she proclaims that photographing anyone makes them important and lends celebrity status onto them. She contests that every person photographed is as important as any other person photographed regardless of their social standing – to photograph someone is to monumentalize them (Sontag 1977:31).

    Anaka wishes to highlight the importance of these individuals and their creative pursuits which is accomplished by the mere fact that she created an object from their likeness (a photograph sometimes altered by intervention into a collage). This has a deeper purpose however; the archival material hopes to decolonise the meaning of being an artist within a societal system of violence and oppression against people of colour.

    As her website states “Imagery is infinite” and outlives human mortality. Imagery created by her and her collaborators are put under the ‘Imagery is Infinite™ Ar(t)chives’ title and serves to hold physical and digital space in the world. This also promotes the idea of creating consciously. The title acts as a means to “document how artists are creating now in the face of colonization”.

    Anaka’s work can thus be regarded as a practice of inner healing as well as a broader healing practice towards the community she situates herself within. Her positive energy oozes from her intervention with already documented imagery as well as the power of her future and current vision is of evident prevalence.