Last Saturday, the 2nd, was the infamous Jan Fabre. Antwerp-based, visual-artist-turned-theater-maker Fabre is a handful. I had heard only negative things about him as a person and very mixed reviews on his work. He recently got lots of Belgium media attention for his continual throwing of cats in his latest work.
And that's not all... Here are the audition notes:
"The 24-hour Project will be a Fabre project about Greek mythology, a search for the origins of tragedy. A battlefield of love and war. The actors wake and sleep on stage. For twenty-four hours Fabre directs his images using their stolen dreams.The 24-Hour Project cannibalises theatre. For a whole day and night the remnants are digested and ejected through the passage where everything ends up. In this way Fabre metamorphoses theatre. Has done all his life."
Contrary to the project itself, the first round was packed tightly into 1,5 hrs. I have never been so pushed, manipulated, displayed, and humiliated. We did a 'warm-up' of fast-moving turns, jumps, and acrobatics, solo improvisations to Michael Jackson, embodied killer animals and died for ten minutes, stared in the eyes of another completely motionless, and stood like columns while each of us introduced ourselves one-by-one and spoke a short text.
He uses dancers as if their bodies and talents are clay to be sculpted, to be pushed to the limits of psycho, crazy, and grotesque. I was nearly the color blue so he could use me to paint his artwork with. Where was the human relation in all of this?
Look, I like crazy. I love extremes. I want theater pieces to make you uncomfortable and questioning. This level has to come from a vary real place, it needs to be developed and trust between the director, performers and spectators needs to be in place for there to be any meaningful necessity for the extreme.
Fabre didn't have my trust, my appreciation, my willingness, so how could I make the spectator also believe in what I was doing?
I didn't make it to the callback, and I would have walked out had I have been. I knew he was crazy... but I had to see it first hand if he was still a credible artist.
If this man didn't channel his 'crazy' toward art-making.... he might just be a serial killer.
So:
Yesterday's audition was far from this scene and it was a welcomed calmness.
The choreographer, Elio Gervasi, is soft-spoken and kind-hearted. We worked mostly in improvisation. He gave a small warm-up with connections in Counter- and Release techniques, loosening up our joints and becoming available for movement. We learned an arm phrase that was big, spirally, and free of counts. To this we improvised the leg and bodywork. After a short break, we came to to watch, one-by-one again, a solo improv in the circle. The atmosphere with time was supportive and encouraging you to move like you.
As I gathered by the end, he was looking for pure movement. Nothing expressive, with performance 'code', tricks. Just movement.
I wasn't sure to what extend this meant. What about dynamics? and different textures? Qualities of movements? I had spent the last week with Peter Jasko explore all the different ways a body could move, have qualities, and be dynamic. And now I was asked to be a moving body...
I assume I'd understand it a bit better if I worked with him for longer. There is a simplicity that was alluring to me. He lets the body speak for itself. And a release to allow yourself to just be. I missed the challenge. I want to step into the studio every day to discover something new, pushing myself to different directions, abilities, possibilities. Where was the drive? the struggle? the NEED?
I'll hear back from him on Tuesday.
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