Lesson 2 - 10.1.16

Lesson 2 - 10.1.16

In this lesson, we started by doing our version of a cleansing exercise, Misorgi, commonly practiced by Yoshi Oida. The premise of the exercise comes from an old Indian story/myth about a God, who in order to find out about himself, went to live underwater to find himself. The exercise we carried out explores the cleansing of different parts of our body. The eyes, the nose, the mouth, the bellybutton (hara) and the ears. This is usually done after cleaning the room of practice. In all of Yoshi Oida's rehearsals, he would get him and his actors to clean the space they were going to use. This cleanses the space of any pre-existing ideas and acts as a clean slate for a new day. After this, we got to cleansing ourselves. This is so that as actors we can start fresh and all the important parts of us are clean. I found this a useful exercise as I felt totally new and energised to start making work. We especially focused on our Hara (centre). The Japanese consider that the vital spirit resides in the Hara, more specifically at a point just below the navel, known as the "Tan-Den". The Hara describes the quality of a persons energy - one may have a "good hara" or a "bad hara". 

We then looked at Somadhi, which is the exercise of doing just 1 thing at once. In life, it is pretty impossible to do just one thing as our brain is always elsewhere. I found this exercise very difficult as there are always constant distractions. After trying to focus on one thing we did an exercise called the walk into nothingness. We had to walk around the space with our eyes closed. It seems simple but walking around with your eyes closed is a difficult task as with this exercise you have to throw away all worries and focus on your body in the room. Surprisingly I didn't bump into anyone and I believe that other senses become heightened when others are dampened.


Music is a huge part of all our sessions so I made sure to make a note of the music we used during this session: 

Reflection - Brian Eno

In the next exercise we looked at how music can affect us creatively, through movement, drawing and writing. We looked at 4 pieces of music and we had the choice of these three ways of reacting.

Chopin - Etude No.11 in A minor, Op.25 'Winter Wind'

This piece of music is very dynamic and I remember having many different feelings during this piece of music. I chose to draw to this piece. I don't have the actual drawing as they were all collected but I remember I drew a sort of church like building. Throughout the piece, the building got a lot more twisted and distorted. 

Lead Belly - Goodnight Irene 

This piece of music felt raw and natural. I decided to react to this song physically and do a series of movements that reflected my reaction to this piece.

Judy Garland - Somewhere Over The Rainbow

This piece of music is so beautiful and airy. I reacted to this by drawing. I used many different colours and felt almost child-like once again. I drew a large scribble consisting of different colours.

Tom Jones - It's Not Unusual 

When this piece came on, I, and most people, reacted physically by doing the classic Carlton dance, or just by dancing in general.

This exercise/experiment was really useful and insightful into how we react to music instinctively as humans. It was nice to be able to act instinctively without being judged. I felt everyone in the room trusted each other to be 100% committed and honest to the exercise. 

We also went out around Selhurst and around school and had to ask people what song they would listen to to bring them joy. Jimmy and I asked a man serving at the Co-op and he said that his was 'Johnny B. Good' by Chuck Berry.

We also asked Happy at the reception and his was 'Jus' Know' by Partynextdoor. 

(Site Specific) First Lesson - 5.1.16

5.1.16

In today's lesson we looked at the art we had previously selected on our trip to The Tate Modern in London. We had to select 1 piece of art to take inspiration with. The one that I saw that inspired me and that I thought could link to the brain was 'Beirut Caoutchouc' by Marwan Rechmaoui. This is the photo I took:

The piece is a map of the city of Beirut, Lebanon, made out of rubber on a large mat. It has every single building and road embossed in precise detail onto the map. This map is actually a social statement about the city. The piece demarks any specific roads, towns, landmarks and any specific points of identification. Beirut is a very divided city, religiously and politically, and Rechmaoui wanted to strip the city of that, and focus on its complexity and beauty. The rubber material is used to stress the resilience of the place, despite the human and natural threat. It also provides a durable surface for the viewer to walk on, making this piece very interactive. Rechmaoui has stated: 

"For me architecture is a very clear expression of urban life … It’s a way to talk about demography, migration, borders and behaviours. The link through all of my work is the history of this place and how it moves … If I lived in London, I’d work on London, as a space. So it’s not Beirut itself but what’s happening in this place. It’s the exchanges and the inheritance of things."

Marwan Rechmaoui was born in Beirut in 1964. He left the city nine years later, moving first to Abu Dhabi, then to Boston and then to New York. He began his career as a painter, exploring social realism and then abstract expressionism. But after his return to Beirut in 1993 Rechmaoui developed an interest in architecturally-informed sculpture and wall-based work. 

The reason I picked this piece of art is because I think it perfectly depicts the brain. The seemingly endless tangle of streets, with buildings covering every inch represents synapses and nerve endings. The demarcation of any roads and landmarks depicts the unknowing vastness of the mind as we as humans do not fully understand the brain just yet. The rubber material that boasts resilience against human and natural threat is just like the brain. Our mind is constantly at risk of damage from humans, be it from physical damage, or emotional damage that could affect mental health. Natural threat such as alzheimer's and parkinson's disease are also a huge risk for our brain's health. 

As I'm working on a duet with Jimmy, we also used a second piece of art that he chose for inspiration.

 This piece was called Behold by Sheela Gowda and was made from steel car bumpers and knotted human hair. The piece was rooted from her work in Bengalaru (Bangalore) where she observed the coexistence of ritual and superstition alongside modern, urban and economic transformation. The hair comes from local temples where it's cut as a sacrificial offering when pilgrims fulfil sacred vows and the longer strands are sold to make wigs or supply keratin for hair products. The shorter strands are kept to make protective talismansm, sometimes used by motorists.

Even thought the piece is so perfectly organised in the way it is lay out, it will never look tidy because of the tangled, knotty mess of the hair, which I think is such a brilliant metaphor for the brain. The hair is used to suspend the car bumpers, which is used for protection on cars which I think is also a good metaphor for the brain. The fragile hair supports something large and heavy.