Getting Down to the Why

The Crossover Between Art and Life 


The studio is my home. It holds a lot of weight. Every time I enter a dance studio or any art or music studio I feel its holiness. Like a temple, the space demands your full spiritual and creative presence. The only place more sacred is the stage where anything superfluous could be considered blasphemy. Or in Shakespeare's words, "All the world's a stage," and our lives are the holy creative scenes and every action deliberate and unafraid.

I strive to achieve this authenticity and have been reminded these past couple of weeks of how the creative process truly brings you to the core of it. Jacinte Armstrong, a Halifax dance scene veteran, recently mentioned this quote:

"A stage space has two rules: Anything can happen and something must happen." -Peter Brook

 

What a simple metaphor for life especially these days; being braced between a multitude of options and making decisions within that evermore overwhelming structure. Both dealing within the realities of our sometimes sterile modern lives and asking ourselves the questions, What does authenticity mean to me? How can I balance living creatively and feeding myself? What is my art worth to me? To others? How great a risk am I willing to take? As artists we are forced to make statements and answer these questions and the best art is always subjective or even shocking.

In the 2016 Emerge program led by Kathleen Doherty and Sara Coffin I have been confronted with myself and these questions. The simple task of entering the studio daily and making creative decisions can start to feel less simple as you delve in. But that's the challenge; to both create and amalgamate; to make a mess and arrange it; to be an empty conduit and a tasteful, assertive choice maker.

Sometimes Kathleen (the choreographer) offers up some movement or direction and follows with the phrase, "kind of sort of?" implying that we somewhat got what she was demonstrating. I like the sense of openness that insinuates. It's as though she is already prepared to take our interpretation of things. It feels that in this process Kathleen comes across vigorously available which is a great quality in any collaborator. Kathleen leaves us (the dancers) space to offer ourselves individually by bringing some of our personal stories into the piece directly whether through text, emotional or character driven movement, or improv. I feel us dancers have shaped the piece a lot because of this. It is both challenging and liberating and overall, more effective in carrying across a sense of genuineness to an audience.

I've found myself asking why more often which is a good thing, a sacred thing, that should happen both inside and out of the studio; on and off the stage. Even if the answer is, 'because I must,' or, 'because I feel compelled to,' asking why is a powerful question in shaping ourselves as artists and humans.

"Life is a bust
All ya can do is do what you must
You do what you must do and ya do it well" -Bob Dylan

If the whole world was a stage how would you play out your life and why?



Vivika Ballard