12/2 Performance
I prepared that morning differently having watched The Artist is Present. State of being. Taking my time. Cultivating.
Performance: I loved juxtaposing gestures and oddly matched costumes.
In line, pulling my bra over my head feels exhilarating. Pulling down my underwear even more so. Naked – liberation, standing firm on the ground, feeling the wind. Camaraderie and solidarity we built over the rehearsals helping us take the risks. Looking along our line, compared to the clothed hierarchies we’d played with, I suddenly see that collectively we have just redefined naked as powerful.
Second rehearsal reflections 11/25/14
Dress up – clothes as … power objects – how they change us, open up identities, parts of us we haven’t owned, shadows.
Just handed them – both choice from the rack and “here, put this on.” What does this do to you?
Physically walking in line, replacing myself, who am I, I keep changing, I think this dissolves a layer of ego, perhaps.
I needed to process all that about gestures in my last journaling, and then by the second rehearsal it seemed very simple and not conflicted – I just did my gestures with love, and added one maternal one. I did not mock, though mocking is rampant in the culture at large.
I enjoyed the contrast when we did “both”, mixed them up. I realized in my solo is where I can play with what I want to, including matter of fact / my interpretation of androgyny, depending on how I feel like that day. I also love wearing whatever I want and performing whatever genderness I want and the subversion of mixing those up. Not even subversion as I would have reveled in it in my 20s, a fuck you I’m more liberated than you kind of subversion that compares. But more- subversion as opening minds, my own included. About liberation from identities through playfulness.
This was powerful and fun.
Also my place in the first line, I knew as a mermaid I was a supernatural being, and so belonged “above” humans. Honoring spirit somehow, unseen worlds and legends. A sweet superhuman moment. Mermaids outrank men. Even though I know rank is a game and maya.
Watching “The Artist is Present”
notes I took:
Real knife & your own blood – performance. Ketchup – theater
Performance is all about state of mind. audience is like a dog, they can smell insecurity
Nude doorway; State of being; Wild, raw, vulnerable; Preparation, risk; Humanity of audience –enthralled – witnessing, relationship, silence, stillness, eyes, looking, being seen.
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