Seminar 1

Our first seminar took place between 10 and 12 September 2009 in Brighton, UK. Events unfolded as planned and the group did just what groups are good at: dialogue; debating work and historical context; outlining a flow of progression for the two years of the Network and beyond; establishing a working method; group members articulating their different positions; building a bank of recommended papers and screen-based works; and proposing a development of the group’s website, as well as sharing meals.

The following page details the critical framework for the first seminar of the Network, outlining the course of events and documenting some of the presentations and debates.

Critical framework

'Screendance has not yet been invented'

For the first seminar of the AHRC Screendance Network, Claudia Kappenberg invited Professor Ian Christie (Professor of Film and Media History at Birkbeck College, University of London) to give a presentation based on his Slade Lecture from 2006, in which he surveyed a history of cinema under the title 'The cinema has not yet been invented.'[1]

To open the discussion about current discourses on Screendance, Claudia proposed that Ian’s lecture title could be applied to Screendance, arguing that ‘Screendance has not yet been invented’. As a provocative statement, the title enables a critical review of the progression of Screendance in the twentieth century and a reflection on the possibilities inherent in the art form.

In his Slade Lecture series, Ian Christie examined debates across the twentieth century which considered film variously as a mechanical advance, as popular entertainment or as a form of art. Today, different bodies of work such as popular narrative cinema and experimental film practices continue to hold conflicting views as to the potential and use of the medium. This is of interest to the debate on Screendance, as the differences have created a healthy diversity of bodies of work, each with their own theoretical discourses and references, and also allowed the development of a variety of platforms and audiences.

By comparison, different practices within Screendance remain undefined and there are no distinctive bodies of critical enquiry. The work is shown most often within a festival format with programmes mixing work of different artists and few curatorial statements accompany the screenings or placing the work within broader cultural discourses.

In the accompanying literature the work is variously presented as ‘dance for the camera’ or as ‘a genre of dance’, neither of which fully grasp the hybridity, interdisciplinarity nor potential of the art form. In order to give a new impulse for critical debates, the AHRC Network has agreed on the term 'Screendance' to suggest an equal partnership between choreographic and cinematic approaches. Therefore, the notion of ‘dance for film’ is replaced with ‘dance as film,’ to quote a statement from Amy Greenfield published in the Filmdance Festival Catalogue in 1983.[2]

To examine the cinematic, screen-based nature of the art form, the Network dedicated the first seminar to an examination of the histories of film and to the concepts, productions and collaborations of the early twentieth century pioneers.

Ian Christie made two presentations; his first presentation focused on the films Entr’acte (Réné Clair, 1924), and The Red Shoes (Michael Powell and Emeric Pressburger, 1948); the second presentation reviewed a wider historical context for the film practices of the avant-gardes, of the British post-war Neo-Romantic movement and various American filmmakers, to explore the different artistic intentions and aesthetics.

The presentations laid a ground for a rigorous review and critical debate on ‘dance as film’ and its futures.

Claudia Kappenberg, 25 September 2009

[1] Christie, I. (226), ‘Cinema has not yet been invented’, Slade Lecture Series 2006. Cambridge, http://www.admin.cam.ac.uk/news/press/dpp/2006012001

[2] Greenfield, A. (1983), ‘Artist Statement’, Filmdance Festival Catalogue. New York City: Public Theatre, p. 26.

Report on the first seminar of the Screendance Network

10 - 12 September 2009, Brighton, UK

Thursday 10 September

We met each other and our guest, Ian Christie, debated a selection of videos screened by Claudia, Doug and Marisa; shared dinner.
Claudia screened: Richard Serra, Hand Catching Lead (1968) and Becky Edmunds, Light:Heat:Motion (2007).
Doug screened: Trisha Brown, Walking down the Side of a Building (1970), and Sally Gross, Stopped in her Tracks (1978).
Marisa screened: Chantal Ackerman, Un Jour Pina a Demandé (1982), and Carlos Saura, Carmen (1983).

Discussion ensued about:

• narrative aspect of the image; image as narrative
• gender constructs in performance/ relation of gendered body to space
• work versus gesture; gesture as action reminiscent of work
• questions of tasks versus personal narrative
• performance for the camera versus performance for the audience
• whose gaze? Dance on camera reinforcing/doubling the looking and being looked at - see Rosalind Krauss, Video: The Aesthetics of Narcissism (October, vol.1, Spring, 1976)
• camera as witness versus documentation
• the still frame in Ackerman, painterly framing
• Pina Bausch as ‘post-cinematic’ in the sense of choreography informed by the workings of the film frame/fragmentation/cut.

Friday 11 September

First presentation by Ian Christie on Entre’acte (1924) and The Red Shoes (1949), contextualizing the encounter between dance and film in these works. Continuation of video screenings by Harmony, Chirstinn and Ann, with critical debate by group members.

Harmony screened: Cari Ann Shim Sham and Kyle Ruddick, My 1st Big Break (2008)
Chirstinn screened: Geoffrey Jones, Snow (1963), and Michel Gondry and the Chemical Brothers, StarGuitar (2002)
Ann screened clips from Ken Russell, Women in Love (1968), specifically the wrestling scene and the dance scene

Discussion on:

• Screendance in relation to High Art/ Popular Culture
• emphasis on the technical medium/ performance via technical apparatus and lack of choreographic invention in My Big Break
• visually the background informing the foreground action
• panoramic seeing facilitated through train travels and replicated in film/video (snow)
• industrial films of the GPO Film Unit, not made as Screendance, but creating a kinetic viewing experience
• state support for Avant-garde film-making
• Women in Love shows movement as ‘natural’ or primal relation, alternating between primal and codified relations
• rarity of naked men on screen, in physical erotic encounter.
  

Concluding the afternoon: round of discussion according to Open Space rules, each member identifying possible themes for debate.  Drinks at South East Dance, followed by dinner.

Second presentation by Ian Christie, drawing on his Slade Lectures 'Cinema has not yet been invented', reviewing the original ambitions for film and comparing it to the actual developments of the art form.
Debate on relation to the development of Screendance.
Lunch, with debate over visions and ambitions for the future of the group.
Third video screening session - Kyra screened:  Miranda Pennell, Drum Room (2007), with reference to Steve McQueen, Drumroll (1998).

Discussion on:

• relation of image/surface quality to content
• Rrelation of sound to image
• relation of sound to intention/expressivity/psychology
• 'sound' in film/video, and Screendance, like the weather of the anthropologist, often overlooked (see talk by Tim Ingold, Opensource {Videodance}, Findhorn 2007).

Followed by concluding roundtable:

1) Each member describing in key words their position and particular interests for critical investigations

2) Agreement over dates and proceedings for the next seminar, focusing on bringing essay material/ drafts for presentation and critical debate

3) Each member naming a possible subject for a critical essay

4) Agreement to allow for a flow of activities, which would weave together the writing of new essays, shared critical debates, panel presentations at conferences and Screendance festivals, and for the group to function as the editorial board for the future Screendance Journal

Closing of the seminar with a walk on the beach, dinner and drafting of a report.

Research topics

Positionality