DAN020X321Y: The Resourceful Choreographer

Autumn Term 2009

Week 4: 23 October 2009

Two strategies/methods for disrupting the known:

Kinesthetic/Haptic initiation, with iterative ‘shaping’ of improvisations
Fragmenting and pasting

Housekeeping
• Blogs – questions/thoughts/concerns, commenting on others, rhythm
• Assessment concerns/questions, group averages

Task
Create 20 seconds of material that focuses on idiosyncrasies, complexity and the
unrecognisable1. The challenge is to make extraordinary demands on your
capacity to: a) watch carefully and critically, b) alter, manipulate and focus the
actions of the dancer, c) hone in on details beyond your usual concerns, habits
and methods, d) experiment with the possibilities of the movement, and e)
challenge your assumptions about what you like, what you expect and what you
would normally settle for (and when you would normally settle for it).
A sub-task is to bring the way you communicate as a team into the foreground.
What type of listener are you? What kind of director? How much is enough to
say? How direct or indirect should you be?
Assigned watching: http://resourceful.posterous.com/on-conducting

Assessment Study 2: Complex movement

Task
In assigned groups of two or three, develop a 2 – 4 minute solo study that
prioritises the development of complex and idiosyncratic movement. The work
will have a single (fixed) light with no more than three cues (including beginning
and ending). You are required to operate the lights.
The emphasis is on an imaginative engagement with the possibilities and (once
again) complexity of physical action/dance and time, as well as a creative and

1
I am thinking here of the distinction between class material and the choreographic

The Resourceful Choreographer: Week 4 Simon Ellis (simon.ellis@roehampton.ac.uk x3209) Page 1 of 3

well-considered approach to ‘choreographing’ the audience’s experience of the
work.
Questions that carry over from the previous assessment are: How do you
organise the collaboration so that your voices are heard, nurtured and
supported? To what extent can you develop and maintain a strong sense of
experimentation and play as you develop ideas? How might ideas and
possibilities emerge as you wrestle with the materials and stimuli? What are the
ways in which you might reflect on—and document online—your experiences,
thoughts, concerns, and understandings?

Assessment
Week 5, 30 October (3 – 5pm).

General Assessment Criteria (from course outline)

• Evidence of curiosity and experimentation in workshops, in the
development and performance of assessment studies, and in the reflective
blog/archive
• Evidence in practice/choreographic studies of considering and
understanding the experiences of audiences, and their role in meaning-
making in dance/performance

Assessment
Peer and Self Assessment: You have been placed into peer assessment groups.
Each of these will be responsible for assessing one other group on the following
three assessment criteria:
1. Evidence of creativity, imagination and experimentation in developing
complex and idiosyncratic movement
2. Evidence of consideration of light, time and spatial concerns in the form-
content of the work
3. Evidence of considering the entire experience of the audience, and degree
to which this contributes to the form-content of the work
You will allocate a mark out of 20 that will contribute 25% of that group’s mark for
AS2. You are not assessing whether or not you liked it, but how the group’s work
reflected the criteria.
In addition, each group will assess their own performance in the task, based on
the same criteria. You will give yourself a mark out of 20 and this will contribute a
further 25% to your group’s mark for AS2. You may decide not to allocate these
marks evenly, based on relative contributions to the working process.

The Resourceful Choreographer: Week 4 Simon Ellis (simon.ellis@roehampton.ac.uk x3209) Page 2 of 3

The peer assessment (including comments) must be emailed to me by 5pm on
Tuesday 3rd November, whilst I expect the self-assessment marks (including
justification of your marks) by 1pm on Friday 6 November.

Reading
Ellis, S. (2009). The Resourceful Choreographer [Blog]. Retrieved 29 September
2009, from http://resourceful.posterous.com.
Forsythe, W. (2000) Improvisation technologies: A tool for the analytical eye.
Stuttgart, Hatje Cantz Publishers [CD-ROM].
Huxley, M. and Witts, M. (Eds.) (1996). The Twentieth Century Performance
Reader. London: Routledge.
Talgam, I. (2009). Lead Like the Great Conductors [Vodcast]. Retrieved 22
October 2009, from
http://www.ted.com/talks/itay_talgam_lead_like_the_great_conductors.html.
Vason. M. (2009). Art Collaboration. Retrieved 23 October 2009, from
http://www.artcollaboration.co.uk/

The Resourceful Choreographer: Week 4 Simon Ellis (simon.ellis@roehampton.ac.uk x3209) Page 3 of 3