Archive for the ‘Research’ Category

The Furies – Rooting

Sunday, February 27th, 2011
umbrasolis @ Melkweg Amsterdam

Melkweg theater Flyer

Umbra Solis will present a showcase performance the 14/15 of April in the Melkweg Theater in Amsterdam.

The double event will include Samadhi (the furies) and a new piece called Rooting.

Ecate (Eleonora Cantarini) Study

Eleonora Cantarini in a study for Rooting

Time derives from movement and is movement that reveals time. To see a certain kind of movements changes the perception of time.

Irreversibility is the name we use for a damage that cannot be fixed. And is a rule.

The Mind we call “our” is connected to and lived by a mind that is not us, and thus is visited by everyone.

Darkness is the condition of Eternity. Geometry is another name for the things we draw in the dark.

In darkness there are figures that move.

Sound come before the word. And the word is God. From the sound took shape light and light is in the shape of all there is.

eleonora-5benedetta

Cosa ci spinge nei cunicoli dell’arte

Tuesday, August 24th, 2010

Cosa ci spinge nei cuniculi dell’arte, lettera di magma

Illustration

Scrivere per il teatro non e’ scrivere ma ricercare. La ricerca non e’ creazione, ma riscoperta di cose forse note, sulla carta, prima di noi, ma che aquisiscono valore nel momento in cui le facciamo nostre riscoprendole.

Io mi sento immerso nelle cose, circondato dalle cose, spesso cose che hanno un prezzo ma non un valore. Per carattere non amo i prezzi e testardamente voglio dare un valore alle cose. Con cose che hanno valore si puo’ costruire una lingua differente da quella comune, e parlarsi con questa lingua ci tiene svegli, vicini alla vita e lontani dal regno della risposta automatica, del sonno intermittente, della paura di esserci e persino dalla paura delle cose. Io voglio costruirmi una lingua di valore.

Ho studiato. Lo studio aiuta a costruire reti con cui ogni tanto ho anche catturato qualcosa di valore. Qualche volta l’ho tenuto scritto cio’ che ho catturato, molto piu’ spesso l’ho detto subito a qualcuno, raccontato, usato per trovare altro, per tirare su una bella forma, per dare le ali a un sogno vago e farlo vivere di giorno, per guardarlo assieme a un amico, per spararlo in faccia a un nemico vero o inventato, per ridere, per piangere per tacere e lasciare che tacesse assieme alla Zia Meraviglia, per fare innamorare di me.

Dico spesso che lo studio l’hanno scoperto i filosofi per invidia dei poeti. I poeti avevano dato un nome alle stelle, inventato storie sugli dei, spiegato gli uomini. E per questo i poeti avevano sempre sedotto i giovinetti piu’ belli. Cosi’ i Filosofi, per invidia, introdussero il logos e rovinarono la festa. Il logos, la lingua che rimane dentro la testa e non tocca davvero le cose. Costruisce universi e poi li distrugge. Il piu’ affilato dei coltelli.

Allora io il mio studio l’ho trasformato in formule, in numeri, e ho passato anni a infilare formule dentro delle macchine che le mangiano e le trasformano in cose, alle volte in cose di valore. Alle volte in parole per la mia nuova lingua, una lingua che ha senso solo se almeno due persone la comprendono e che oramai e’ imparentata con la lingua che parlano tutti senza capirne veramente il valore. E questo mi ha provocato molto, aiutato a fare uscire dal sottobosco in cui vivevo, mi ha aperto la testa e l’ha seminata. Ma non mi e’ mai bastato, perche’ a me piace soprattutto essere felice e lo sono se ho qualcosa che posso raccontare, come il poeta, sotto le stelle, attorno al fuoco, magari per sedurre qualcuno.

La mia lingua valente ha ancora poche parole, cerco di farla saltare e ballare, e qualche volta canta. La devo affinare, provare in racconti che scolpiscano la vita rimanendo nella sua memoria, nei modi di dire, nei suoi racconti.
Per ora la tengo stretta, ci vogliamo bene, e stiamo bene l’uno con l’altro.

Lettera di presentazione al progetto di residenza “Le Ville Matte” a Orroli (SA)

La Soglia – (at the threshold)

Friday, July 9th, 2010

I receive and publish from Benedetta. The title is mine.

it is the edited clip of an improvisation she did last night.

The structure of movement constructed with care for the previous choreographic essays is about to collapse. In front of an entrance, at the threshold, is necessary to deal with the hart.

What I see happening are some first steps into chaos. We are about to look for the Dionysian side of the work, stepping out of intuitions and reasoning. A starting point for what is to be done. I observe. I reverberate.

Going backwards in the structure of the myth both chronologically and logically we find Orphism. Meditate… Is as dark as it gets in a night without moon.

The clip is danced, felt, shot and edited by Benedetta, the violin(?) music is by Jan Tyrsen. More is due to come…

threshold
noun
1 the threshold of the church: doorstep, doorway, entrance, entry, door, gate, gateway, portal, doorsill.
2 the threshold of a new era: start, beginning, commencement, brink, verge, cusp, dawn, inception, day one, opening, debut; informal kickoff.
3 the human threshold of pain: lower limit, minimum.

La Soglia (at the threshold) from Umbra SOlis on Vimeo.

Shamadi (le furie)

Saturday, June 12th, 2010

Shamadi (the furies) – synthesis from Umbra SOlis on Vimeo.

Esiste un luogo, a meta’ strada tra la mente e il cuore, in cui il tempo si ferma?
E se esiste, e’ possibile aprirne le porte e mostrarne l’interno a dei compagni di viaggio?
La domanda se la pone questa ricerca coreografica di cui Samadhi costituisce il frammento che vedrete stasera.
Addestrati dala fluire regolamentato del vivere noi concepiamo il tempo come misura matematica del fluire dell’esistenza, ma non lo esperimentiamo mai come tale.

Samadhi in sanscrito, la lingua sacra degli indu’ indica un livello di meditazione profonda, accessibile agli Yogi. Ai danzatori di Benedetta e’ necessaria estrema concentrazione mentre esplorano movimenti diacronici. La sfida e’ di dare a ogni arto un tempo proprio, meccanico, e costruire su questi ritmi differenti un equilibrio nuovo. Lo sforzo dapprima impegna totalmente il danzatore, poi lo libera, lo trasporta in un non luogo, simile alla meditazione profonda.

E noi che vediamo la danza fluire, nel ritmo che ne disegna le misure, sperimentiamo forse un sapore nuovo, come se ci avessero consegnato la chiave di un giardino segreto.

I movimenti nello spazio ripropongono la geometria del 2 del 3 e del 5, affascinandoci con le innumerevoli figure possibili nell’accostamento geometrico di elementi semplici. La danza seppure in astratto, si collega con i motivi fondamentali del mito, in cui il triplice principio del femminile si manifesta, durante la meditazione o forse a causa di lei, come le tre furie, o forse le moire, pronte a decidere, srotolare e tagliare a misura il destino di ognuno.

F.B.

Choreography by Benedetta,
Danced by: Benedetta Mazzotti, Eleonora Cantarini, Giovanna Rovedo

Music by: Alberto Novello, Federico Bonelli and Benedetta

Costumes by: Yari Molinari

Dramaturgy and Texts by Federico Bonelli

all the photos here are by Andrea Boccalini

premiere of "Shamadi" - Choreography by Benedetta in "la mama" New York, 11 june 2010

A synthesis of the performance is now available on VIMEO, check it out and leave your comment if you wish!

Memling

Tuesday, May 18th, 2010

Hans Memling (also spelled Memlinc; c. 1430 – 11 August 1494) was a German-born Early Netherlandish painter. You can find some news on him on Wikipedia [Memling].

Zeitgeist

Sunday, May 16th, 2010

Someone links from facebook today:

http://www.themorningnews.org/archives/galleries/ghosts_of_shopping_past/04gosp.php

Photos by Brian Ulrich from empty-abandoned shopping malls… Zeitgeist, or the sigh of the time, or the ghost of the time to come…

Yeah!
http://www.themorningnews.org/archives/galleries/ghosts_of_shopping_past/10gosp.php

http://www.themorningnews.org/archives/galleries/ghosts_of_shopping_past/10gosp.php

http://www.themorningnews.org/archives/galleries/ghosts_of_shopping_past/04gosp.php

Photos by Brian Ulrich

Monadi

Saturday, May 15th, 2010

I remember myself half awake half dreaming. This is a first report out of an experience I had 3 days ago, in the night of wednesday. The cause of the nightmarish kind of dreams and thoughts I had was probably the material of two different films that I had seen in bed in the preceding days: Danton by Andrzej Wajda and Shutter Island by Martin Scorsese. In particular the associations of negative type I had because of the second film, that disappointed me quite a lot.

But let’s go back to the facts. I have been perceiving the whole night my self has a quite week layer of thoughts and emotions. My dearest memories were like short, broken, pipes of meat and feelings, hanging above the bed and getting lost into the wardrobe. Contingency, mere weak attributes of my ego.
I perceived the thin layer of my persona, the slight fragile border between myself, in time, as one and the millions of myself that have lived, seen, felt, loved, feared and sinned before and after me.
Is was quite a scary feeling. I try to “observe it” as I have learned to do, to detach my body from my mind, but i don’t seem to be always capable of it. I fear this detachment. I fear this form of death. I kept to follow into dream and waking up abruptly, often spotting the room walls for movements or scanning for ghosts.

I have a recollection now, some days later, that is only partial, and to with my conscious self has already made peace with. Not as frighting, not as physical. But I can see it was a feeling of physical nature of a mental hypothesis of deep philosophical implications, observed and lived while on the border between sleep and wake.

the monad

I removed the event and went on living the day as it come to me. Waking up, the next morning, the day after this “satori” experience of that night I got up early and upset, repeating inside my head “Appercezione pura”. And relating this term to Kant. A sort of mantra.
(more…)

Jodorowski’s Dune – The film you’ll never see

Saturday, May 15th, 2010

THE FILM YOU WILL NEVER SEE
by Alejandro Jodorowsky
[versione in italiano]
[Moebius][Giger][Christopher Foss]

There is a Hebraic legend which says: “the Messiah will not be a man but one day: the day when all the human beings will be illuminated “Kabbalistes speak about a conscience collective, cosmic, a species of méta-Universe. And here are what for me all the DUNE project was.

Enthusiastic Admiration

To show the process of illumination of a hero, then a people, then a whole planet (which in its turn is the Messiah of the Universe since by giving up its orbit, the holy planet leaves to spread its light throughout all the galaxies)…

I did not want to respect the novel, I wanted to recreate it. For me Dune did not belong to Herbert as Don Quixote did not belong to Cervantes, nor Edipo with Esquilo.

There is an artist, only one in the medium of a million other artists, which only once in his life, by a species of divine grace, receives an immortal topic, a MYTH… I say “receives” and not “creates” because the works of art its received in a state of mediumnity directly of the unconscious collective. Work exceeds the artist and to some extent, it kills it because humanity, by receiving the impact of the Myth, has a major need to erase the individual who received it and transmitted: its individual personality obstructs, stains the purity of the message which, of its base, requires to be anonymous… We know whom created the cathedral of Notre-Dame, neither the Aztec solar calendar, neither the tarot of Marseilles, nor the myth of Don Juan, etc.
(more…)