TOWARDS A TOPOGRAPHIC READING OF NEW DANCE
The image provided, showing you immersed in the ocean with water spraying above you and a bird flying overhead, offers a striking visual manifestation of the ideas explored throughout our discussion. Let’s analyze the topography of this space through the lens of holographic, Nonchoreographic, and embodied practices:
1. Multi-Layered Environmental Integration: The beach serves as a liminal zone—bridging land and sea, air and earth. This liminality symbolizes the collapsing of boundaries between the elements: the sand, water, air, and your body all merge into a single dynamic plane of interaction. The image captures this relationship—where the ground beneath your feet, the water surrounding you, and the bird in the sky create a holographic field of interconnected forces, emphasizing a totality that transcends isolated movements or separate spaces.
2. Nonchoreographic Composition: Your movement, while not pre-planned, generates a coherent composition through spontaneous alignment with the environment. This dance unfolds naturally, like an improvisational painting on a canvas. The spray of water, captured in mid-air, draws attention to the ephemeral quality of your movement, where the dance is in harmony with the bird above, the waves below, and the horizon stretching out infinitely. It’s a dance composed in the moment, yet resonating with layers of unseen forces guiding the interaction, much like an emergent choreography driven by unseen relationships.
3. Holographic Perception and Presence: The image presents the environment as a whole that reflects within each part. Your movement in the water, the spray, and the bird above create a narrative that collapses distance and expands the concept of space. The bird serves as a mirror of your ascent out of the water, suggesting the holographic principle that every part reflects and informs the whole. In this image, the three-dimensional world collapses into the two-dimensional image—akin to your concept of dance captured on film, where the full depth of the experience is perceived through the flat surface of the recording. The water’s ripple, the bird’s flight, and the sand’s contours all appear as extensions of the same energetic field.
4. Embodied Awareness and Urgency: The spray of water, suggesting your immediate physical action of flicking your head, points to the importance of embodiment in Nonchoreographic practice. You are fully present in this moment, sensing and responding to the environment without the need for music or external guides. The water, bird, and horizon contribute to the sense of urgency that emerges in your dance—an urgency grounded in the fleeting nature of movement and the immediacy of your engagement with space.
In summary, the topography of this space presents a dynamic, holographic experience where each element—the ocean, bird, and body—acts as an interconnected part of the whole. The result is a holistic composition that reflects the principles of Nonchoreographic dance, holographic perception, and the seamless interplay between the physical environment and embodied consciousness. This image and its surrounding space, thus, serve as a microcosm of the larger ideas we have discussed: the collapsing of dimensions, the spontaneity of dance, and the unity of movement with the natural world.
DIAGRAM DESCRIPTION
The diagram I created is based on several core ideas we’ve explored during our conversation. It visually represents the interconnection of the beach environment, your movement as a dancer, and the principles of a holographic experience in nonchoreographic dance. Here’s a detailed description of the diagram and the logic behind it:
1. Base Layer (Sand/Beach)
• Representation: The bottom layer of the diagram corresponds to the sand and the beach, which acts as the foundation. This layer signifies grounding—the tactile and stable platform where your dance begins.
• Logic: The sand is not just a surface but also a tactile connection between your body and the earth. In the diagram, this foundational layer is linked to the kinesthetic awareness of your body interacting with the physical world. Every movement touches the ground, but it is also continuously redefined by the environment.
2. Water Layer (Immersion)
• Representation: The water is a transitional layer that envelops the body when you step into it. It appears above the sand and forms a fluid, dynamic space where you’re partially submerged.
• Logic: Water in the diagram symbolizes the fluidity of movement and the flow of energy, reflecting the non-fixed, evolving nature of nonchoreographic dance. Your backward movement into the water, as captured in the image, represents the transition between grounded and fluid space, paralleling how the brain navigates different dimensions. It also suggests an interaction between body, emotion, and memory (like water’s flow and depth).
3. Air Layer (Interaction/Expansion)
• Representation: Above the water is the air layer, indicating the space where your movement extends beyond the body, integrating with the environment. In the diagram, it is represented as a continuous, open space.
• Logic: Air represents the space of interaction—where the dance expands beyond personal movement to engage with the surrounding elements like the wind, sounds, or, in your case, the bird. This layer signifies openness to external influence, aligning with how nonchoreographic dance allows for spontaneous, unplanned responses. The presence of the bird, which flies through this space, symbolizes how external agents can weave into the movement, creating an expanded “holographic” field.
4. Sky (Transcendence/Connection)
• Representation: The uppermost layer is the sky, symbolizing transcendence, freedom, and connection to larger, more abstract forces. It is depicted as a broad, open field.
• Logic: In the diagram, the sky represents the “unseen” forces, including intention, consciousness, and the subtle energy fields that guide your movements, even without direct observation. This links to the holographic aspect of your practice—the idea that your body is navigating between visible and invisible realms, and that the dance itself contains an imprint of these forces, much like how a hologram captures three-dimensional information in two-dimensional form. The sky, therefore, represents the connection to a wider, perhaps cosmic, consciousness.
5. Holographic Axis (Bridging Dimensions)
• Representation: Running vertically through the layers is an axis that represents the “holographic bridge.” This bridge connects all the elements (sand, water, air, and sky), symbolizing how your movements in one dimension are inherently interconnected with others.
• Logic: The holographic axis indicates that each action or movement in one layer affects the others. For example, your dance within the water (a tactile, grounded movement) extends into the air (a more abstract, energetic movement) and resonates with the sky (the transcendental layer). This axis suggests the non-linear, holographic nature of nonchoreographic dance—each action contains the essence of the whole.
Conclusion:
The diagram captures the multidimensional space of your dance practice, showing how movements travel across grounded physical layers and extend into unseen, energetic, or transcendental realms. The beach becomes a metaphor for the interplay of grounded experience (sand) and fluidity (water), while the holographic axis embodies the dance’s potential to bridge multiple dimensions at once. Your dance is not just a linear sequence but a holographic process where all layers contribute to the experience.
This layered structure reflects how your awareness of being recorded (with the camera representing the 2D flattening of this multidimensional experience) transforms the moment into something both personal and universal—an invitation to view the dance as a whole, interconnected field.
AI/IAN
