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I happened to stumble across something odd (and I mean it in a positive way, as I haven’t heard about something similar and I think it really impressive). I’m writing about a Butoh dance project called “Hanging Event”, performed by Sankai Juku (one of the most renowned Japanese Butoh ensembles) – four bald figures, whitened all over with rice powder, hanging and “dancing” down buildings:

Alexandra Paszkowska: Hanging Down 01, New York © A. Paszkowska

Hanging down on ropes in fetal positions, the dancers are lowered to the ground over a certain span of time (30mins, e.g.), accompanied by meditative sounds like whale sounds.

I haven’t found much information about these “Hanging Events” in particular (other shows by Sankai Juku are much more reflected and commented on in the www, if anybody is interested to google… , youtube provides footage on several stage shows), though a lot about Butoh in general (collection of essays about Butoh on butoh.net).  I will publish an article about Butoh and Butoh photographs soon on Art and Events (sorry, in German only).

Alexandra Paszkowska: Hanging Down 02, New York © A. Paszkowska

Nevertheless: the New York project is called “Jomon Sho”, created and first performed in 1982, and since then again in different cities, Paris, Edinburgh, Los Angeles,….

An article in the New York Times by Anna Kisselgoff in 1986 writes as follows:

“For change is very much a motif in ”Jomon Sho.” Its title in translation, ”Homage to Prehistory,” suggests the existence of some kind of history – the production as a whole is the story of evolution. Typical of the Butoh school, it is concerned with creation and destruction. Cataclysm is part of the cycle and the most evocatively terrifying image here is one that features four fishlike creatures starting up to stare into the bright glow emanating from the wings while a thundering sound rumbles on. We next see Mr. Amagatsu himself as a foreshortened mutant, a body that later breaks apart before our very eyes.

The Bomb is never remote from the consciousness of Butoh. The very lack of remoteness between such images and the events of the last week in the Soviet Union is self-evident.

”Jomon Sho” uses a structure and style that are starkly ritualistic. Combined with Expressionist techniques, it is very much a ritual meant to draw in the audience on a ceremonial level. There are two huge rings that might symbolize the sun and moon, giving the seven episodes a universal cast.”

A video of a performance in Paris:

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=z5phfF4qUlU]

Not an undangerous performance: During one performance in Seattle 1985, one of the dancers’ rope gave way and the dancer, Yoshiyuki Takada fell to death ( an essay with a personal description and reflexion by Michelle Dent, I found online in a google book preview of Ordinary Reactions to Extraordinary Events, ed. by Ray Broadus Browne, Arthur G. Neal, 2001 ).

Sankai Juku Website

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Alexandra Paszkowska: Schottland Highlands 07 © A. Paszkowska

A note about the photographs by Alexandra Paszkowska:

The photographer made an amazing series about Sankai Juku in the 1980s, when observing the group at performances and during tours in the USA, Scotland, and at historic Neuschwanstein Castle in Germany.

Her photographs are energy-laden, bizarre, and surprisingly aesthetical and catch the complex expressivity and the spirit of Butoh.

Even Andy Warhol has been impressed by Paszkowska’s works and commented on them in his magazine “Interview”. Her photographs were presented in museums all over the world and can presently be seen in a photo gallery near Munich (Wasserburger Fotogalerie).

In January (13.01.09 – 31.01.09), Michael Hoppen Contemporary, London, shows photographs by John Davies, an English photographer known for his narrative shots of British landscape. “His black and white photographs show the vast, complex and majestic scenery of industrial and post industrial Britain. He establishes classical geometries within his unique vision that take on a mystical appeal. His works are coolly detached and seductive, showing moments of calm and quiet amidst the inevitable change of the modern landscape.” (quote by MH Contemporary)

House 1 1993 © John Davies courtesy of Michael Hoppen Gallery Silver Gelatin Print 30 x 42 inches

In 1993, Davies made a series of 9 photographs which portray “House”, a public scultpure by Rachel Whiteread, winner of the renowned Turner Prize in 1993 and the first woman to be awarded.

Whiteread is best known for her sculptures  which are actually casts: “In the late 1980s, Rachel Whiteread began casting the ‘negative spaces’ inside and underneath domestic objects and soon moved on to architectural features and entire rooms.” (quote by MH Contemporary)

John Davies: House 8 1993 © John Davies courtesy of Michael Hoppen Contemporary Silver Gelatin Print 30 x 42 inches

House (1993), perhaps Whiteread’s best known work (according to wikipedia.com), was a concrete cast of the inside of an entire Victorian terraced house completed in autumn 1993, exhibited at the location of the original house — 193 Grove Road — in East London (all the houses in the street had earlier been knocked down by the council).

“Whiteread created the work by spraying liquid concrete into the building’s empty shell before its walls were removed. The work became a temporary monument to lost communities and a focus for public debate before it was demolished in January 1994. It stood alone as a symbol of survival, as all the other houses in Grove Road had already been knocked down to make way for redevelopment.”

“The House project was commissioned by the public works organisation Artangel. Whiteread asked Artangel to commission Davies to make some pictures for a limited edition book to record what was her largest and most ambitious work to date.” (quote by MH Contemporary)

Davies photographs are all that remains of house, site and sculpture. His photographs document the site of the condemned building, documenting the scaffolding going up, the cement ‘ghost’ of the building, and finally, the empty space the structure occupied.

John Davies Rachel Whiteread HOUSE

13.01.09 – 31.01.09

Michael Hoppen Gallery
3 Jubilee Place,
London SW3 3TD