Sabine Lesenneslesenne@gmail.com

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« Writing movement : kinetography Laban and traditional Dance in Chad. »

A work in progressCongrès WRAB Paris 2014

The Origins of the research

● My practice● A meeting● Research on writing (PhD, 2009)● Cinetography Laban training (Dance and music

academy of Paris) CNSMDP

How analyse these dances?

● System of Laban notation- the philosophy: body experience in an Holistic way : dance, body in work situation (effort theory), impact of environnement on bodies (modernity, urbanisation)

- Gradually he symbolises movement and gesture with a writing system

- decomposition of gestures

- a score of body movement like a score in music

A score example: a walk with arm movement

--> I need to understand, how to decompose movement in Chadian dances

--> be careful of westerner interpretation of movement and body representation

The effort

● Understand movement (at work) in factory

● quality of movement

● Vary the rhythms

The effort

"The study of movement deals with the spatial order of the limbs' trajectories in the kinesphere; it also deals with the relationship between the outward appearance of the movement and the internal attitude of the person moving. This attitude is apparent not only in the choice of trajectory or the use of a certain limb, but also in the dynamic accentuations that are chosen." Rudolf Laban "Dynamic Spaces"

« L’étude du mouvement traite de l’ordre spatial des trajets que les membres effectuent dans la kinesphère; elle traite aussi de la relation entre l’aspect extérieur du mouvement et l’attitude intérieur de celui qui bouge. Cette attitude ne se révèle pas seulement dans le choix d’un certain trajet ou dans l’usage d’un certain membre, mais se caractérise aussi par le choix des accentuations dynamiques." Laban, Espaces Dynamiques

The effort

Axes of analysis in "effort": The time, the space, the weight, the flow

links between movement and symbolic, signification of choregraphy

- space: direct or indirect

- time: sudden or suspended

- weight: heavy (farm) or light

- flow: free or controled

The effort

● Exemple 1: "Strike(Knock)"space: directtime: suddenweight: ferme

● Example n°2: "dust"Space: directtime: suddenweight: léger

● Example n°3: "shake (tremble)"Space: directtime: suddenflow: free

African dances

● variety● Flow of energy● Symbolization of the immediate environment● Links with cultures or ritual

● African Ballets: ● following the independence of the country

● an artistic mediation to the Chadian traditional dances

Data

● Studied Collection (3 hours)

--> National Ballet of Chad dances

Ritual dances

Festives dances

● Youtube Vidéo

6 dances by national ballet of Chad

Méthodology

● Intensive viewing (analysed by effort grid)

● Interviews with Chadian artists and dancers(contextual information)

● Synthesis of information

First results

● Esthetic of energy

Importance of the free flow, origin of movement in vertebral spine

● Versus Esthetics of the shape in classical dance

● Vertebral spine

Breastbone and pelvis: two motors (dynamic centers) in African dance

Breastbone and pelvis: two motors (dynamic centers) in African dance

Kolbet dance

Male initiatory dance (exit of initiation; Need to reassure; Reinstatement in the community)

South of the country

Serenity / lightness (Symbolized by the feather)

Rooting in the ground (The energy comes from the ground)

Knowledge of the gesture: repetition & Symbolic movement

● Spiritual context (perfect knowledge + places in the improvisation)

● Incorporated understanding● The African traditional dancer is in perpetual

dialogue with the cosmos, and as in any language, he respects the "words" but improvises, creates his "sentence" (Alfonse Tiérou)

● Baoundaye dance: Agrarian rite

Example: Baoundaye dance

● Bayan Dance: Dance of feminine initiation

Rooting in the ground

Secret of feminine ritual

Example: Bayan dance

Rythm dances: origin of tap dance ?

● The body as the musical instrument● The flow is not free any more but "controlled"

by the collective musical rhythm● Mbébé dance:

Mbébé Dance:

And so what?

● Laban --> The consideration of the internal and foreign aspects in the approach of the movement

Allows to consider the movement danced as an EXPERIENCE in the phenomenological sense of the term

● A display of living ( Derrida), a writing, a registration

Writing traditional african dance?

● What the Chadian dances register :● Energy --> motif notation● symbol (by repetition) --> traditional Laban Score +

effort symbol● musical space --> rythm notation

● Ontology creation for digitalization of a video collection (with FMSH Paris)