skills workshop 4: Versatile actor dancers- DV8
In this workshop I explored the combination o physical theatre (movement, gesture, prop and vocal) in the style of the company DV8. We explored a topical issue of the arrest of Rosa Parks in 1955 to coincide with today's campaign of black lives matter. This is really prominent as we are celebrating Black History month. We used the styles and techniques of DV8 to combine art forms to create thought provoking factual scenes.
DV8 like to take risks physically and topically by using taboo subjects for example sexuality, religion and tolerance/ intolerance. DV8 use a range of different dancers and even include dancers with disabilities. They reflect of real relationships and real themes at the time, they use verbatim to use the real dialogue taken from interviews. They use gestures, and physically demanding moves and lifts to challenge the 'norm'. They use the relationships between genders, people with different abilities and sexuality's and be able to control and convey the movements in different ways, they all combined their different art forms. With DV8's work you can clearly see the combination of different art forms, as their dances all differ from each other.
In 'Enter Achilles' (1996) DV8 explored into the male psyche and creating a cruel and funny piece of work. DV8 did their research for this work by going into multiple British pubs and watching men individually to create the perfect characters. They turned their dance into a short film rather than it just being on stage.
'To be straight with you' (2009) to a deeper look into tolerance/ intolerance, culture, religion and sexuality. DV8 used verbatim (which is words that people have said) from over 80 interviews to make this piece of work realistic as possible. In this piece of dance they used; music, dialogue, projections and props to show a perfromance on a stage rather than just a dance.
The final one we looked a 'cost of living' (2004). In this dance DV8 challenged the 'norm' and used the taboo subject of disability by having a man with disability as their main dancer. This show that DV8 are a company which involve rather than turn away from people who are different. This dance was also a short film rather than a dance on stage.
throughout the practical workshops I can clearly see that you have worked hard to understand the different styles and conventions the 3 different practitioners we looked at. You were able in your blog to describe their style, and how they can be considered a combined arts practitioner or company. Within each video and blog post, I can see that you can identify and perform as well as describe how they use a range of techniques within their professional pieces and you had clearly demonstrated these in your videos. You have also described the effective ways they combine elements together to create their pieces of professional work. Your confidence in your practical workshop performance grew each week and I am very pleased with your practical ability to display the conventions of each practitioner
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