I spent the weekend in the theater, directing Ryder Cooley’s production of Xmalia. For the past number of years, my theater has been the arena, dancing with horses. It is good to get back inside for a bit.
The theater is a good place to look for light. Literally, figuratively. My focus with this production is to find the light within the dark themes of extinction and mourning. To bring each of the performers into their individual, specific lightness of being. And doing that in such a way that the shadows are also revealed, the spaces between, the interstial illuminations. That is how the work can surprise us with little moments that shake the heart, as well as the big ravishing ones.
On Sunday, January 8, C. Ryder Cooley is bringing her show, Xmalia, to the Silvermine Arts Center in New Canaan, CT.
I first met Ryder when I interviewed her for my book. A friendship bloomed, and I have since been helping her with direction and choreography for her lovely show.
Ryder is a serious artist who creates and inhabits worlds that are both whimsical and deadly. Xmalia explores themes of extinction in film, song, movement and trapeze. Among her subjects are deer gigantus, tiger, butterflies and the tragic dodo. Joining her onstage are her band of musicians and the exquisite Lady Moon.
Ryder calls her work “tragedy cabaret,” a description I find apt and provocative. Showtime is Sunday at 5:00. You will not be disappointed.
postscript: Breaking into Blossom begins January 23. It is an online, five-week meditation on moving into an improvisational life. There will be assignments, conversations and surprises. Join us!
For those of you who have not visited the RIDE site, here is a bit of what we call horse dancing. What I want to call attention to is the attunement, the listening, and the conversation between bodies. That is what has always been important to me about this work.
Escorial (aka Pony, and yes, he has his own page) is the equine performer. He is trained as a liberty horse (no restraint) by the brilliant Sarah Hollis of Tintagel Andalusians.We have worked with Pony and Sarah for nearly five years. I think of it as the yoga of the herd. Learning how subtle a signal is required to create a profound shift in Pony’s movement. Rehearsals are humbling, because despite our dancerly skills, our ability to communicate in herd-speak is always in need of improvement. Sarah, being the alpha mare, keeps all of us in line.
Why this might be important to non-horse people: Since 87% of our communication is non-verbal, figuring out what we are communicating with our movement seems like a good idea.
For example, my horse Amadeo is majorly spooky. For a long time, I thought he might be autistic because his reactions seemed so disproportionate to what was happening around him. My godson is autistic, and I have had a similar difficulty in decoding his responses. What I finally understood is that Amadeo’a responses were precisely calibrated to his perception of the situation because he is hyper-aware of movement and the underlying emotional landscape. And in order to be around him, I had to become hyper-aware too, but not tense, not nervous. That is a very nuanced and subtle dance, requiring some deep inner and outer listening. And that is horse dancing.
A new feature of this blog is that each week I am going to point you toward something delicious. This week it is the strandbeest of Dutch artist Theo Jansen. Many of you probably know about him, but when I saw this I thought, “This is a different kind of horse!” A windhorse. And of course I wanted to dance with it.
The beest has a sophisticated anatomy with muscles and even a stomach, with names like Animaris Percipiere! There is even a rhinoceros beest.
What I love about horse dancing is that it is unpredictable. I imagine that the strandbeest on a good windy day would give us a lot of improvisation opportunities. And that a group of about 20 dancers would create a pretty interesting beest themselves!
Photo: Jeffrey Anderson, from RIDE with Escorial and Deanna Pellecchia
