Ex...it!´95 - Idea & Concept

idea of concept:   
Since middle of the Eighties Japanese Butoh dance had an enormous and on-going impact on the European dance world. As internationally touring German-Japanese Butoh dance company since 1986 we lived with this development and would now like to propose and offer an inventory and exchange of experiences. A growing number of young Europeans are getting inspired by this Japanese expressional dance and are working more or less in the sense of Butoh woven into the roots of European cultures and expressions. To research this new generation of Butoh and other dancers, join them for an exchange of ideas, present their work by a dance project collaboration on a special subject as well as documenting it is the goal of this symposion.

occasion:   
    • preparation for "Ten Years After", a Butoh symposion & festival of Künstlerhaus Bethanien 1996, 10 years after the 1st Butoh Festival in Berlin
    • research of the European Butoh dance scene, ascertain a status quo
    • desire for exchange of thoughts and work
    • desire for meeting and coming to know each other, widening the artistic view

location/ time schedule:
    • 31.7.-13.8.1995 symposion and realisation of project at Schloß Bröllin, the International Theatre and Arts Research Centre in Mecklenburg-Vorpommern
    • successively digestion of the project by record, video production, press documentation, documentation brochure, preparation of "Ten Years After" project 1996 and exchange/collaboration with European artists, organisations and networks to extend the project all over Europe.

cooperating organizers:
       • tatoeba e.V.-THÉÂTRE DANSE GROTESQUE Berlin/Tokyo
       • Schloß Bröllin/ International Theatre Research Loc. e.V.
       • Künstlerhaus Bethanien Berlin

art directors:        Yumiko Yoshioka & delta RA'i
administration directors:    Peter Legemann & Kristine Schütt

frame:   
    • invitation of professional european Butoh dancers
    • invitation of Japanese Butoh dancers who live and work in Europe as observers and experts
    • invitation of interested European artists of other disciplines (musicians, painters, sculpturers etc.), who want to contribute their work as an integrating ingredient to the whole collaboration concept.

subject/title:   
    Ex... it! is an invitation to explore the 'ex'-pressions: Experiment it! Express it! Expand it! Extinguish it! Explore it! Extract it! Exchange it! Exclude it! Exhibit it!         Extend it! Exaggerate it! Export it! Expose it! ...

    Do it! is the request. Every dancer or group will work on a specific ex... -pression and create their own contribution.
    The ex... is a very western orientated behaviour, which shows both ways of acting - positively lifting or negatively rejecting/recepting. In the images of the far east sprung Butoh dance the 'explosions' become artistically refined and reflected. Here traditional and actual behaviour within the different cultures of the participants can be researched, transformed, and expressed on very concrete examples: the dealing with the outside, the break-out, the ex &hop, the 'throwing out', extinguish, exile, freak out, the 'strangers out!'. From this starting point it will be possible to reflect a topic highly actual throughout Europe. Thus the project wil give the chance to explore new ways of communication between different cultures and people to participants and spectators and by documentation even to a wider interested audience.

work concept:
    The interested professional artists meet at Schloß Bröllin. The dancers will meet artists of other disciplines and countries and their work will be presented to them by  samples. After this two day long meeting period the development work of the dance and performance sequences for the final presentation weekend of the symposion starts. During this phase the emphasis lies on a general training with all participants exchanging trainers and lecture demonstrations.
    Several groups of interest or soloists will work on their specific subjects and free chosen spaces within the castles surroundings on their project performance.
    On top of this a workshop camp will be scheduled for beginners and interested non-professionals, whose participants get the chance to perform as extras in the final presentation.

staging:
    Stage space for the final presentation will be the total estate of Schloß Bröllin and surrounding rural areas like forests, park and fields as well as all buildings at the estate. Due to their age and structure they serve as an extraordinary and very interesting ambiente for any artwork. More informations are contained in the enclosed brochure.
    The artists choose an appropriate space, design it and work independently and self-directed on the realisation of their contribution to the final project performance. This will be presented during three days on the last weekend of the project (middle of August) as a station play. This means the audience will be led through the estate and play by 'performance guides', wandering in groups from station to station, which will be connected by the 'performance guides' telling a tale. The spectaculum is going to start at sunset in the open and will retreat into the buildings by nightfall, where after the multifold interpretations all artists combine to create a final image designed by collaboration of all participants.