Performance Workshop: eArt festival and Transart
Arthub is producing a series of new collaborative artworks for Shanghai eArt festival and Transart. Patience for the Man is born, following a number of workshops to explore the possibility of an open creative interdisciplinary production, where the “actors” could come to know each other and generate new artistic content, meaning and directions.
These workshops went on all summer in three steps:
The first one saw the artists working together from May 23rd to May 30th in the BizArt center, Shanghai.
The second one was done in June at the Shanghai Conservatory. The artists were able to work in the Conservatory thanks to the support of eArt Festival. At the end of a 3 day workshop the artists gave a full rehearsal in H Space for two nights.
The third one just finished in preparation for the first presentation on the 19th of October 2008. This will take place at 8:30 pm on a stage specifically created for the occasion in Xujiahui park.
Alizia Borsari introduced a new dramaturgy to the dancers. Select visual artists were asked to go beyond their medium and to experience new techniques of expressions more affiliated to “decontextualized emotions.” The result is a multi-media presentation–a live performance within a musicscape. Both B6 and Aaajiao performed live together with the dancers on a stage created by the architect duo Wang Zhenfei and Wang Luming. The presentation still requires further development, which the performers hope improve upon in the future.
This collaborative way of working in a multi-disciplinary context is fairly new in China. Only few experiences like this one where usefully put in place in the last decade. As Els Silvrants of Theatre in Motion writes: “In this respect this program, will create a localized partnership with artists from various disciplines that traditionally are not communicating enough at a creative level. The projects presented are interested in creating connections and clusters in China that are able to go beyond themselves to the public in other places.”
Els Silvrants continues, “Working with the right partners, in a collaborative effort, establishing in effect a network based on artistic integrity, quality standards and an equal sense of professionalism provides artists, curators and the audience in China and Europe with an important point of reference. It allows for a context to grow in China, while events and exhibitions in Europe about China, can draw upon a solid knowledgable framework rooted in the local scene. Providing this will allow for a more in-depth image of the situation in China than we unfortunately often come across in larger Chinese festivals and exhibits in Europe.”
Participants:
B6, music composer; Alizia Borsari, art director/performer, Beijing; Aaajiao, new media artist and computer programming, Shanghai; Nunu, dancer, Shanghai; Ling Xi, Dancer, Shanghai; Wang Zhenfei and Wang Luming, architects and concept designers, the Netherlands; He Yiming, graphic designer, Shanghai
