We're busy here at ChoreoFest--Our annual 24-hour festival in Cambridge MA. Read below to find out what we're all doing, thinking, dancing, (sleeping?). Enjoy!
11pm: Monkeyhouse
by karen Krolak
I dug two themes out of the Anthropologie bag of ideas: Inifinite Regression and Missed Connections. Strangely both of these topics meshed with the added suggestions that our supporters had sent to us via facebook this week: Triangulation, Canine Agility Training, and the Revere Tornado.
Where to begin on this next part? A text message to a friend this afternoon, a friend who has been watching and encouraging my work for over twenty years now. He said, "I think you just typed the line that should be your inspiration for the piece...'I am doing much better though' which could transition from 'I have been such a mess." Then he continued, "I know your instinct would be to focus on the 'I am such a mess' part of the piece but in this case I might start with the ending and work the way back." It was a fabulous structure to tie our ideas around.
I could blather on with more stories of what has evolved in the last three hours but I need to get back to the studio before things begin to unravel.
1am: i'm nicole with the chifferobe tropigals and i am:
tired
drinking coffee
excited to continue
being pressured to write more by tropigal amanda
muah!
2am: This is Tyler Catanella here with Monkeyhouse. My company Paradise Lost participated in the ChoreoFest last year, and I'm having a very different (but still wonderful) experience with the event from the perspective of a collaborator. The mental exhaustion is much less than when I was leading and organizing my own company's piece, but the bodily pains and pangs have been kicked up a knotch this time around. I am thoroughly enjoying the Monkeyhouse process; their theatricality and improv-composition methods feel very familiar to the way I work with my company. Also, I think I've figured out a wonderful lil' ChoreoFest secret: if you don't stop eating, you don't get tired! Tah-daaah!
I am having a wonderful time back here in the Dance Complex connecting with some familiar faces, and remembering how much this event changed me as a choreographer exactly one year ago. This is the best marathon for any dance artist out there. I am eternally grateful, Luminarium!
Let's get yarnin' in the DC, Monkeyhouse!
...
hello,
this is nikki from luminarium.
the bagel bread sticks are amazing. having a blast. it is currently 2:36 so sorry for having improper grammar. Going back to work!! :)
xoxo gossip girl (nikki)
Heyhi
Currently it is 3:49 and I have been given permission to SLEEP IT IS A MIRACLE but there is serious concern I won't wake up for tech and that doesn't quite work if I sleep for the entirety of the piece. Maybe the first minute. We get to lie on a bed and yell into a fan and scurry around on a doily. I swear it all makes sense when you see it.
Aisha (Monkeyhouse (verytired(veryexcited)))
...
Oh heeeeey.
Lipstick Criminals here. We're in the home stretch, on our third or fourth wind. We've gone from super serious to super punchy and slapstick-y with our theme and choreo and we're getting sleepy... (it's after 4am) but we're gonna nail this thing to the wall, do some yoga, and get some zzzzs so we're ready to rock in a couple hours! Hope to see you in the audience!
xoxo
...
It's Kim of Luminarium Dance! It's just before 5am and we might be finished with our work. This roughly translates to I will change everything in the morning on these poor merciful dancers. I'm not sure how much brain power is left, but we just nixed the plan to have everyone wear drop-crotch pants which I think is a good sign. Rose is helping me with a little voice recording and we are getting punchy, and now is the time I wonder whether my piece is the tiniest bit dumb, or a good manifestation of the theme we pulled ("logical fallacies"... thanks, Mark Kranz). We are doing a little visual wacky philosophy lesson and just having fun. This is the time every year where I feel totally fortunate to call this my job, as I galavant through the halls of the Dance Complex. There is so much diverse awesome happening in the building!
Please come to the Culminating Concerts to support the creative process. More so this year than any other I am recognizing the importance of process, communication, community and spirit. That sounds a bit lame, but if you were locked in with us you'd understand!
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10am: Good morning, World! Merli here, another AD of Luminarium and the videographer of ChoreoFest. It has been such a blast once again having the excuse of filming to get a closer glimpse into the creative process of each group pushing through this festival. Whether started by concept, text, movement, or improv, these works speak to the abundance of creativity possible when given 12 hours to play/work in the studio, with another 12 to stage these freshly sculpted pieces. Congratulations to everyone involved, and for our readers at home, come join us! 2pm and 4pm.
