Space Making Workshop 11/18

At the beginning of 2022, I started to reach out to many Japanese female dance artists in the United States. Because, over these 7 years of staying in the U.S., I realized how important to understand my upbringing in terms of refining a relationship with my cultural identity and dance-making. Therefore, I looked for someone who shares a similar background as me and is able to tell the struggles and success stories with me.

When I came to the undergraduate program in Oklahoma, I was the only international student, Asian student in the department. I was super visible and aware of my skin, body, and how I move. Regardless of the visibility of my ethnicity, I had never met anybody who immigrated from Japan and pursued a career as a dance maker. I also started to figure out that I have the ability to sense and understand the choreographer’s mind. For me, dancing to someone’s choreography is some kind of translation and also a transformation of myself to be their voice. On the other hand, dance-making is embodying my own creative voice. It was more difficult to process than translation. I felt I needed some assistance in understanding what is my creative voice, and how to polish it.

The generous artists named, Ayako Kato (Chicago IL) and Nami Yamamoto (NYC, NY) are willing to share the stories of their careers in dance-making in the United States. They are born and raised in Japan, and at some point in their life, they came to the U.S. and decided to stay here in the U.S. to pursue dance-making. Their decision itself is super brave to me but also they have been actively making work. Nami is awarded by Bessie Award in 2017 for her work, “Headless wolf” and Ayako just completed her performance series Ethos started in October 2022.

Photo: Nami Yamamoto (Left) and Ayako Kato (Right)

I communicated with them over 5 months about the idea of hosting a workshop to connect us as well as share their story in a public space. We named as “Space Making Workshop” to invite people to experience Nami and Ayako’s dance practice and have a conversation with them.

I organized the “Space Making Workshop” in November 2022 at the Ohio State University. Both artists traveled to Columbus for the first time on November 17th. The workshop was at the Barnett Theater from 3 to 5 PM. Nami started to make us move. She brings us to a circle and shifts weight from one leg to the other. Looking at each other, sensing each other’s weight. Naturally, we were smiling at each other. Nami incorporates puppetry in her work. She and I made the puppet on the site, and we offer participants to try puppetry. In Japanese puppetry, Bunraku is usually three puppeteer move one puppet. It’s coordination, communication, and storytelling. Next, following Ayako telling Japanese philosophy, Furyu (Wind and flow). Back to the circle, opened both arms, and breathe together. Found a partner and slowly improvised with music.

After all the movement sessions, we formed the circle at the Barnett Theater. I asked them prior to the workshop, What events/What things/who did shape them. It was so interesting to hear about their upbringing; what was important and affected them being who they are. As I write above, I felt my cultural identity always come forward more than myself. I was always grappling with authenticity and cultural representation. What does it mean to be an “Asian”, “East Asian”, or “Japanese” woman? I was curious to hear about their journey to think about the intersection between cultural identity and dance-making. Ayako is externally expressive about her choreographic inspiration which is based on the Japanese philosophy, Furyu while Nami doesn’t mention “Japanese culture” in her work. However, the way Nami communicated with dancers and how she utilized the space between dancers and movement phrases are informed by her college time in Ehime, Japan. No matter how much explicit their Japanese upbringing, both said “I am proudly being a Japanese woman making a dance work in the United States.”

During these intense two days, I spent a wonderful time sharing my and their story of struggles and successes. Moved and shared the space. Even though we were born and raised in different times and places, this workshop made a space for us to gather here, in Columbus, Ohio. Currently, we were working on a solo collaboration that I am going to share at the MFA thesis project showing on February 16th-18th 2023. Each artist oversees my work and creates the solo together with me over zoom and in-person studio rehearsal. I am excited to share our work at the end of my journey in the MFA program at Ohio State University.

Stay tuned!

Performance information is here -> https://dance.osu.edu/events/mfa-concert-0

Being analog -Documentation in Film Photography-

Archiving, Life logging, Research Project

I am always fascinated by black and white photography. The simplicity of color yet provokes the imagination of what scenery looks and feels. I cannot deny my mother’s influence. In our living room, wherever we move to, she always hangs two black and white photographs on the wall. I am always fascinated by black and white photography. The simplicity of color yet provokes the imagination of what scenery looks and feels. I cannot deny my mother’s influence. In our living room, wherever we move to, she always hangs two black and white photographs on the wall. These photographs are taken by Ansel Adams. Very detailed, slow-shatter speed, high contrast photographs show the beauty of nature.

In our world lives in, we prioritize speed. How quickly we can get to the goal, or achieve the results, find the fastest way to be successful… This semester, one of my favorite courses I am taking is the Darkroom photography course. The process of developing film photography in the darkroom teaches me how slow and delicate the process will assist in making the best result.

To see what you take in a film camera, start with developing the film roll to the negatives. Usually, the process takes 20-30 minutes. It required constant agitating with chemicals, almost like soothing the baby. The delicateness and slow porcess make a magic.
There is one time, when I tried to develop the negatives by class time, I rushed the process and destroyed them… If negatives don’t develop well, all data turned out all black and will not restore the image. Also, it is impossible to recreate the moment you snap a photo. It gives you not only the sallow but the sense of loss. Same as human memories. We forget and lose someone, something, or some events in our life if we do not imprint them in our brains or recall them. These memories will vanish in the dark.

After finishing making negatives, it’s time to make the prints. In the darkroom, use an enlarger to light up one negative on a printing paper. It requires experimenting with the duration of exposure time to get the preferred tone of color. The longer exposure to the light, the darker the color gets. Similar to human skin.
After lighting up the negative on the paper, the print goes through 3 chemicals; developers, stop-bath, and fix. Sink it in each chemical tray for a couple of minutes with constant agitation. Finally, after all the processes, you are out of the darkroom and able to see the result.

The pictures above are the moments from my rehearsal. I documented when dancers talked about their stories about their memorable objects. Looking at the prints, no matter how much movement inside the frame, they exist at the exact moment when I snap the camera. It’s almost like the camera froze the time. The sense of time is totally different in film photography compared to photos on the digital camera or on the phone. I see this difference as the magic of being analog. This analog technology makes time tangible. It is interesting how humans create film photography to capture the fragment of time. We have a desire to conserve the time slipping through us. And for me, using analog technology such as film photography gives me an opportunity to re-think the definition of time and understand the meaning of documentation. Going through all the processes with many hours to print one frame of negative is more meaningful than an instant snap by the phone.

START -The last year of my MFA journey-

Archiving, Life logging

The last year of my MFA journey started this Monday. Time flies so fast. I cannot believe that it has been already 2 years studying at Ohio State University.

What has changed?

There has been a huge shift in my dance career. I injured my knee over the summer and I cannot fully capable of dancing by end of this year. The first thing I learned was how to rest by sensing and managing the pain. The second thing I re-learned was how to walk. Walking is like breathing in daily life so I have never paid attention to my bones and muscle that are utilized in walking. This injury made me feel like I was aging back to be a baby, which is very refreshing and I appreciate more about the human body more. It also drew my attention to somatic movement practice such as Bartenieff Fundamentals (which I am excited to teach this Fall 2022). The surgery was successful and after 9 weeks of surgery, I can walk without crutches and climb stairs without pain.

Through this recovery journey, I had to ask myself,

“Why do I want to keep dancing?

First of all, I came too far to stop my dance journey. If I may speak bluntly, I am very stubborn so I don’t want to quit. I came to the U.S., finished my B.F.A. in Dance Performance, and I am here in Columbus to wrap up my Master’s degree in DANCE! Dance has always been in my life and no matter what I decided to live a life with dance. Dance is my priority, love, passion, and something I see myself can contribute to the world.

Dance is an underestimated subject if you are in school, underestimated career if you work as a dancer, and underestimated research topic if you are in academia. Not many people understand how much we dedicate our effort, labor, and time to use dance to challenge the world.

Even though the dance population is huge, the people who use dance as a lifestyle are very few. I am fortunate to be surrounded by people who dance with their life. In my last year as a dance student as OSU, I will prepare to go out to the world and make a community of dancers who create change beyond borders and cultures.

Reflection of Transcendence -時を超えて- 4/16/2022

Performance, Research Project

I have been searching for who I am as an artist. And getting into the beginning stage of my thesis, I pondered the experience of being a Japanese female contemporary artist in the United States. I have my own unique experience of how did I arrive at this point in my life. However, I was curious to hear the story of precedents.

Over this spring semester, I have researched one Japanese female contemporary artist, Saeko Ichinohe. Saeko Ichinohe came to the U.S. in 1968 and since then she performed/choreographed/taught dance as a cultural exchange experience. She was inspired by Japanese culture, philosophy, poems, and literature. She was well-known for bridging Western concert dance and Nihon Buyoh (Japanese traditional dance). She passed away in 2021 though I was fortunate to access her choreography through Labanotation. I chose “Chidori” because she notated the choreography by herself in 1972. I wanted to know her movement pattern through how she notates.

I asked for help with reading scores from Dr. Williams and my cohort, Forrest Hershey. We met two times a week to read and move our bodies to connect with Ms.Ichinohe kinesthetically. She emphasized the location and direction of the weight. Weight drives the movement the most and clearly draws the space between two dancers. “Chidori” is a love story between a fisherman and a bird, so I imagined that she has a specific instruction to deliver this story.

I wanted to know more about her artistic journey outside of notation score. I have researched her online yet there were only a few materials available. Then I found out that there are a couple of her personal archives are stored at New York Public Library. So, I decided to go to New York City in March to trace her footsteps. At the library, I watched many video recordings and read her artistic statements, CV, company record, and choreography notes. All the materials help me to understand her deeper than it used to be. Also, I visited all the locations she filed as her company locations and performance venues. Even though our paths did not cross, through her archives I could know her and her passion deeply. Sharing the same space where she practiced, performed, and choreographed was meaningful to me. I summarize my research journey on Saeko Ichinohe in a short documentary film.

Tracing her footsteps made me think about how I want to proceed with my career as a contemporary performing artist. Ms.Ichinohe made the most of her Japanese upbringing and integrated it with her primary dance training; ballet, and modern dance. I have a similar background in former movement practice as her. Although, I have a huge resistance to being perceived to be unique because of my cultural heritage. I was born and raised in Tokyo, Japan where I can encounter many people visit from around the world. And since I came to the United States in 2016, I have absorbed multiple cultures into my body. However, I cannot get rid of the labels such as “female”, “East Asian,” and “Japanese” from my body. When I stand on the stage my body speaks out louder than who I am. Therefore, dancing serves me how to free myself from the labels. How I can challenge my audience to see my authenticity that is coded in the movements that I create. This question was the start of my solo practice.

The research journey concluded on 4/16 performance “Transcendence -時を超えて-” with amazing collaborators, Columbus Koto Ensemble/ Forrest Hershey/ Yujie Chen. I also have huge thanks to Dr. Williams, the Institute of Japanese Studies, and the Center for Ethnic Studies to make this performance happen.

What’s next?

1/3 of the Fall 2021 -Beginning of the 2nd year-

Research Project

Time flies so fast. I started the 2nd year of my MFA program. It’s been like a jet coaster ride: running around, ups and downs with full speed.

There are many ”new” things happening this fall semester. 1) I am teaching two movement classes jazz and ballet for non-major students, 2) fully in-person classes, 3) living with one of my cohorts…. so many ”first time”!! It is exciting but exhausting at the same time.

My challenge for this semester is to ground myself and preparing for the fruits of this MFA journey. The starting of my 2nd year feels fresh like my 1st year since we are shifting to fully in-person class. COVID is still a thing however I definitely have a strong community that I can rely on and deeper creative thoughts.

In Japan, there is a quote from Zeami,

“初心忘るべからず。=Don’t forget your first resolution. Always keep your mind open and evolvIng.”

Zeami established Noh, which is the oldest traditional performing arts in Japan. He mentioned in his book saying obtain one art form takes a lifetime. As a movement practitioner, this word hits me hard. It tells me the importance of rooting myself and reminding where and why I started this journey with dance.

My hope this semester is to deepen my understanding of the relationship between me and dance. I have been dancing for almost 22 years yet there are many things I need to learn to expand. However, if I keep looking up and forget the root, I will lose my growth and eventually fall.

Reminder: Pause and look down where you arrive at. Finding the connection to the ground and feel the root/the heart where everything starts from.

Sitting at the riverside -12 hours into 2 minutes-

Choreography Workshop

Time is an interesting element of life. Everyone has 24 hours a day, but depends on your situation, you feel and experience it at a totally different time speed.

I thought a lot about time during the quarantine. Society seemed to stop or slow down when the pandemic hit. Each day felt dragged out and tried to fill the emptiness at first. However each day my schedule was fluid. I could do whatever I wanted to with no time limitations. With this freedom, I was able to try new things and explore many possibilities.

Now I am in a graduate program, and my daily schedule looks completely different. From morning until night, my schedule revolves around my classes, appointments, meetings, get resources at the library, and teaching Japanese in the breaks between everything. Now more than ever, I realize the importance of time management and the effect it has on one’s future.

Speaking of time, I recently committed to stay and film myself for 12 hours at the riverside. It was for one of the assigned prompt “durational work” for the Choreography Workshop course. I would like everyone to check my video before reading my story at the riverside. –> https://vimeo.com/463212300
The process was almost like therapy to me. My initial idea for this piece was that I commit to being somewhere for 12 hours from sunrise to sunset and I move the exact same way and shoot myself every 30 minutes. The piece is not about me, about the time passing around me. I am part of the narrative.

I woke up at 6:30 am and biked to the riverside. I found the perfect place on my way to Laura’s rehearsal at the Chadwick Arboretum (I will write about her project later. It has been an amazing journey!) Set up the tripod, check the time constantly, and the angle of the camera. Started film when the clock hits 7:30 am. Every 30 minutes, I get up, move, and film. It was very simple. The same simpleness that I had during the quarantine.

In the morning, the sun had not yet and it was cold. The only I could hear was the wave of the water. Everything around me felt as if it were still asleep. I felt all my senses were awakened. I could hear the birds swimming, feel the brisk morning air coming off the river, see the sky brighten up from blue to purple to orange. All the changes I witnessed were beautiful. The higher the sun was up, the more people and birds visited the river, cars, and airplanes passed by, and the bugs flew around. I could tell the town woke up from sleep.

Sitting at the riverside for this long period, I was expected to be exhausting. However, surprisingly, I was not. This 30 minutes check-in was helping me to keep my time tracking and it was a consistent indicator of my time at the river. Some of the 30 minutes slots, I was very productive and able to finished some of my assignments from dance film class, research class, and composition class even though I did not have access to the internet, and some of them I just observed birds. There were ducks, geese, great egrets living at the river. As time passed, they swam super close to me and looked at me like “what is this human doing for so long at our territory?” Especially ducks were friendly and their curiosity and my curiosity seemed matched. Super fun imitating their neck movement and made eye contact.

I finished at 7:30 pm. Overall, I shot 25 clips of me moving for 12 hours. The sun is completely out and just the sound of the crickets echoing at the river. The night wind blew to my face and I was satisfied with the accomplishment of being at the riverside for 12 hours.

I went back home and started editing and I noticed that my labor at the riverside and the final product does not have equal quality. It looked choppy when I put together all the clips. I was disappointed. It was my fault not to study enough of filming to capture the progress of time, but I did not want to shoot in timelapse which I thought ruined my movement. I learned that it is great to do all the options first then choose what is the most appropriate to use in the piece. I could not quite express how much I put my effort to be at the riverside for 12 hours in the film, yet sum up my 12 hours into 2 minutes was meaningful and worthwhile to record as my creative process.

Trust fall -Beginning of my MFA journey-

Choreography Workshop, Uncategorized

Even though I have been dancing my entire life, I did not have dailiness in creating a process. The facts of being the youngest and the fewer life experiences as a dance artist in the cohort are definitely standing a huge wall in front of me. I do not regret my choice and I am excited to see how much I can absorb and grow through the program. Though, I have to admit that coming to the MFA program straight from the undergraduate program would be a challenge. I have to remind myself that this challenge is getting inspirations from amazing, talented cohorts, not take into recognizing my immatureness and fall into self-criticism.

When I look back on my choreography progress, I tend to use choreography as embodying internal struggles so that I always wait to proceed with the process until the ideas come into my mind. It takes a long time to ferment them. However, when I have ideas to work on, I am very spontaneous and open-mind trying them all to find the ‘fit’ in the context. Also, I am lean into concrete presentation than abstract.

In the Choreography Workshop lead by Susan Petry, we are assigned to create 8 pieces (at least!) in about 14 weeks. This is a huge challenge for me. I believe this course will force me to generate ideas within my daily life by keeping my eyes open to every possibility and allow myself to explore, investigate, analyze, and fail them. Because there is no time to ferment the ideas!

It would be great to have a “plan” to tackle this huge assignment, although holding on to the authority to make the task right and using space and time efficiently along with a plan might limit myself. I have to keep going and let the decision to make, not me deciding what to do. Letting go of the control and allow the freedom to play which I will get messy and repeat trials and errors. To learn how to make the balance to manage myself in this short period of time would be one my goal.

Also, this is related to my habit of controlling, I am always scared to show the work in progress which is raw and vulnerable. For me, I’m very affected by others’ eyes, opinions, thoughts. What if the audience did not get the intention of my work? What if they take it as offensive? What if they think my art is worthless? So many what-ifs. I get scared to show my works because most of them are sharing the private experiences. However, I would like to practice to trust the community and let the fear go.

I hope this journey through the program will help me develop and obtain a deep understanding of my identity of art-making. Let’s do a trust fall to the MFA program!!

Yukina Sato

A mosaic of Japanese female contemporary dance artist's life

MFA program