Collaborative Choreography: Experimenting with a multi-modal approach

Eila Goldhahn, Independent Artist and Scholar, Visiting Professor at the Performing Arts Research Centre, Theatre Academy, Helsinki
Soili Hämäläinen, Head of Performing Arts Research Centre, Theatre Academy, Helsinki
Leena Rouhiainen, Academy Research Fellow,  Performing Arts Research Centre, Theatre Academy, Helsinki

Introduction

This paper describes the setting up of a new research project at the Performing Arts Research Centre, Theatre Academy, Helsinki. Its original presentation at the Sibelius Academy as part of the interdisciplinary conference Embodiment of Authority (2010) served to stimulate discussion, questions and suggestions. The paper traces these early developments of the group.

The Collaborative Choreography Group was formed by Dr. Eila Goldhahn, Dr. Soili Hämäläinen and Dr. Leena Rouhiainen in 2009 in Hamburg in order to develop an approach to choreographing that surpasses the singular authority of the choreographer and that is uncompromisingly shared, open-ended and emergent in nature. In the case of the Collaborative Choreography Group it also involves the use of digital media and web-based tools whilst collaborates were both in close proximity as well as in different geographical settings.

The group first aimed to learn more about collaborative creativity within dance improvisation and choreographing while working as a team. Then its intention was to open the process into a more collective dimension by networking with other arts professionals and social groups. At the conference the group was physically represented by Leena Rouhiainen and Soili Hämäläinen sharing video-footage and commentary on the very early phase of the collaboration. Its purpose was to point out some of the group's guiding principles and to share documentation of the early stage of a collaborative artistic research process that aimed to abdicate the single authority of the choreographer/art-maker. For the purposes of this on-line publication the original video-footage (which was shown as a back drop to the spoken presentation at the Sibelius Academy) has been further edited down to stills and smaller clips that are referred to within the text and can be played alongside the reading. 

Background

The joint interests to explore a collaborative form of choreography spring from the contemporaneous approaches to dance-making that

1) underline that choreography is a shared and relational practice of ordering and structuring human movement and its significance in different environments,

2) recommend immediate forms of choreography that take place collaboratively and spontaneously within certain settings of dance and movement improvisations,

3) increasingly utilize digital media and social networking systems as choreographic devices and forums and

4) advocate a social form of choreography and discusses choreographers as frame-makers. (Butterworth & Wildschut 2009; Klien et. al. 2008.)

The latter view relates to choreography as an inter-disciplinary, creative and socio-political act of  “setting humans, actions, ideas and thought in relation to one another, to create or reveal order, channel energies, explore dynamics and create conditions for something to happen“ (Klien & Valk 2008, 20-21). This is an approach that has inspired the group’s thinking. Additionally,  in its work the second view on dance-making relates to pioneering movement therapist Janet Adler's  (2002) notion of “Collective Body”, a specific movement improvisation part of the discipline of Authentic Movement, in which participants spontaneously create group dances. 

The Collaborative Choreography Research Group believes that truly collaborative undertakings are considered to be open-ended and involve a shared manner of problem-solving and moving-forward with the work (Leinonen 2009). The group also shares general starting points with the so-called devising-method.  Theatre director Alison Oddey (1994) defines devising performances as a particular form of open-ended collaboration that originates from the interests and interactions of a specific group. It includes working and persevering with the ”process (finding the ways and means to share an artistic journey together), collaboration (working with others), multivision (integrating various views, beliefs, life experiences, and attitudes to changing world events), and the creation of an artistic product” (Oddey 1994, 3; see also Hämäläinen & Rouhiainen 2009). This process demands commitment, sharing responsibilities and interests as well as active initiatives, inputs as well as adaptations from all members of a group.

The Collaborative Choreography Research Group’s work is framed by the expertise, skills and interests of its members. Eila Goldhahn's method of MoverWitness Exchange (Goldhahn 2009a; 2009b; 2007) together with its tool of Camera-Witnessing offers the group a framework that enables non-directive movement improvisation as well as non-judgmental and participative-observative reception of the danced material. It likewise offers an approach to documenting movement and its verbal reflection. Soili Hämämälinen's (2007; 1999) interest in the nature of bodily knowledge focuses on perception, sensations and feelings as a source for creative work. In her view bodily knowledge provides the ability to remember, reproduce and create movement. Leena Rouhiainen (2010a; 2010b; 2008) in turn has explored artistic research as a collaborative and performative venture together with artists working in the field of the performing arts . She is interested in collaborative creativity, the emergent nature of artistic processes and co-relative knowledge production. 

When a creative group works together, it creates and operates through mutually built up routines. These are those that each member brings from previous experiences as well as those ones which are drawn from new conventions arising from the group working together. These form creative interactions and eventually become what could, after educational theorist Etienne Wenger (1998), be called a community of practice. This is a system of activity amongst participants who share a specific engagement and so develop meanings of what is done together. In this process the group creates a shared repertoire of skills and thereby ways of solving problems; they create a meaningful understanding of the world and their own practice together (Wenger 1998).

In Wenger’s view participation in a community of practice deals also with a construction of identity, which is known to be an important part of any learning process. To learn is to become through active participation (Standal 2009). Embedding artistic learning in a collaborative artistic process allows for learning experiences that are shaped by participation. They are neither completely internalized nor externalized, but located in an ongoing relational process of becoming, namely between the subjectivity of the learner and the negotiative and meaningful constructive activities of the collaborators (Standal 2009). Each group member thus becomes a skilful participant in the collaboration. She expands her artistic knowledge and enhances her capacity to interact artistically (Räsänen 2000). This is what the Collaborative Choreography Research Group aims to accomplish in one of its future work phases.

Creating a new kind of community of practice involves a willingness by all participants to engage in a mutual process as well as openness, trust and sensitivity to each other’s acts and reactions. These features relate to feelings of acceptance, reciprocity and safety in human interaction and relationships (Parviainen 2006). They also imply a willingness to follow the initiatives of other group members without a judgmental attitude but with positive curiosity. Approaching creative and collaborative work in this manner allows for flexible integration of individual effort of the group members and a sense of not being alone in the struggle to create. Then group members can indeed co-participate and share the uncertainty of their open-ended endeavors together (Moran & John-Steiner 2004). 

Our Work-in-Progress

Open-ended conversations about our plans and processes are currently our way of realizing the above-mentioned goals and/or principles. These verbal and written communications are likewise supported by studio-based meetings in which we utilize artistic working methods. We have found ourselves  brain- and body-storming – the latter being about emotional, sensory and motional observations and expressions of bodily behaviours and acts (Linds & Vettraino 2008).

The method that Eila Goldhahn has introduced to the group is an approach that evolved from elements of the therapeutic practice of Authentic Movement (Adler 2002). It applies improvisatory movement and movement observation tasks from Adler's Discipline of Authentic Movement within the field of artistic research, the MoverWitness Exchange (Goldhahn 2007). Camera witnessing in turn applies the principles of being a witness (in the sense of these practices) into camera-recording of a mover’s actions. Put simply, Camera witnessing utilizes a single perspective and applies a non-judgmental attitude and positive regard towards the seen. This can be movers improvising or other subjects and/or objects. What makes it distinctive is the humane and soft gaze that is applied whilst using a camera. (Goldhahn 2007.)

Above-mentioned methods appear to support the emergence of creative understanding of both the groups' shared processes and each individual’s experiences and acts. In the MoverWitness Exchange all participants are simultaneously potential witnesses and movers. They can respond spontaneously to the group by becoming movers and decide when to withdraw from moving to be witnesses to the group. Each mover, in pursuit of their own pathway and movement pattern that is ‘correct’ to them at any given moment in time, is also open to the collective sound scape and kinaesthetic landscape, constantly responding and contributing to collective needs as they unfold. Participants are active members of a constantly evolving collective movement image. (Goldhahn 2007.)

Further articulation and understanding of the movement improvisation emerges when movers and witnesses verbally exchange their perceptions. Then they speak about their experiences and may discover the ‘‘shared habitats’’ or moments in which movement and witnessing experiences meet. The careful linguistic separation and clarification of individual experience frequently reveals similarities, interdependencies and differences between participants. This happens also when the filmed material is viewed. It allows participants to observe a shared event from new perspectives. We find shared descriptive writing to do this, as well. All these measures allow for a dynamic intertwinement of different experiences. They support the emergence of socially shared understanding of the group’s embodied undertakings. The revelations of varied realities conclude with a shared commonality between all participants. In this sense participants’ experiences are inspired and permeated, nourished and contaminated by a multitude of influences (Goldhahn 2007).

The Workshops

So far we have met and worked together in two short workshops. The first was in Helsinki at the Theatre Academy, the second was held partly outdoors on the island of Pettu in Southern Finland as well as in Merihaka and the Hanasaari power plant in Helsinki in addition to the studios of the Theatre Academy. In the midst of the second workshop we wrote the following summary of what we had done so far:

Meeting at Theatre Academy in Helsinki in February 2010

Following a larger seminar for staff and research students in her applied methods Eila led sessions for the new research group. In these the group improvised undirected movement within the MoverWitness Exchange which allowed the group to get to know each other in an embodied and artistic way. The group also practiced camera-witnessing in order to both observe, share and document these processes. The learning processes were both methodological, artistic and personal and opened up a new platform of shared experience.

Meeting in Pettu and at Theatre Academy in Helsinki in August 2010

Soili and Leena demonstrated how they worked together in their previous artistic collaboration that produced two solo dance performances. In the studio they lead movement exercises that consisted of breathing, opening the body through internal stretch, weight release, hiding and revealing body parts as well as working with spatial parameters. All three participants also moved together. Returning to discuss the nature of the collaboration the group found its meeting point to be the in that fact that the emergent process would reveal the goals, working methods and contents of the group. Process oriented and open-ended group work allows for changes in focus according to the life, interests and developments of the group and can be conceived of as a radical approach to co-operation. For the group it was an exciting approach allowing freedom and fostering creativity through mutual learning and inclusion. By its very nature it this collaboration is about an embodied process: brain-storming and body-storming to find answers.

Whilst exploring how to continue the process of working together the group watched video footage produced by Eila and Soili on Pettu island. Seeing dance improvisation in the beauty of a landscape with rocks and sea triggered the idea of going out into urban environment to work within a very different setting. Going to the urban shore of Merihaka, a high-rise dwelling area next to the Theatre Academy, the group became fascinated by the massive black coal heap of the Hanasaari power plant both as a visual inspiration and as a possible metaphor for the work itself.

The video footage so far produced gives an example of camera-witnessing in the first section where Leena and Soili are seen improvising with eyes closed in a studio at the Theatre  Academy (Helsinki February 2010). The camera-witness, Eila, is still except for small movements where she adjusts the frame to the movers altering their positions in the space. This is similar to turning ones head whilst remaining in one place when witnessing without a camera or when being part of a seated audience in a performance. It is different and more personal to a usual filmed document of performance where a more objective perspective is both assumed and offered. (Figure 1 and CCRG Clip 1, filmed by Eila)

Figure 1.

In the following section filming and movement takes place outdoors alternately by Eila and Soili. Whilst the floating stage is a familiar space to Soili the landscape and the beach are unfamiliar to Eila. This difference appears to be apparent in their movement. (Figure 2 and CCRG Clip 2, filmed by Eila) 

Figure 2.

A long, hand-held shot of the moon light on the water was added into the group's  and stands in for the pausing for reflection and the not knowing at the beginning of a research project. (Figure 3 and CCRG Clip 3, filmed by Eila)

Figure 3.

The joint, improvised movement exploration of the floating stage opposite the big black coal heap within the city uses instead a fixed tripod mounted camera that allows all three collaborators to move together. It produced altogether less animate images than the ones that are hand held and camera-witnessed, but has perhaps more interesting dynamics as three women move on a small and constantly shifting “stage”.  Here the video footage provides a visually more colourful, animated documentation of the tacit processes involved in the research process. (Figures 4 to 9 below)

Figure 4.

Figure 5.

Figure 6.

Figure 7.

Figure 8.

Figure 9.

Conclusions

Regarding the overall manner in which the group worked, it was noticeable that in the open processes participants were able to allow for happenings in the group to trigger further action. All members were simultaneously reflexive of and contributing to the themes that were dealt with and addressed. The group continually questioned, for example, the content of the video footage: what was it addressing and what was it for. But the group also asked what happens when one works according to collaborative, spontaneous and intuitive choreographic decisions: where does this process lead, and does it lead anywhere. What kind of collective embodiment was this group creating by sharing the present moment and locations in moving, filming, discussing and writing as well as working through web-based media through geographic distance and different temporal moments?

Whilst relinquishing individual, artistic authority, the group has begun its process of questioning how does a collaborative process evolve as a mode of movement exploration, dance-making and producing digital visual and written material. It is in the process of exploring how the group’s emergent collaborative approach and social aesthetics is produced and mediated by the three collaborators in their different ways. What will be additionally probed and how can this process be understood as performative artistic research? The negotiations between form and content, method and outcome become the precipitous edge on which our cooperation in collaborative choreography hinges. 

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