For people who know me, it might seem quite odd that I would focus so much of this trip to Japan on taking dance classes. Indeed, even for me it seems quite odd. Although I have always been interested in the arts, both from an appreciative standpoint and a as a practitioner, I never really got into dance. Perhaps I felt like it was something that I could not do, but furthermore, that it was an art that was subservient to music, and thus could not stand on its own.
The first time that I really saw a dance performance that I was fascinated by was several years ago in Central Park, New York. A friend had brought me on a whim, and as I watched, it amazed me the relation that the dancers had with their surroundings, the music, and the audience. It was at the moment that I decided that I would try to write a theater peice and coordinate with a choreographer to incorporate dance as the visual medium.
Several years later (one year ago from now, in fact), I began seriously studying postwar Japanese avant-garde art. Of course, there were many examples of happenings that took place in parks and in urban settings. This much I expected since many global artists, especially in America and Europe, were focussed on such things. However, then I came across a chapter on that focussed on new Japanese dance.
Butoh dance was (by most accounts) started by Hijikata Tatsumi and Ohno Kazuo. Of course, they were influenced by Western modern developments in theater and dance (especially from France and Germany), but they also had their own wealth of Japanese cultural historical vein from where they could set out. As I was to learn in the class, embracing dichotomy would be a significant feature of butoh. This was even so from the beginning with the two character of Hijikata and Ohno. Hijikata seemed to embrace the dark side, and Ohno the light side. I couldn't tell you what it is, but something about butoh dance attracted me immensly, and for quite a while, I was only reading books about butoh.
It so came to pass that Hijikata would die at the age of 57 in 1986, but Ohno would live to be 103 when he died in 2010. Until he died, Ohno continued to perform, often dancing while sitting in a chair. He also taught classes at his dance studio, though his son, Ohno Yoshito, would take on most of the teaching duties. Being so obsessed with butoh, I learned about these classes sometime ago, and decided that, despite my absolute lack of dance training or ability, I would attend these classes when I came to Japan. And so here I found myself today.
Ohno Yoshito is still teaching the classes today. I was informed that I should expect the classes to be conducted in Japanese, and if I was fortunate enough, a student might be able to translate for me. This made me quite nervous, but my presupposition was that dance is not a verbal medium, but rather a physical and kinesthetic medium, and as long as I could see how other people were moving, I should be able to follow, at least a little bit. However, Ohno Yoshito spoke plenty of broken English, and I could understand quite well.
Over the course of the two and a half hours, I could try to organize it by breaking it into 6 lessons. The overall theme of each of the lessons remained the same, ultimately, and that was to embrace the dichotomies within us. In each of the lessons, he gave us a prop to help make the complicated concepts concrete.
The first lesson, however, was without a prop. Ohno Yoshito pointed out the studio, and showed us the beams, and the space. He wanted us to be concious of the space. He remarked that Hijikata Tatsumi had been here a long time ago, and was astonished at the magic that the space contained. Ohno-sensei also remarked that his father was still here, and so was Hijikata, and they would be looking down upon us. It was a very spiritual way to start the lesson. He also wanted to remind us that our body would have to be in this space. Body and space: this is what dance is. I suppose that the dichotomy to explore here was self versus environment. He then turned on some music, and told us to dance. Just like that. Since butoh was not a surprise to everyone, I suppose that we all danced the way we had scene in videos, or pictures, or read about. And so, there I moved. I wasn't sure if I was doing it right or not, and afterwards, Ohno would give us no other guidance or feedback other than these spiritual dance sermons that were addressed to everyone.
In order to try to understand what I should do, or what might be the right thing to do, I looked at other people. Amongst the dozen or so of us there were, I tried to gauge quickly whom I should be watching. It seemed clear to me that two students were probably regulars because they were helping not just with dance, but with straightening up, and passing things out. Besides all that, the guy Naruo (I believe his name was) just looked the best, the most athletic, and had an intensity about his eyes the told me he was the person to watch. (Perhaps he was the worst possible person I could have watched; afterall, what do I know about dance? But, looks and appearance can still go a long way to impress me.)
Looking at everyone else, I could also determine a few things about dancers. The first is that they all have ugly feet and toes. Well, not all of them, but most of them. The other thing is that they all wear similar outfits for rehearsals or practice: a dark tshirt, and very loose pants, also dark. I did not pack very well, so I only had a pair of white linen pants that would have to suffice, and a white vneck tshirt. The problem seemed to be that there was a large oval yellow stain at the bottom of one of my pant legs. I wonder where that came from? Maybe I had spilled orange juice on it earlier? Maybe something else?
The second lesson focussed on the dichotomy of strength and weakness. We have to be both strong and weak at the same time, Ohno said. In order to illustrate this point, he gave us each a lump of loose cotton. To illustrate that this cotton was the embodiment of both strength and weakness, he started to pull the strands apart. It was very easy to pull apart when you take a little piece. However, when you ball it back up, and try to pull it apart as a whole, it is strong, and difficult to rip. Interesting. Then he put on music and told us to dance with the cotton. Ok. I just kind of copied what he did, and spied on other people to see where and how to begin. The amazing thing about all this is that once I got started, my body kept moving, and it seemed easy to continue on. I am not sure what that meant, but I felt like I understood something, and I was enjoying myself.
The next lesson focussed on the strength versus weakness again, but with the prop of a bamboo stick. He handed us each a large pole of bamboo. I wondered if he got these from the small bamboo forest that was growing close to his home. He illustrated how the bamboo was strong, and we could not bend it. It was firm and stiff and straight. But it was empty inside. He explained a pun that was difficult for me to understand because of the lack of my Japanese skills. However, "empty," and "body" and "bamboo" seem to all be similar words in the Japanese language, and offer poets a lot for word play. He then asked us to dance with the bamboo, while he played a cd. The first two pieces of music he played were ambient electronic types of music with long chord changes that lack real melody or even rhythm. This time, however, when we were dancing with the bamboo, Ohno played two negro spirituals that sang about a deep river, and another that sang that "I believe." Another difference from the earlier lessons was that after the music finished and we were done dancing, he gave us more information. He reminded us that the woman was singing about searching for her husband, deep in the river, and in the other piece she was singing a proclamation, that she believed! The feedback was directed to the whole group, but he still didn't offer anything individually. He then replayed the music and told us to dance again. After we were finished this time, he asked for an encore, and for us to dance again.
As I am writing this, one of two things dawn on me. Either my own memory or my ability to write about my memory seems deficient in some way so that I cannot portray the full scale of the experience. If I heard someone say the things I am now saying, I would play it off as a hippie-spiritual nonesense experience. Perhaps that is what it was. If that is the case, then I am drinking the kool-aide and I am emersing myself in it. However, it might just be that there is something quite interesting about dance, about the communication that occurs with simple words, music, body, and space weave together and when I can appreciate the interplay of these different dimensions, and try to express something within such a context.
Despite my difficulty in trying to put this into words, I will continue. After completing the lesson with the bamboo, he then asked us to take a plastic flower, and he began. Like the bamboo, the flower's stem is straight up, with the petals looking to the sun. However, we have to remember that the roots of the flower are down, looking into darkness. Ohno then instructed us to dance, simply by walking. Walk with the flower. So we did that. Then he reminded us that although the flower is straight up and down, the Buddhist conception is such that the vertical axis is part of us, so too is the horizontal axis. That is, we have to be both vertical and horizontal. Now dance. I wasn't sure what this meant, but my body moved anyway. And it felt good. He then asked us to imagine a rose bush. What would we see if we were tall, above the rose bush? But then what would we see if we were small, below the rose bush. It seems that our perspectives would change. Whereas when standing we would see the whole rose bush with many flowers, from below we might only see one flower. Dance. Then he asked us to imagine that the flower was sad; remember, we are not sad, it is the flower that is sad. Dance. We were then asked to weep for the dead flower; recalling that after terrible tragedies, we are always reminded that so many humans die, but flowers also die. Dance.
Then next activity was the one I enjoyed the most. It seemed that all of our previous lessons were very isolated, and we were only dancing with ourselves, despite the fact that there were many other people in the room. This became starkingly clear when one of the ladies began to cry as he was describing the dead flower. I felt the draw to move closer to her, and to comfort her in while she was obviously grieving. But I did nothing but watch, and hope that she got would recover from her grief, and continue living on despite whatever loss she had experienced. It is within that context that I especially appreciated when Ohno asked us to get into a circle and hold hands. The metaphor that he used for this activity was the full moon. We would be a full moon. He further explained that duality here, since in Western culture, the full moon is bad (think werewoves), but in the Buddhist conception, a full moon is a thing of beauty, to be appreciated. He stressed that while holding hands, there is no need to forcibly move; movement will just happen. Indeed it did. The first impression I had was that of a Ouija board, and how the lense on the ouija board moves while everyone is touching it, but nobody takes responsibility for the movement. Taking this as a cue, I very lightly held the hands of the two girls on either side of me, and saw where it might go. Nobody took off their clothes, but it was still fun.
The final exercise that Ohno had us perform was to hold a tissue paper inbetween two hands. The challenge was not to hold the tissue; that is easy enough. Instead, he asked us to hold our hands as close together as the tissue is thin. He reminded us that to let go of the tissue is easy. To clasp the tissue is also easy. However, it is difficult to keep our hands a tissue's thickness apart. Then he told us to dance with the tissue.
After the two hours were up, he set out tea for us to drink, as well as snacks. I thought this was very kind, and it fostered a community environment with the other dancers. We all talked about our experiences, where we were from, and the like. Before coming to Japan, I had hoped to participate in four of these classes; they are given every Sunday and Tuesday, and since I would be here for two weeks, I should be able to fit in four classes. However, I began to doubt that I wanted to attend these classes, and thought that I might find something more interesting to do, especially since I am not a dancer. After my first class, I have decided that I want to continue on and take as many classes as I can.
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