Hitogata

Hitogata is inspired by Butoh and the extraordinary ability in which its dancers transform themselves into inanimate objects, different people, animals and even move between different spatial realms. I'm fascinated by this sense of bodily infinity where individual gestures and convolutions are performed extremely slowly, creating an expansive sense of time and space.

Ankoku Butoh directly translates from Japanese to ‘the dance of utter darkness.’ It is an accumulation of surrealist post-war values such as neo dadaism, French mime techniques and Neue Tanz and is most traditionally performed where the body is completely covered in a layer of white paint. Hijikata, one of the founders of Butoh was inspired by a sculptor named George Segal. In his oerformances he would cover himself in plaster. As the plaster dried it would draw heat away from the body, forcing it to tremble.