With the tremble drumbeat, and the dense and piercingly cold timbre, the energy seems to accumulate at the contact point between the body and ground, and then move from the toes to the tips –it wriggles on the body of the dancer: turning, recovering, kneeling, prancing, pulsing, and rotation are of a sudden.
On November 6, 2017, the “Tao Dance” Theater was held in the hall of the first floor of the CAFA Art Museum, and the exhibition space was transformed into an art theater. As one of the major projects of “German 8”series activities and “introducing classic art into campus”, the “Tao Dance”Theater put on a public performance of the technical elements（original stage technology - circular movement system）in the latest work 9 and presented a dialogue about the body art for the students from the colleges and universities in Beijing.
Regarding the significance of this series of dances, the choreographer Tao Ye said that“You can feel a person alive, and feel where this consciousness exists. There is no any symbolic implantation in my body, it is just alive, but through this movement of dancing you can discover the beauty as well as the problems and your another side”.
The founder of the“Tao Dance” who has been in the thirty years of age, is sincere like a child when talking about the connection between dance, people, and life.
Most of the modern dance styles are complex, with the great works created by the team behind, and there are also many exquisite works. However, “Tao Dance” does exactly the opposite: in the open space of the hall, a 50m2white plastic “stage” is laid out. The dancers with short hair and bare feet, dressed in cotton and linen clothing, standing relaxed on it. While the audiences sit on the scarlet cushions that lay around the white plastic mat. It is so casual that it doesn’t look like a cutting-edge art performance, which is indeed the case. Different from people’s impression of the important performance “with no mistake,” the members of the “Tao Dance” are allowed to “make mistakes,”correct and improve at any time. Whether each group of dances’ performance is in progress or finished, the choreographer will give a voice to the members for guidance.
Interestingly, this seemingly "interventional" behavior does not affect the expression of the artistic effects and the interests of the audiences but makes the whole atmosphere and the subject-object interaction more realistic, relaxed and natural. The choreographer believes that the body is being regarded more as a carrier (for example, music is the most significant manipulation of dance). We need to return to the most primitive part of the body, alleviate burdens of our bodies, and move instinctively.
"Certainly, in this process, you will find that the modern dance will come down to freedom and liberation, but this is a paradox, that is to say, another meaning of freedom is a restriction. If you do not understand the restrictions, you will not understand freedom. I think the real dance will be closer to the (life) nature. It will continue to enable the life to release energy through a ‘growth and decline’way. ”
The work9 is the final part of the choreographer’s “straight trilogy.”Compared with the previous two parts, the dancer’s body and sights are further confined to a smaller range, but the movement tension is released to a Higher degree.
When talking about the thinking and choices in the creation, he speaks with fervor and assurance: “everything in the universe, such as the relationship between people and people, is interdependent. What matters is where do you return? I think the body is the most original point. Any idea is a process of seeking the truth. For example, if you see many vocabularies being created or accurately discovered, you will certainly have an original emotion for seeking the truth in this process. You can feel what is real and what you want."
However, on the label “Tao body is a modern dance,” Tao Ye smiled and waved his hand: “I didn’t say anything like this, and it was their advertising.”He thinks“Tao dance” is a kind of return. “Usually, the dancers want to leave gravity and want to fly through jumping and spinning, but his way is to go back to the gravitational force. Returning to gravitation is going back to the cosmic chaos.”It may like treating an ice cube, the rigid people gnaw it but they may fail, and the melodious one can melt it in a tricky way to quench his thirst. Instead of confrontation, it reconciles to survive, perceive and seek more naturally.
As the applause of the audience reverberated in the CAFA Art Museum, the event ended smoothly with the perfect posture of the dancers. Many of the viewers said they could enjoy a high level of artistic performance in the museum and reap no little benefit. The event together with the German 8 exhibitions of the same period presented a visual feast for the audiences of the museum. It is also a good opportunity for the students in Beijing to experience the contemporary art.
Dancer team: Fu Liwei Mao Xue Yu Jinying Huang Li Ming Da Hu Jing Yan Yulin Zhang Qiaoqiao Guo Hengshuo Jiang Yunhui
Question 1: What do you see when you perform?
Answer: Everything happens around me. We can see the difference in the time for each of the dancers. In fact, you can try to find out what happens around you when your pupils are empty.
Question 2: When you perform, you must keep your focus. What do you think about during this period?
Answer: It actually depends on your immediate reaction, for example, you find that you are faster or slower than the others, and when you see it, it is the content in your heart. The feedback you give to your heart, and the feedback in your heart is that you are faster or slower than the others. That is what you are thinking now, and then you will feel that I should slow down or be faster. When you think about it, you have already thought about it, haha.
Question 3: Will you notice the audience or things like lights around you?
Answer: Yes, but I will not focus on it. Maybe I see a wide range of red color or something else, but I will not focus, let’s say, on one audience.
Question 4: Do you listen to the drumbeats to dance?
Answer: No, we are following the breath of five people. Dance is mainly based on breath. Music will not be the influencing factor.
Question 5: You talked about the follow-up, how do you manifest this state?
Answer: For example, if your head moves like this (tilts the head), you are initiative, because the head moves directly to the side, and if you do like this (the whole body falls to the right), your head will follow your body. One is the initiative, and the other is the follow-up. What we are pursuing is this feeling.
Question 6: Why define it as the modern art? I think it contains Zen?
Answer: It may be that our work or our dressing looks very Zen. Our dance is like an open proposition that expresses what we want to show, and our audiences have their understanding.
Question 7: What do you think about the dance performed or the behavior of your group, or how do you feel about your participation?
Answer: I think I have a self-sublimation and self-improvement. It is certain that I will improve in the physical aspect, as well as the consciousness and thinking level.
Question 8: How do you view the relationship between yourself and the outside world, the relationship between dancers and the collective, or the relationship between the entire group and the space in which you live?
Answer: This may be something that you see as an audience off the stage, but what we think on the stage as dancers are very simple. What we considered more is the feeling that we are required to show.
We will think more about our dance moves, our entire atmosphere, and whether our consciousness is connected. We will only consider dance itself.
Question 9: The last question, what is your expectation on affecting the outside world? Or just simply like to dance?
Answer: I think it’s too early to expect with the outside world. After all, we are still a small group. Actually, there are quite a lot of people work in dance circles. It will take a long time to change current situations. But we hope that the dance will slowly back to the purest feelings. It is just the movement of the body without any distractions.
Interview with choreographer Tao Ye
Question 1: Your team is called “Tao Dance (陶身体).” Do you take the body as art?
Answer: I think that body art is the sum of all arts. It can be the carrier of all arts, or itself is a primitive art.
Q2: You choose the first floor of the museum to perform. Did you and your team choose this location after observation?
Answer: This should be the biggest space in the CAFA, and it is quite open. For dance, it may be a dialogue between people and space. So I think this space is perfect. There are many structures in it. For example, there are three floors so that the audiences can watch our performances from many different perspectives.
Question 3: I just had an interview with a dancer on the team and asked her what she wanted to express as a dancer. She said that she is acting as a communicator to express the meaning of you. I want to ask, what do you want to show in dance?
Answer: What I want to express is - every moment of life. Because dance is showing every moment, it has no shortcut for the dance itself, and it is one of the difficult and even formidable arts because the body is too honest. The sincerity of the body in each scene can portray everything of the people, including his emotions, all his thoughts, time and sense of presence. I think this perception is the status of every individual for the dance. The individuals and groups are the contents of the dance, and the biggest content is the connection between people. Maybe everyone has to face the loneliness, fear, extinction, and weakness. When faced with these problems, what forms the distance between people and the temperature? The Dance will solve this problem. Because what you see is not completed in one or two days. The accumulation must be in a long period, and then it is established in the mutual understanding and trust between people. So what I want to express at the end is the thought about the life of groups or individuals. Living in all the time, “this moment” is“now” at present, but it is still “the future”before it is experienced. It (life) is asking questions and disabusing every moment. It is the most intuitive, the most current, and the most future.
