Report

 

Dance Base Yokohama (DaBY) will soon celebrate its fourth anniversary.

Since last year, we have been exploring our roles that are more suitable for the performing arts scene by making some changes, such as holding an open call for DaBY residence artists and dancers. (For a list including those who continue to participate in the program, please click here.)

As a part of it, we accepted applications for the residency program from artists under 35 in order to provide a fulfilling creative environment for the younger generation. In addition to providing a venue, publicity, and technical assistance, we decided to offer financial support this year.

As a result, we received 75 applications from 18 countries between December 8 and December 26, 2023. After communicating with each artists and adjusting the schedule, we have decided to select 7 projects. We received a lot more applications than last year, and we are keenly aware of the expectations and needs for support in different ways aside from to a space for creation.

We had a very difficult time selecting proposals full of enthusiasm but we set the following five perspectives as our selection criteria.

・Have a desire develop his/her activities as a professional artist. Professionalism here includes establishing a common ground with society and relationships with the audience through his/her activities as well as recognizing artists’ role in society.

・Willing to maintain balanced relationship with other artists and staff members throughout their creation process. Everyone gathering at DaBY must respect others and share their thoughts and opinions openly.

・Project must be financially and practically feasible for the artists and the company. Budget plan must include appropriate payment not only for the director/choreographer but also for performers and staffs who will work together on the creation. Scale of the project must be clear in advance, including other grants the applicants will receive.

・As for the domestic artists, we expect residence artists from last year to develop research and showings they conducted at DaBY the previous year.

・As for the artists based outside of Japan, we prioritized projects that have a stronger connection to the location of DaBY, such as locality and history of Yokohama and Japan, in addition to exchange with Japanese dancers.

The hearing was a great opportunity to share DaBY’s and each artist’s efforts and to learn about the various thoughts that artists are considering to improve the stage environment.
Although it may be better to limit the number of artists in order to provide a fulfilling creative environment due to studio space, we decided that it is important to share our awareness of the issues and exchange ideas with as many artists as possible in the hope that we can work together to improve the stage environment in Japan under the current circumstances. We have decided that it is important to share our awareness of the issues and exchange opinions with as many artists as possible. For this reason, we have adjusted our schedule this year and increased the number of artists in residence by two groups from the planned number so that as many projects as possible can take advantage of the program, and have decided on the following seven groups as artists in residence this year.

We will continue to make every effort to foster and develop the arts. We appreciate your further support and looking forward to future collaborations.

Dance Base Yokohama

 

Selected projects (7 groups in total)

Name of representative (titles omitted, in the order of residency use)
– Location
– About the work

Deva Schubert
Germany

The dance performance GLITCH CHOIR transposes the phenomenon of the glitch into an analog space. At the heart of the work is a reconstruction of the song of mourning through glitching. Historically, public mourning has been conducted primarily by women, the so-called mourners. In exchange for compensation, these women emotionally expressed the grief of others for the deceased. The two female performers open up the collective body of mourning by creating a space of intimate multiple resonance. In the distortion of voices already inherent in the lament, the mourning transforms into a collective glitch. Through collaboration with local dancers during a residency at DaBY, I hope to develop the duet into a work that uses more bodies and voices.
Credits: Chihiro Araki, Davide Luciano, Lotta Beckers

Dapheny Chen
Singapore

By questioning, reflecting, and critiquing the labor of cultural workers, this project is more than a dance; it’s a dialogue, challenging how capitalist frameworks often undervalue artist contributions. By examining dance as labor-intensive expression, it aims to spotlight the multifaceted nature of dance work, advocating for broader recognition of dance as a profession and pushing for equitable labor practices to support a sustainable, inclusive future in the arts. What does the future hold for equitable labor practices in the arts? How can we reshape the narrative to recognise artists as indispensable?

AWPlanet(Alexis Kam/Dynamic Wang)
Macau/China

This project will embark on a journey of exploration, combining and intersecting physical movement, digital imagery, and AI-initiated content generation (AIGC) technology. By analyzing and reinterpreting the physical body, we transform it into a virtual object. How will AI, which has no physical body in the real world, understand the physical expressions we create? When the body is arranged, dissected, and shifted between the virtual world and reality, will it really be perceived as reality or merely an illusion? The body has functioned as an important medium between life and reality. But under these circumstances, how far can we go to maintain authenticity amidst the flood of virtual information? This will be a visually engaging and spectacular performance that presents a potentially controversial dialogue between emotional human bodily expression and the logical reasoning of AI technology.

Tiia Kasurinen
Finland

My new solo work is inspired by my research on gendered performance and movement, social media bodies and identity, and poetry. It is also inspired by the essay “The Gender of Sound” by philosopher and poet Anne Carson. What do frequency, pitch, and voice evoke in the dancer’s body and in the audience? Inspired by these themes, she creates movements to create solo works of choreography, drag art, and music.

Ayaka Ono You Nakazawa Space Knot Blank
Japan

Dance Base Yokohama is one of the most important bases for us when we are thinking about “dance.” We have been contemplating the relationship between subjectivity and objectivity in “dance” for a long time, and we will take this opportunity to strongly confront “dance” as a “work.” In 2023, under the title of “Inherited Bodies,” we attempted to “inherit” the ” Physical Catharsis” that we have been continuously researching and developing. In 2024, we will be working on a dance piece that makes practical use of ” Physical Catharsis.” We would like to spend time reflecting on what “work” is through “dance” while continuing to collaborate with Yusuke Miya and Shizuka Yamaguchi as members of “Inheriting Bodies” and aiming to encounter even more new people. We will do our best so that as many people as possible will be able to enjoy the “dance work” that is the result of our efforts. Our best regards to all of you.

Kohei Fujimura
Japan

I often say, “My body is,” but the truth is that the body is not mine. I am usually thinking/made to think, expressing/made to express something through my body, and I am trying to take it on as my own. However, my body already senses something else before I do and moves around like a child uttering everything they see through the window of a car.

I pretend to be dancing while I chase after my body But my body slips further away Leaving me behind And become a white hole somewhere in the universe

On the one hand, I am overwhelmed by the eternally unreachable body, and on the other hand, I feel free to let go and look at it from afar.

Niki Verrall and Texas Nixon-Kain
Australia

Building on their current practice in embodied and imaginative responses, Texas and Niki will investigate a new choreographic project during their time at Dance Base Yokohama. They will explore how balance is shown and recalibrated within their own fabricated structure, referencing evolving social dynamics that require our ongoing attention. In their process, Texas and Niki consider the significance of their relationship to the body’s experience, which undergoes a continuous evolution while they work towards a shared objective among exterior interferences.

 

We are pleased to announce that the above seven artists are selected as the 2024 Residence Artists.
Dance Base Yokohama will provide production subsidies and support for production work and studio use for each project.

In addition, we will provide studio and publicity assistance the following six artists for rehearsals and workshops. (titles omitted, in alphabetical order)

Kanae Asakawa
Toranan Ame
Naoyuki Sakai
Miho Hakamada, Tetsuo Koita
y/n (Kiyoshi Hashimoto, Kenta Yamazaki)

Those who have continued their activities since last year (titles omitted, in alphabetical order)

DaBY Artist in Residence

Teita Iwabuchi
Mariko Kakizaki
Kaho Kogure
Ryu Suzuki
Romance Hashimoto
Saori Haras
Shintaro Hirahara

◆