ARTivate will be having our 2nd open rehearsal for Huayi Festival 2010: Fresh Takes ! We have made some changes since the first open rehearsal. With your feedback and participation, we hope to improve the workshop programme and at the same time share some stretching exercises and games with you !
Date/Time:
11 February 2010 (Thu) @ 7-9pm
Venue:
Drama Box 4th Level
14A - 14C Trengganu Street
Singapore 058468
Target audience: 13-20 years old * Workshop will be conducted in Mandarin * 10-12 pax per session
Please email Jiayi your Name and Contact Number @ jiayi.artivate@gmail.com if you are keen! (:
Huayi Festival 2010: Fresh Takes (Open rehearsals)
Hi All!
ARTivate is currently preparing a workshop for Participants in involved in the upcoming Huayi Festival 2010: Fresh Takes.
Fresh Takes is a showcase of Chinese Language Theatre productions put up by Singaporean schools, which have been an important nurturing ground for dramatic talent since the emergence of modern Chinese language theatre in Singapore in the early 20th century.
To help prepare these students physically and mentally for their performances, we will be conducting a 1-hour workshop on the day they will be performing.
We hope to invite some of you to join us in 2 of our open rehearsals so that we can further improve on the workshop content and structure. We appreciate your feedback !
Following are some details of the open rehearsals:
Dates:
23 January 2010 (Sat) @ 11.30am-1.30pm
10 February 2010 (Wed) @ 9-11pm (TBC)11 February 2010 (Thu) @ 7-9pm
Target audience: 13-20 years old
* Workshop will be conducted in Mandarin
* 10-12 pax per session
Please email Jiayi your Name and Contact Number @ jiayi.artivate@gmail.com if you are keen! Do tell us which date you prefer too (:
去伦敦之前,朋友就说在伦敦的博物馆里呆上十天也不一定看的完。当下觉得她也太夸张了。可是当我真正到了那里参观的时候,朋友的话应验了。花了一整个早上,结果只参观完维多利亚与阿尔伯特博物馆(Victoria and Albert Museum)的一楼而已。实在有太多的展出品值得去观赏,去研究了。
出名的博物馆包括国家画作展览馆(National Gallery),泰特古典艺术博物馆(Tate Britain),泰特现代艺术博物馆(Tate Modern),自然史博物馆(Natural History Museum)。其中让我印象与体验最深的,是 Tate Modern 里的其中一件互动艺术品。
"How shall I move forward?" you might ask yourself, as you stand at the threshold, confronted by the darkness ahead. The unknown can be terrifying, especially if it is also without light. How you approach it is unique, as your first encounter with anything can only ever be as an individual. Staring ahead into the black void may make you wonder whether to move ahead at all.
'Its fine', you reassure yourself, "what can actually be inside?" How It Is is complete only when you, the viewer, enter. The container focuses you inwards, both physically and psychologically, deeper into the darkness. In choosing how to move ahead- to march in fearlessly, or to kirt along the walls - you create your won journey. But as you bump into others, or mistakenly grab a stranger's shoulder, your trepidation eases and collectively you navigate the void..
Last Saturday was our last lesson for Biomechanics class!
Although we still have much more to learn (in deepening our knowledge and skills in Biomechanics), this lesson has helped us sum up all that we have learnt in these 11 weeks.
As we started the day with dactyl, Lixie reminded us of the different lines in our body.In this way, we can adjust and align our own body such that it is three-dimensional:
a) 头到天花板 from head to the ceiling (pulling upwards)
b) 背到后方 from the back (pulling backwards)
c) 胸口出去 from the chest (pulling forward)
d) 肩膀两条横的线 from the shoulders (horizontally outwards)
e) 膝盖(稍弯,不要锁起来)from the knees (knees slightly bent instead of being locked)
f) 脚板到地上 from the soles of your feet to the ground (downwards)
We then walked in the space, finding a new tochika as we stop. Some notes here!
1. movement is conscious but not deliberate (e.g. keep otkaz natural-need not bounce on purpose before moving off to the new tochika)
2. Dynamism is VERY important in order to make our movements watchable on stage. A way to exercise this dynamism is to imagine that there is a spotlight in place of the line pulling forward from the chest. This spotlight shines in the direction of the new tochika as you walk. Next, the back also has a spotlight. And we own the space because we have this 2 spotlights.
Continuing to walk in the space, we were told to sense the difference in our movements as we apply it to different forms (e.g. naturalistic play, absurd piece, abstract play). some notes here:
- biomechanics is not against naturalism
- movements need not always be large
- the initial understanding of biomechanics involves exploring the usability of human body (due to influence of industrialization, resulting in human behaving like "machines") but it is not the ONLY understanding
- as long as the principle of biomechanics holds, it can be applied to all kinds of play (note:do not make it like a style)
- etude movements are exaggerated in order to train actors
Proceeding to etude, we finally learnt the last part of the slap etude: the walk
The first person to slap will bring the partner's arm to herself/himself (NOT pull!). The pair will go for a walk together before coming to a stop with mutual consensus. There is a mutual rhythm between partners. The otkaz is important here in giving your partner where you are going.
We then took our "exam" and each pair presented their etude. Unfortunately, we all FAILED !
let's first look at some notes taken as we presented the slap!
- every movement should be calculated
- body control (grouping of stomach muscles)
- Lack of Dynamism (one of the MOST IMPT factor. Dynamism helps to trigger imagination for the audience. It gives meaning to the movements. We cannot be to "mild" when doing etude because this lack of energy does not create the dramatic tension. akhl also mentioned that the power/OMPH is what we need and lacked then)
- during the preparation command, the impulse/tension has to be held. stillness is important to prepare for the dynamic slap
- lines of the body went missing (being precise is very important!)
- note the storyline and rhythm of the entire slap etude. (not a movement piece!)
- different etudes have different levels of difficulty but on the whole, it is all about controlling the body.
第二部分李邪让我们了解biomechanics在以下不同地方的运用:
The 2nd part of the lesson we learnt the application of biomechanics:
1。肢体的biomechanics(body-As in a music score, there is rhythm and a physical score the things we do in biomechanics)
2。空间的biomechanics (space-this space/playground can include the set, object, blocking) and geometry
3。演员之间的biomechanics(between actors-we give each other signals in deciding when to walk together and when to stop together.)
*All (1), (2) and (3) has scores that are being composed.
4。剧本的biomechanics (in the script-the script's Tochika refers to the objective or perspective taken by the playwright/director/actors/character. the playwright and the director can discuss can perhaps deconstruct the play in exploring its objective. the actors have to accommodate to the character's tochika in the play. The tochika also gives show a style.
otkaz is to prepare for the posil of the script, followed by a stoica. tomoz refers to a change/twist in the play, a change in rhythm or even a break.)
5。人物的biomechanics (in the character-character's otkaz refers to his/her background info and it often explains how the character prepares for something. (e.g. The queen in snow white and the seven dwarfs wants to be the fairest person on earth, hence she buys a mirror that tell her lies) Again posil refers to the action being carried by the character. its stoica can be an ending, consequence or realization. tomoz is what changes her objectives such as obstacles encountered.)
6。行动线的biomechanics (action-similar to (5), there is always this cycle of tochika, otkaz, posil, stoica and tormoz in every action.)
在画闻名世界的壁画《最后的晚餐》(The Last Supper)时,达文西为了可以一边画,一边修改这幅壁画,而发明了全新的壁画技术。不只如此,为了能让壁画里的人物能看起来栩栩如生,他花了两年的时间观察生活中人们的身体语言。在画壁画的过程中,他可以一天内不停地画,也可以花好几天不动笔只看着他的画,一直盘算,计划如何继续画。达文西的创作精神真的让我十分敬佩。
Last week’s Biomechanics lesson was fun! As always. ARTivate started the day doing our usual dactyl at different tochika. Then we moved on to estimating the number of steps we would take in moving from one tochika to another. This is supposed to hone our estimation/calculation skills so we can better learn how to conserve our energy on stage. Keeping one’s energy level constant throughout the entire duration definitely takes skill and experience. Moving in groups was definitely more challenging. For one, I had the tendency to be influenced by the speed and exact route that the others took hence my estimation went awry at times.
ARTivate then learnt a new term raccouris, which is a dynamic pose. Imagine taking a picture of someone in constant motion - the pose would be one with anticipation of a next move. Using the basic otkaz, posyl and stoica, each ARTivator had to strike araccouris with a cube, one at a time. Our poses were then varied such that we could only contact the cube with a specific part of our body. Giving a clear stoica is very important as it would buy time for us to plan how to leave the cube and generally, our next move.
ARTivate then did this in groups, striking a raccouris one after another and then concurrently, training our reflexes and improvisation at the same time. ARTivators also played with the different levels, shapes and planes of our body to create a more dynamic image.
Next, ARTivate split into two groups - one group strikes a pose and the other must mirror it after a few seconds of observation. This tested ARTivate’s precision and consistency, especially when the group which posed has to replicate the image again.
After that, ARTivate played “pass the message” but instead of an oral message, we had to pass down an etude. Precision was key in this exercise especially when we replicated the actions to the next person. It probably would have been easier if we could tag each action to some story but as the etude gets passed on, many minor details were left out and sometimes, the actions just seems plain senseless but very comical. It was a hilarious way of learning the need to be precise in everything one does.
As the last activity of the day, ARTivate practised “The Slap” etude but this time, each ARTivator had to hold a plastic cup filled to the brim with water as we did the etude. Every action was executed so slowly as each of us struggled to keep the cup perfectly upright. After a few random splashes of water and many awkward moments, ARTivate learnt that slowing down the actions actually made us more aware of how each move is made and more attention could be paid to the details. Everyone started getting more conscious too. We then concluded the day with a few dactyl, while imagining that we were holding on to those cups of water. Lucky us!
There was no lesson this week as Li Xie has, unfortunately, fallen ill. Here’s wishing her a speedy recovery and to another awesome three hours next week! (:
It is already the 9th biomechanics lesson! It is amazing that I pick up something new each week and have some personal reflections about it. We always make an effort to observe each other whenever we revise the lessons together. Stiff shoulders? Wrong positioning of legs? We remind each other. Last week, we were asked to do ductile and observe ourselves from the outside. In fact, Li Xie told us about this every now and then. It is important to be able to look at ourselves from the outside and we should have a mirror on our mind to know how we do ductile. I guess this apply to our everyday life as well, we ought to "see ourselves" in order to remind and correct ourselves. We help each other with this at the beginning, but it all depends on ourselves as we go along the way.
Each time we are asked to do this, you will hear painful groans from the ARTivators. Perhaps it is how different bodies are structure, or maybe we're not used to using certain part of our body,some ARTivators went through tremendous pain to do this action!
Another exercise... this is to train our waist power. Here comes the important point! We are required to recover to the initial position with one otkaz. How? If you have been reading our blog, you should know the importance of otkaz in biomechanics. You can try it at home! But do remember to have a proper warm up, otherwise you might injure yourself.
Having the pole again..we were asked to hold in pole with both hands and pull it backwards to our waist, then bring it forward again and cross over it with our legs. We were clumsy at first, but it got better when we get the hang of it by using the ever wonderful OTkAZ!
Last week, we did the pole balancing exercise again. Though we were still not an expert of it, everyone is improving =) *Small clap* for all
Previously, we were taught of the stability, accuracy and shape in biomechanics. Li Xie introduced a new word last week, "rythm"(loosely translated) We should be able to feel the sense of rhythm when we do our etude. It should something that is inside us. However, working with the music should only be included in the initial stage of training, when we proceed further, we should in fact learnt that biomechanics requires us to work against the music.
We are all excited to proceed with learning the slap. Everyone have been looking forward to it.. hmm not that ARTivators are not on good terms.. is just that.. hmm.. we are eager to learn the whole etude!
让我简单说说slap的过程 ( 从握手后的最后几个动作)
A simple explaination to the steps of a slap (After the handshake)
1. Handshake
2.Back to stoika position after hand shake (No photos)
3. Preparation to slap
4. Aim
5. Slap
After slapping the person, there are some details that we need to note. Look out for updates!
Handshake
Aim
Preparation to slap
The Slap! They are not really slapping each other, their hand is actually not touching each's other face, is just the actions. As you can see, they are taking turns to slap each other, but the video is stopped because 2 ARTivators ran across the room while practising some other things!
A few points to note: Remember the otkaz of each action. It is not there for the sake of being there. It served as a preparation for the action,for yourself and your partner. It gives the energy of the action as well. Personally, I felt that the rythm comes from the otkaz too.
It is kind of difficult to describe the actions in words as there are far too much details and precision to be noted. Have uploaded some photos to better illustrate the slap. It is not a demonstration as we're still in the midst of learning. Hope it gives you guys a better idea of what it is like. Feel free to leave comments to let us know your thoughts on our entries!
Credits to Yinghao who was injured and helped me take notes
休息过后,我们继续学习李邪为艺树人设计的Meyerhold的etude, “The Slap”。艺树人学会了Meyerhold的握手方式,还有准备给人一巴掌的姿势。从头练习整个etude是一件蛮辛苦的事,因为Meyerhold要求的准确性和我们平常不习惯的姿势使用的肌肉很少会被动用到。要不是这些etude,我想,这些肌肉差不多能说是永远都不会派上用场。
In our last lesson, ARTivate continued working on our otkaz, posil and stoica through games activities such as:
Throwing an increasing number of tennis balls across the room while moving in a random manner
Moving around the room in groups, with every change in direction effected by general consensus and not following a leader (as opposed to the “fish exercise”)
The game of laoyingzhuoxiaoji (“eagle and the chicken/chick”?) between each pair
Each ARTivator had to ensure that his/her actions are executed precisely so as to facilitate anticipation in the other parties.
We then practised our balancing skills, which consists of grouping our core muscles, the three principles listed above and switching of our tochka every step we take. Wooden cubes of the same size were placed in the middle of the room and every ARTivator had to cross the room by stepping on them, similar to crossing a river while stepping on stones. The distance between each cube was slowly increased and soon, even the size of the cubes was varied, and also the orientation of the cubes. Other requirements were added, such as rotating your upper body three times before crossing the “river” and spinning 360° before getting up a cube. All these little changes increased the difficulty at each stage but they were really simple activities that could keep us entertained.
We then continued learning Meyerhold’s etude, “The Slap”, as modified by Li Xie for the amateur ARTivators. From last week’s “greeting position”, we proceeded on to “greet” and “preparation to slap”. Revising these actions right from the start was really tiring. All the weird angles and the need for clean lines definitely put my lazy muscles to a good test.
We concluded the day by honing our balance with the help of bamboo poles. By balancing these poles on our palms, each ARTivators had to move around the room, meet up with a partner halfway through and even shift the poles from one palm to another. It certainly was no easy task moving around with a long extension from the middle of your palms but nonetheless, we enjoyed that activity very much.
Once again, the lesson ended on quite a good note, with it’s fair share of laughter and muscle aches (from staying in the same position while practising the etude). I’m definitely looking forward to learning the actual slap. *evil laughter*
Have you ever thought of doing your part for Mother Earth?
I've just heard from my friend this morning that Singapore Management University (SMU) is hosting a recycling drive by Nokia. From now till the end of November, simply drop off your old and unwanted Nokia mobile phones at SMU and you'll get to have a tree planted in YOUR name! The exact coordinates of the tree would be given so you can check the location of your tree on Google Maps/Earth.
Interested? You can probably find out more from your friends or make a trip down to the very accessible campus today!
Last week, the main part of the lesson is placed on the training of our legs and the flexibility of our body. The placement and position of our legs are very important in biomechanics because these are some of the factors affecting the weight shifting of our body. The weight shifting will actually affect the steadiness of our body in some way and that is what Li Xie has been emphasizing to us -- the importance of the steadiness of our body. On the other hand, our flexibility will affect the "shape" of our body when we do certain actions. Training of our legs is not as tired as it seem to be as Li Xie trained us using some fun exercises!
Still remember the games that we played when we were young? Catching was one of my favourite game then. Li Xie actually uses this game as part of our training! Everyone was excited when we knew that we are going to play that =) However, there are some rules and regulations that we need to follow. We are only allowed to move on one leg! But we can freeze ourselves and stay at the same spot if we are unable to escape in time. The purpose of having this "freeze" privilege is in fact one of the things that we had been trained on-- Thomoz. We have to learn to balance ourselves in all situations and identify the brake of our body. Sounds fun? It was indeed a fun game where everyone scream and run for their lives on one leg. It did not feel tiring at all until the game was stopped.I guess is really a good way to train our legs hee.
Prior to the catching game, we had some exercises to prepare ourselves for the game. We were asked to bend our knees and lowered our bodies to move across the space. We have to keep our bodies straight at the same time. This requires a lot effort from our leg as well.
我们也来跳 Hip Hop!
还记得每次看到舞蹈员跳 Hip Hop的其中一种舞步吗?就是蹲着,把其中一只脚伸直并把双手放在地上然后伸直的脚便会在地上旋转一圈。为了训练我们身体的灵活度,我们上个星期也练习了类似的动作。大家第一次尝试这样的动作难免看起来有点僵硬和笨拙但练习了几次大家便发现其实这个动作和我们之前学的很多动作一样,只要懂得运用otkaz就不会觉得那么吃力。
Still remember the dance movements by hip hop dances? Those movements where they will squat down with one leg straighten and both of their hands on the ground after which they will then spin their leg on the ground. We did a similar exercise to train the flexibility of our body. Of course, we are not able to do it as swiftly and nicely. But, once we identify the use of otkaz for the movement, things become much easier.
We were pair up at first for this exercise. Each pair had a pole and we were required to support the pole with one of our finger each while moving around in the room. We have to try to keep the pole in place and not let it dropped to the floor. It started off easy but as are asked to close our eyes, it became challenging. While we try to keep the pole in place, we are constantly shifting the weight of our body, hence we will naturally need to move our legs in a flexible way. We were later asked to form a group of 5. The increase number of people and poles requires more coordination of our body movement. Li xie added more conditions along the way and it challenges our body to be really flexible in order to complete the task without dropping the poles.
For the past few weeks, we had been learning how to walk, run and jump. Last week, we have finally proceed to shaking hands! This may sound weird to you, why do we need to learn how to shake hand? The biomechanics way of a hand shake is different from the normal ones that we have when we met someone that we just know. Like what Li Xie had been emphasizing, biomechanics is not a performing method, it is a form of actors training. So, regardless of what we learnt, we are in fact tuning our body in order to achieve the shape of the actions we are required to do. In other words, many actions in biomechanics challenge us to use different parts of our body that we do not usually use. Last week, we line up the jump and run actions together with the handshake that we just learnt into a sequence of movements. This sequence of movements is actually part of an etude that we are learning - the "Slap". If you are interest in finding out what is an etude, you may want t read up on books or check it out online. I am still learning along the way, so I shall not state my understanding of a etude here in any case if I mislead anyone.
Looking forward to the next lesson! Hope you guys will look forward to our next post too! See you!
Again, we were to find 20 directions/shapes of different body parts during the warm up. 2 additional things we had to look out for were the pre-planning of our next direction/shape as well as the emotion attached to it. I found it most fun to find 20 shapes for the body as it really challenged me to give it more possibilities.
With 2 people standing in the hoop, they take turns to push each other once in attempt to get the other party out of the hoop. The idea is to apply our brake (tomoz) and regain balance quickly, while using the push from the other party as an otkaz to return the energy.
After this exercise, the "playing field" was expanded to the entire rehearsal space and each were to push the other party to a point.
One important point to note is that the application of our centre (muscles around the stomach) is especially important in finding our balance. To show that, we were told to maintain at the mode of being "on the verge of falling" so that we can feel our muscles at the centre of our body tensed up in order to prevent the fall.
3. Shrinking Rectangle The original rectangle had 13 people in it. The crowdedness was comparable to that of the amk central crowd along the shophouses. we were told to walk in it (applying our tomoz) and not hitting anyone. As the rectangle "shrinks", the crowd becomes that of citylink on a public holiday, and gradually to that of orchard road on christmas eve. We were told to slow-mo our movements so that we are fully aware of our body.
using the exercise above, we were to push each other our of the rectangle! and MYRA emerged as the winner ahahah
4。跑/跳
注:
-用右脚来把自己“弹”上来
-跳完后手的位置
4. Run & Jump We finally learnt how to run and jump!
These were the main instructions:
preparation for running position
preparation for run
jumping to stop position (replaced by an "hurp" sound)
some notes here include beig aware of the "spring" on right foot and the position of hands after jump (hands should be "prepared" during jump)
ARTivate is the youth wing of Drama Box, launched in May 2007. It is made up of a group of passionate youths who aims to reach out to the larger community through the arts.
ARTivate aims to nurture this new group of youths into cultured and socially aware theatre-practitioners in Singapore. ARTivate also offers a career choice in the industry over time.
ARTivate uses the O-A-O-R (Orientation-Artistic-Organization-Regeneration) pedagogy and the youths are trained not only artistically but also in organizational skills. They undergo training in theatre skills (such as Forum Theatre, Newspaper Theatre, Production Management etc), other art forms such as music, film, multimedia, as well as principles of leadership, management and organization. They will put these skills to test by managing their own teams.
Each year, they will collaborate with at least one underprivileged group to create works/projects. These projects may help to generate income (in support of the project and ARTivate).
Through such collaborations, they hope to change the mindsets of both the general public and the disadvantaged groups, thus moving them from monologues into dialogues with one other.
*The workshop/courses are conducted mainly in Mandarin.
许慧铃 Koh Hui Ling 艺术总监 Artistic Director
母性泛滥; 热爱人
着重于戏剧/剧场的应用与教学法
Overpowering maternal instincts
Loves Human(ity)
Aims at developing the use of applied drama / theatre
ARTivate will be having our 2nd open rehearsal for Huayi Festival 2010: Fresh Takes ! We have made some changes since the first open rehearsal. With your feedback and participation, we hope to improve the workshop programme and at the same time share some stretching exercises and games with you !
Date/Time:
11 February 2010 (Thu) @ 7-9pm
Venue:
Drama Box 4th Level
14A - 14C Trengganu Street
Singapore 058468
Target audience: 13-20 years old * Workshop will be conducted in Mandarin * 10-12 pax per session
Please email Jiayi your Name and Contact Number @ jiayi.artivate@gmail.com if you are keen! (:
Huayi Festival 2010: Fresh Takes (Open rehearsals)
Hi All!
ARTivate is currently preparing a workshop for Participants in involved in the upcoming Huayi Festival 2010: Fresh Takes.
Fresh Takes is a showcase of Chinese Language Theatre productions put up by Singaporean schools, which have been an important nurturing ground for dramatic talent since the emergence of modern Chinese language theatre in Singapore in the early 20th century.
To help prepare these students physically and mentally for their performances, we will be conducting a 1-hour workshop on the day they will be performing.
We hope to invite some of you to join us in 2 of our open rehearsals so that we can further improve on the workshop content and structure. We appreciate your feedback !
Following are some details of the open rehearsals:
Dates:
23 January 2010 (Sat) @ 11.30am-1.30pm
10 February 2010 (Wed) @ 9-11pm (TBC)11 February 2010 (Thu) @ 7-9pm
Target audience: 13-20 years old
* Workshop will be conducted in Mandarin
* 10-12 pax per session
Please email Jiayi your Name and Contact Number @ jiayi.artivate@gmail.com if you are keen! Do tell us which date you prefer too (:
去伦敦之前,朋友就说在伦敦的博物馆里呆上十天也不一定看的完。当下觉得她也太夸张了。可是当我真正到了那里参观的时候,朋友的话应验了。花了一整个早上,结果只参观完维多利亚与阿尔伯特博物馆(Victoria and Albert Museum)的一楼而已。实在有太多的展出品值得去观赏,去研究了。
出名的博物馆包括国家画作展览馆(National Gallery),泰特古典艺术博物馆(Tate Britain),泰特现代艺术博物馆(Tate Modern),自然史博物馆(Natural History Museum)。其中让我印象与体验最深的,是 Tate Modern 里的其中一件互动艺术品。
"How shall I move forward?" you might ask yourself, as you stand at the threshold, confronted by the darkness ahead. The unknown can be terrifying, especially if it is also without light. How you approach it is unique, as your first encounter with anything can only ever be as an individual. Staring ahead into the black void may make you wonder whether to move ahead at all.
'Its fine', you reassure yourself, "what can actually be inside?" How It Is is complete only when you, the viewer, enter. The container focuses you inwards, both physically and psychologically, deeper into the darkness. In choosing how to move ahead- to march in fearlessly, or to kirt along the walls - you create your won journey. But as you bump into others, or mistakenly grab a stranger's shoulder, your trepidation eases and collectively you navigate the void..
Last Saturday was our last lesson for Biomechanics class!
Although we still have much more to learn (in deepening our knowledge and skills in Biomechanics), this lesson has helped us sum up all that we have learnt in these 11 weeks.
As we started the day with dactyl, Lixie reminded us of the different lines in our body.In this way, we can adjust and align our own body such that it is three-dimensional:
a) 头到天花板 from head to the ceiling (pulling upwards)
b) 背到后方 from the back (pulling backwards)
c) 胸口出去 from the chest (pulling forward)
d) 肩膀两条横的线 from the shoulders (horizontally outwards)
e) 膝盖(稍弯,不要锁起来)from the knees (knees slightly bent instead of being locked)
f) 脚板到地上 from the soles of your feet to the ground (downwards)
We then walked in the space, finding a new tochika as we stop. Some notes here!
1. movement is conscious but not deliberate (e.g. keep otkaz natural-need not bounce on purpose before moving off to the new tochika)
2. Dynamism is VERY important in order to make our movements watchable on stage. A way to exercise this dynamism is to imagine that there is a spotlight in place of the line pulling forward from the chest. This spotlight shines in the direction of the new tochika as you walk. Next, the back also has a spotlight. And we own the space because we have this 2 spotlights.
Continuing to walk in the space, we were told to sense the difference in our movements as we apply it to different forms (e.g. naturalistic play, absurd piece, abstract play). some notes here:
- biomechanics is not against naturalism
- movements need not always be large
- the initial understanding of biomechanics involves exploring the usability of human body (due to influence of industrialization, resulting in human behaving like "machines") but it is not the ONLY understanding
- as long as the principle of biomechanics holds, it can be applied to all kinds of play (note:do not make it like a style)
- etude movements are exaggerated in order to train actors
Proceeding to etude, we finally learnt the last part of the slap etude: the walk
The first person to slap will bring the partner's arm to herself/himself (NOT pull!). The pair will go for a walk together before coming to a stop with mutual consensus. There is a mutual rhythm between partners. The otkaz is important here in giving your partner where you are going.
We then took our "exam" and each pair presented their etude. Unfortunately, we all FAILED !
let's first look at some notes taken as we presented the slap!
- every movement should be calculated
- body control (grouping of stomach muscles)
- Lack of Dynamism (one of the MOST IMPT factor. Dynamism helps to trigger imagination for the audience. It gives meaning to the movements. We cannot be to "mild" when doing etude because this lack of energy does not create the dramatic tension. akhl also mentioned that the power/OMPH is what we need and lacked then)
- during the preparation command, the impulse/tension has to be held. stillness is important to prepare for the dynamic slap
- lines of the body went missing (being precise is very important!)
- note the storyline and rhythm of the entire slap etude. (not a movement piece!)
- different etudes have different levels of difficulty but on the whole, it is all about controlling the body.
第二部分李邪让我们了解biomechanics在以下不同地方的运用:
The 2nd part of the lesson we learnt the application of biomechanics:
1。肢体的biomechanics(body-As in a music score, there is rhythm and a physical score the things we do in biomechanics)
2。空间的biomechanics (space-this space/playground can include the set, object, blocking) and geometry
3。演员之间的biomechanics(between actors-we give each other signals in deciding when to walk together and when to stop together.)
*All (1), (2) and (3) has scores that are being composed.
4。剧本的biomechanics (in the script-the script's Tochika refers to the objective or perspective taken by the playwright/director/actors/character. the playwright and the director can discuss can perhaps deconstruct the play in exploring its objective. the actors have to accommodate to the character's tochika in the play. The tochika also gives show a style.
otkaz is to prepare for the posil of the script, followed by a stoica. tomoz refers to a change/twist in the play, a change in rhythm or even a break.)
5。人物的biomechanics (in the character-character's otkaz refers to his/her background info and it often explains how the character prepares for something. (e.g. The queen in snow white and the seven dwarfs wants to be the fairest person on earth, hence she buys a mirror that tell her lies) Again posil refers to the action being carried by the character. its stoica can be an ending, consequence or realization. tomoz is what changes her objectives such as obstacles encountered.)
6。行动线的biomechanics (action-similar to (5), there is always this cycle of tochika, otkaz, posil, stoica and tormoz in every action.)
在画闻名世界的壁画《最后的晚餐》(The Last Supper)时,达文西为了可以一边画,一边修改这幅壁画,而发明了全新的壁画技术。不只如此,为了能让壁画里的人物能看起来栩栩如生,他花了两年的时间观察生活中人们的身体语言。在画壁画的过程中,他可以一天内不停地画,也可以花好几天不动笔只看着他的画,一直盘算,计划如何继续画。达文西的创作精神真的让我十分敬佩。
Last week’s Biomechanics lesson was fun! As always. ARTivate started the day doing our usual dactyl at different tochika. Then we moved on to estimating the number of steps we would take in moving from one tochika to another. This is supposed to hone our estimation/calculation skills so we can better learn how to conserve our energy on stage. Keeping one’s energy level constant throughout the entire duration definitely takes skill and experience. Moving in groups was definitely more challenging. For one, I had the tendency to be influenced by the speed and exact route that the others took hence my estimation went awry at times.
ARTivate then learnt a new term raccouris, which is a dynamic pose. Imagine taking a picture of someone in constant motion - the pose would be one with anticipation of a next move. Using the basic otkaz, posyl and stoica, each ARTivator had to strike araccouris with a cube, one at a time. Our poses were then varied such that we could only contact the cube with a specific part of our body. Giving a clear stoica is very important as it would buy time for us to plan how to leave the cube and generally, our next move.
ARTivate then did this in groups, striking a raccouris one after another and then concurrently, training our reflexes and improvisation at the same time. ARTivators also played with the different levels, shapes and planes of our body to create a more dynamic image.
Next, ARTivate split into two groups - one group strikes a pose and the other must mirror it after a few seconds of observation. This tested ARTivate’s precision and consistency, especially when the group which posed has to replicate the image again.
After that, ARTivate played “pass the message” but instead of an oral message, we had to pass down an etude. Precision was key in this exercise especially when we replicated the actions to the next person. It probably would have been easier if we could tag each action to some story but as the etude gets passed on, many minor details were left out and sometimes, the actions just seems plain senseless but very comical. It was a hilarious way of learning the need to be precise in everything one does.
As the last activity of the day, ARTivate practised “The Slap” etude but this time, each ARTivator had to hold a plastic cup filled to the brim with water as we did the etude. Every action was executed so slowly as each of us struggled to keep the cup perfectly upright. After a few random splashes of water and many awkward moments, ARTivate learnt that slowing down the actions actually made us more aware of how each move is made and more attention could be paid to the details. Everyone started getting more conscious too. We then concluded the day with a few dactyl, while imagining that we were holding on to those cups of water. Lucky us!
There was no lesson this week as Li Xie has, unfortunately, fallen ill. Here’s wishing her a speedy recovery and to another awesome three hours next week! (:
It is already the 9th biomechanics lesson! It is amazing that I pick up something new each week and have some personal reflections about it. We always make an effort to observe each other whenever we revise the lessons together. Stiff shoulders? Wrong positioning of legs? We remind each other. Last week, we were asked to do ductile and observe ourselves from the outside. In fact, Li Xie told us about this every now and then. It is important to be able to look at ourselves from the outside and we should have a mirror on our mind to know how we do ductile. I guess this apply to our everyday life as well, we ought to "see ourselves" in order to remind and correct ourselves. We help each other with this at the beginning, but it all depends on ourselves as we go along the way.
Each time we are asked to do this, you will hear painful groans from the ARTivators. Perhaps it is how different bodies are structure, or maybe we're not used to using certain part of our body,some ARTivators went through tremendous pain to do this action!
Another exercise... this is to train our waist power. Here comes the important point! We are required to recover to the initial position with one otkaz. How? If you have been reading our blog, you should know the importance of otkaz in biomechanics. You can try it at home! But do remember to have a proper warm up, otherwise you might injure yourself.
Having the pole again..we were asked to hold in pole with both hands and pull it backwards to our waist, then bring it forward again and cross over it with our legs. We were clumsy at first, but it got better when we get the hang of it by using the ever wonderful OTkAZ!
Last week, we did the pole balancing exercise again. Though we were still not an expert of it, everyone is improving =) *Small clap* for all
Previously, we were taught of the stability, accuracy and shape in biomechanics. Li Xie introduced a new word last week, "rythm"(loosely translated) We should be able to feel the sense of rhythm when we do our etude. It should something that is inside us. However, working with the music should only be included in the initial stage of training, when we proceed further, we should in fact learnt that biomechanics requires us to work against the music.
We are all excited to proceed with learning the slap. Everyone have been looking forward to it.. hmm not that ARTivators are not on good terms.. is just that.. hmm.. we are eager to learn the whole etude!
让我简单说说slap的过程 ( 从握手后的最后几个动作)
A simple explaination to the steps of a slap (After the handshake)
1. Handshake
2.Back to stoika position after hand shake (No photos)
3. Preparation to slap
4. Aim
5. Slap
After slapping the person, there are some details that we need to note. Look out for updates!
Handshake
Aim
Preparation to slap
The Slap! They are not really slapping each other, their hand is actually not touching each's other face, is just the actions. As you can see, they are taking turns to slap each other, but the video is stopped because 2 ARTivators ran across the room while practising some other things!
A few points to note: Remember the otkaz of each action. It is not there for the sake of being there. It served as a preparation for the action,for yourself and your partner. It gives the energy of the action as well. Personally, I felt that the rythm comes from the otkaz too.
It is kind of difficult to describe the actions in words as there are far too much details and precision to be noted. Have uploaded some photos to better illustrate the slap. It is not a demonstration as we're still in the midst of learning. Hope it gives you guys a better idea of what it is like. Feel free to leave comments to let us know your thoughts on our entries!
Credits to Yinghao who was injured and helped me take notes
休息过后,我们继续学习李邪为艺树人设计的Meyerhold的etude, “The Slap”。艺树人学会了Meyerhold的握手方式,还有准备给人一巴掌的姿势。从头练习整个etude是一件蛮辛苦的事,因为Meyerhold要求的准确性和我们平常不习惯的姿势使用的肌肉很少会被动用到。要不是这些etude,我想,这些肌肉差不多能说是永远都不会派上用场。
In our last lesson, ARTivate continued working on our otkaz, posil and stoica through games activities such as:
Throwing an increasing number of tennis balls across the room while moving in a random manner
Moving around the room in groups, with every change in direction effected by general consensus and not following a leader (as opposed to the “fish exercise”)
The game of laoyingzhuoxiaoji (“eagle and the chicken/chick”?) between each pair
Each ARTivator had to ensure that his/her actions are executed precisely so as to facilitate anticipation in the other parties.
We then practised our balancing skills, which consists of grouping our core muscles, the three principles listed above and switching of our tochka every step we take. Wooden cubes of the same size were placed in the middle of the room and every ARTivator had to cross the room by stepping on them, similar to crossing a river while stepping on stones. The distance between each cube was slowly increased and soon, even the size of the cubes was varied, and also the orientation of the cubes. Other requirements were added, such as rotating your upper body three times before crossing the “river” and spinning 360° before getting up a cube. All these little changes increased the difficulty at each stage but they were really simple activities that could keep us entertained.
We then continued learning Meyerhold’s etude, “The Slap”, as modified by Li Xie for the amateur ARTivators. From last week’s “greeting position”, we proceeded on to “greet” and “preparation to slap”. Revising these actions right from the start was really tiring. All the weird angles and the need for clean lines definitely put my lazy muscles to a good test.
We concluded the day by honing our balance with the help of bamboo poles. By balancing these poles on our palms, each ARTivators had to move around the room, meet up with a partner halfway through and even shift the poles from one palm to another. It certainly was no easy task moving around with a long extension from the middle of your palms but nonetheless, we enjoyed that activity very much.
Once again, the lesson ended on quite a good note, with it’s fair share of laughter and muscle aches (from staying in the same position while practising the etude). I’m definitely looking forward to learning the actual slap. *evil laughter*
Have you ever thought of doing your part for Mother Earth?
I've just heard from my friend this morning that Singapore Management University (SMU) is hosting a recycling drive by Nokia. From now till the end of November, simply drop off your old and unwanted Nokia mobile phones at SMU and you'll get to have a tree planted in YOUR name! The exact coordinates of the tree would be given so you can check the location of your tree on Google Maps/Earth.
Interested? You can probably find out more from your friends or make a trip down to the very accessible campus today!
Last week, the main part of the lesson is placed on the training of our legs and the flexibility of our body. The placement and position of our legs are very important in biomechanics because these are some of the factors affecting the weight shifting of our body. The weight shifting will actually affect the steadiness of our body in some way and that is what Li Xie has been emphasizing to us -- the importance of the steadiness of our body. On the other hand, our flexibility will affect the "shape" of our body when we do certain actions. Training of our legs is not as tired as it seem to be as Li Xie trained us using some fun exercises!
Still remember the games that we played when we were young? Catching was one of my favourite game then. Li Xie actually uses this game as part of our training! Everyone was excited when we knew that we are going to play that =) However, there are some rules and regulations that we need to follow. We are only allowed to move on one leg! But we can freeze ourselves and stay at the same spot if we are unable to escape in time. The purpose of having this "freeze" privilege is in fact one of the things that we had been trained on-- Thomoz. We have to learn to balance ourselves in all situations and identify the brake of our body. Sounds fun? It was indeed a fun game where everyone scream and run for their lives on one leg. It did not feel tiring at all until the game was stopped.I guess is really a good way to train our legs hee.
Prior to the catching game, we had some exercises to prepare ourselves for the game. We were asked to bend our knees and lowered our bodies to move across the space. We have to keep our bodies straight at the same time. This requires a lot effort from our leg as well.
我们也来跳 Hip Hop!
还记得每次看到舞蹈员跳 Hip Hop的其中一种舞步吗?就是蹲着,把其中一只脚伸直并把双手放在地上然后伸直的脚便会在地上旋转一圈。为了训练我们身体的灵活度,我们上个星期也练习了类似的动作。大家第一次尝试这样的动作难免看起来有点僵硬和笨拙但练习了几次大家便发现其实这个动作和我们之前学的很多动作一样,只要懂得运用otkaz就不会觉得那么吃力。
Still remember the dance movements by hip hop dances? Those movements where they will squat down with one leg straighten and both of their hands on the ground after which they will then spin their leg on the ground. We did a similar exercise to train the flexibility of our body. Of course, we are not able to do it as swiftly and nicely. But, once we identify the use of otkaz for the movement, things become much easier.
We were pair up at first for this exercise. Each pair had a pole and we were required to support the pole with one of our finger each while moving around in the room. We have to try to keep the pole in place and not let it dropped to the floor. It started off easy but as are asked to close our eyes, it became challenging. While we try to keep the pole in place, we are constantly shifting the weight of our body, hence we will naturally need to move our legs in a flexible way. We were later asked to form a group of 5. The increase number of people and poles requires more coordination of our body movement. Li xie added more conditions along the way and it challenges our body to be really flexible in order to complete the task without dropping the poles.
For the past few weeks, we had been learning how to walk, run and jump. Last week, we have finally proceed to shaking hands! This may sound weird to you, why do we need to learn how to shake hand? The biomechanics way of a hand shake is different from the normal ones that we have when we met someone that we just know. Like what Li Xie had been emphasizing, biomechanics is not a performing method, it is a form of actors training. So, regardless of what we learnt, we are in fact tuning our body in order to achieve the shape of the actions we are required to do. In other words, many actions in biomechanics challenge us to use different parts of our body that we do not usually use. Last week, we line up the jump and run actions together with the handshake that we just learnt into a sequence of movements. This sequence of movements is actually part of an etude that we are learning - the "Slap". If you are interest in finding out what is an etude, you may want t read up on books or check it out online. I am still learning along the way, so I shall not state my understanding of a etude here in any case if I mislead anyone.
Looking forward to the next lesson! Hope you guys will look forward to our next post too! See you!
Again, we were to find 20 directions/shapes of different body parts during the warm up. 2 additional things we had to look out for were the pre-planning of our next direction/shape as well as the emotion attached to it. I found it most fun to find 20 shapes for the body as it really challenged me to give it more possibilities.
With 2 people standing in the hoop, they take turns to push each other once in attempt to get the other party out of the hoop. The idea is to apply our brake (tomoz) and regain balance quickly, while using the push from the other party as an otkaz to return the energy.
After this exercise, the "playing field" was expanded to the entire rehearsal space and each were to push the other party to a point.
One important point to note is that the application of our centre (muscles around the stomach) is especially important in finding our balance. To show that, we were told to maintain at the mode of being "on the verge of falling" so that we can feel our muscles at the centre of our body tensed up in order to prevent the fall.
3. Shrinking Rectangle The original rectangle had 13 people in it. The crowdedness was comparable to that of the amk central crowd along the shophouses. we were told to walk in it (applying our tomoz) and not hitting anyone. As the rectangle "shrinks", the crowd becomes that of citylink on a public holiday, and gradually to that of orchard road on christmas eve. We were told to slow-mo our movements so that we are fully aware of our body.
using the exercise above, we were to push each other our of the rectangle! and MYRA emerged as the winner ahahah
4。跑/跳
注:
-用右脚来把自己“弹”上来
-跳完后手的位置
4. Run & Jump We finally learnt how to run and jump!
These were the main instructions:
preparation for running position
preparation for run
jumping to stop position (replaced by an "hurp" sound)
some notes here include beig aware of the "spring" on right foot and the position of hands after jump (hands should be "prepared" during jump)
The Green Man is part of Drama Box’s community project on Environment.
Conceptualized and organized by ARTivate, the event consists of:
- ARTivate’s thought-provoking plays on environmental conservation
- “The Flames” musical performance by girls from Andrew & Grace Home
- A mini bazaar that promotes environmental conservation
Selfish, written by Lam Dan Fong, reveals a story about the decision of a daughter -
to escape into a perfect new world or remain in the world of self destruction.
Plasti-City Kills the Cat written by Ho Kian Tong, explores the harm brought about by plastics to the environment.
What Matters? is a package of one forum theatre play and three fringe activities which explores the issue of race with the youths of today.
Through the series of fringe activities and the Forum Theatre play, ARTivate aims to probe further into the awareness of racial issues with the youths of today and understand the true meaning of harmony between races.
Forum Theatre Play
3 students of different races set up an Adventure Club in school. As they prepare to go on a new adventure to search for fugitive Mas Selamat in their club room, an accident happened in the school and conflicts arose within the group.
*The play is performed mainly in English with some Mandarin and Malay
Fringe #1: Race in School – Stereotypes and Others
The youths were asked to move, play, think and discover, thus finding the way of dealing with racial issues in real life.
Fringe #2: Movie screening – To Kill a Mocking bird
Based on the novel by Harper Lee, this award-winning classic film present racial issues vividly on screen.
There was a discussion session after the screening facilitated by Mr. Danny Yeo.
Sharing by young actors of Class Enemy from Bosnia
Fringe #3: Survival Ethnic Conflicts in Bosnia – a Singapore Arts Festival programme
Sharing by young actors of Class Enemy from Bosnia on their personal experiences of the war-torn times and how they have learnt to cope with growing up in an environment filled with violence caused by racial and ethnic conflicts.
Speaker: Director Haris Pasovic and the cast of CLASS ENEMY (East West Theatre Company)
The Movie Screening is the second installment of Project Mending Sky: The Green Man, held in conjunction with Project Mending Sky: ME (补天计划之我).
Through movie screenings and post-movie discussion sessions ARTivate hopes to explore issues surrounding our Earth’s survival amidst the damages we are inflicting on her.
Documentary-Movie #1: Winged Migration
Teaching the audience how to make dustbins using flyers
Directed by Jacques Perrin, a noted actor and film producer in France, this Academy Award nominated movie records the flight of dozens of different birds from around the globe as they follow their navigational instincts and make the taxing journey to more temperate climates in the fall.
Documentary -Movie #2: The Greening of Cuba
Cuban farmers and scientists working to reinvent a sustainable agriculture based on ecological principles and local knowledge rather than imported agricultural inputs which remind us that developed and developing nations alike can choose a healthier environment and still feed their people.
The audience sharing
Documentary -Movie #3: The Power of Community
A follow-up to The Greening of Cuba 10 years later to see how the Cuban transitioned from a highly mechanized, industrial agricultural system to one using organic methods of farming and local, urban gardens.
Discussions facilitated by: Mr Danny Yeo and Mr Tay Lai Hock
*Language: English (with English subtitles)
Part of a double-bill during Singapore Drama Educators Association (SDEA) Celebrate Drama 2009
“CityS” is ARTivate’s first devised play. It is also ARTivate’s debut presentation following a year-round capacity-building process, during which the ARTivators underwent a series of training involving acting and playwrighting.
It is conceived and brought to satisfactory theatrical fruition by the collaboration of all ARTivators via a gradual process and accumulation of brainstorming and improvisation, under the guidance of devising facilitator Kok Heng Leun and director Koh Wan Ching.
“CityS” explores the concept of an inclusive city, in Singapore’s context, and in the context of our current highly integrated, globalised world.
In this play, stories from different aspects of a city are connected by a series of luggage sonatas which symbolizes a journey that questions the ideology constructed and perceived by majority of the society. Realities are confronted: autocracy, disharmony, discrimination, limitations, alienation, oppression and the likes. Does the decision of the majority always account for the minority? Will the elites ever consider the welfare of their downtown folks in this race to the top? Is that action you took out of free will or under the influence of others?
ARTivate hopes that audiences will reconsider the meaning of a truly inclusive city after watching the play and in turn, answer these questions for themselves.
Devised and performed by ARTivate Devising facilitated by Kok Heng Leun Directed by Koh Wan Ching
*Performed mainly in Mandarin. (English Surtitles provided)
Drama Box is Singapore's most prominent contemporary Mandarin theatre company. It is a professional non-profit company with charity status. Formed in 1990, it has since gained a respectable reputation for its acute sensitivity and perception in heightening social awareness and civic responsibility. Our productions remain fun and entertaining, yet thought-provoking and reflective.
Blanc Space
The Blanc Space was inaugurated in 2000 to provide a training platform for performers. In 2007, the company expanded Blanc Space to include programmes for budding directors and aspiring playwrights.