Choreo-graphic Figures
CHOREO–GRAPHIC FIGURES: Deviations from the Line
The interdisciplinary research project “CHOREO–GRAPHIC FIGURES. Deviations from the Line”, led by artist Nikolaus Gansterer (Austria/Vienna) in collaboration with choreographer-dancer Mariella Greil (Austria/Vienna) and artist-writer Emma Cocker (UK/Nottingham), in dialogue with a team of international critical interlocutors was approved funded by the FWF PEEK research grant of Austria.
With ‘arts-based research’ at its heart, this research project stages an inter-subjective encounter between drawing (Gansterer), choreography (Greil) and writing (Cocker) in order to
a) investigate those forms of ‘thinking-feeling-knowing’ produced through collaborative, interdisciplinary exchange, ‘between the lines’ of drawing, dance and writing,
b) explore the performativity of notation (figures of thought, speech and movement) for articulating and making tangible this enquiry,
c) contribute new knowledge and understanding to debates about the specificity of artistic enquiry and expanded practices of drawing, dance and writing.
The project explores the nature of ‘thinking-in-action’ or ‘figures of thought’ produced as the practices of drawing, choreography and writing enter into dialogue, overlap and collide. Through processes of reciprocal exchange, dialogue and negotiation between the key researchers, „CHOREO–GRAPHIC FIGURES. Deviations from the Line“ interrogates the interstitial processes, practices and knowledge(s) produced in the ‘deviation’ for example, from page to performance, from word to mark, from line to action, from modes of flat image making towards transformational embodied encounters.
Researching the reciprocity of drawing and thinking, Nikolaus Gansterer accumulated a rich archive of more than three hundred drawings over the duration of the Choreo-graphic Figures project. (see more: Choreo-graphic Figures & Embodied Diagrams)
Choreo-graphic-Figures_trailer from Choreo-graphic Figures on Vimeo.
Key researchers:
Nikolaus Gansterer (University of Applied Arts / Vienna)
Mariella Greil (University of Roehampton / London)
Emma Cocker (Nottingham Trent University / Nottingham)
Sputniks: Alex Arteaga (UDK / Berlin), Lilia Mestre (APASS / Brussels), Christine de Smedt (PARTS / Brussels)
Key words: choreography, performance, notation, drawing, writing, mapping, embodied knowledge, figures of thought, figures of speech, figures of movement, body diagrams, embodied diagrammatics, gestures of vitality, gestures of re-/searching
Research period: 2014 – 2017
Funded by the Austrian Science Fund FWF – PEEK Programme for Advancement and Development of Artistic Research.
Artistic Research Catalogue – Visit the Choreo-graphic Cyclopedia: Choreo-graphic Figures: Scoring Aesthetic Encounters (https://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/462390/462391)
Official project website: http://www.choreo-graphic-figures.net
Publication/Monograph:
– Choreo-graphic Figures. Deviations from the Line
A comprehensive publication on the research on embodied diagrammatics and the performativity of various interconnetected forms of live an/notation edited by Nikolaus Gansterer, Emma Cocker, Mariella Greil with contributions by Alex Arteaga, Arno Böhler, Christine De Smedt, Catherine de Zegher, Christopher Dell, Gerhard Dirmoser, Karin Harrasser, Adrian Heathfield, Victor Jaschke, Simona Koch, Krassimira Kruschkova, Brandon LaBelle, Erin Manning, Dieter Mersch, Lilia Mestre, Werner Moebius, Alva Noë, Jeanette Pacher, Jörg Piringer, Helmut Ploebst, P.A. Skantze, Andreas Spiegl.
Please find more details and selected pages for download here:
http://www.gansterer.org/Choreo-graphic-Figures_Deviations-from-the-Line/
http://www.choreo-graphic-figures.net/publications/book/
in: Edition Angewandte, DeGruyter Publishers, Berlin/Boston, 2017. Scheduled presentations: 29 April 2017: Theatre Academy Helsinki; 5 May 2017: AILab, Vienna; 19 -22 May 2017 Nida Art Colony, Lithuania; 9 June 2017, in the framework of the symposium „Zeichen Setzen“, co-organized by KU Linz; University of Art and Design Linz; & Anton Bruckner University, Linz, Austria. More presentations in Brussels and Berlin to be annouced soon!
You can order the book HERE or download the full digital version (pdf) HERE!
Published articles:
– On Scoring:
The SAR RC Prize for Best JAR Exposition 2019 goes to: Choreo-graphic Figures: Scoring Aesthetic Encounters (2019). The exposition Choreo-graphic Figures: Scoring Aesthetic Encounters (2019) stages an encounter between choreography, drawing, sound and writing in order to explore those knowledge forms through collaborative exchange. The exposition stages the different modes of practice as an actual dialogue and collision, and derives from the findings of the artistic research project Choreo-graphic Figures: Deviations from the Line (2014-2017) by Emma Cocker, Nikolaus Gansterer and Mariella Greil. The researchers seek to extend their investigation in questioning how a digital archive can be created that is capable of reflecting the durational and relational aspects of the research process. The outcome is a non-linear rhizomatic (using the artists’ term) encounter with artistic research, where the findings are activated as a choreo-graphic event. The artist and designer Simona Koch supported the transformation from an embodied, experiential enquiry into different publication formats, including a text-based book, alongside the online digital format of the RC exposition. The RC complements the shortcomings of printed material and utilizes the performative qualities of sound, image and film that cannot be expressed in the printed material. In this way in the project, the digital and printed material complement each other.
The exposition can be encountered experientially through a section called ‘Playing the Score’, whilst the ‘Find Out More’ section contains contextual framing alongside conceptual-theoretical reflections on the ecology of practices and figures. The authors (Emma Cocker, Nikolaus Gansterer, Mariella Greil-Moebius, Simona Koch) make an interesting use of the RC platform, communicating their research through rich and articulate interactions between text and multimedia materials. Once the user selects ‘Play the Score’, the exposition becomes an inhabited drawing where performance, documentation, notation and user agency are blurred, and their interconnections are explored in rich ways. The complexity of the exposition is built through written and spoken word, video and sound recordings, photos and graphic elements that enable and encourage the user to literally re-enact the research process. Documentation of the performative elements of the research interplay with artistic writings, presented as animated text elements and reflections of notational forms that are embedded in the current discourse on [e.g.] aesthetics and human nature. The delightful and enjoyable layout and design of the exposition helps the reader understand the content. The exposition was published in Journal for Artistic Research – JAR 18.
– On Beginnings and Emergences: Choreo-graphic Figures: Beginnings and Emergences, is a collaborative research article reflecting on the first year of the project Choreo-graphic Figures: Deviations from the Line by Emma Cocker, Nikolaus Gansterer and Mariella Greil, was published on the 7.5.2015 in the online journal RUUKKU: Studies in Artistic Research, in the issue on „Process in Artistic Research“: http://www.researchcatalogue.net/view/132472/132473
– On An/Notations
‘Notion of Notation > < Notation of Notion’, an article/artists’ pages produced as a collaboration between Nikolaus Gansterer, Emma Cocker and Mariella Greil has been accepted for inclusion in the issue of Performance Research, Vol. 20, Issue 6, ‘On An/Notations’, eds. Scott deLahunta, Kim Vincs and Sarah Whatley. Publication date: 31 December 2015.
About the issue: ‘On An/notations’ considers the potential of the surface of the page, alongside other surfaces, including the screen, as sites for engaging with and thinking through performance ideas and processes. An annotation at its simplest level is adding information to information using some kind of mark-up language or tools. This issue will seek to engage projects using a wide range of approaches alongside critical reflection to draw out and make explicit research and insights from within the entanglement of sensing, feeling and thinking that is the body-based practitioner’s research field.
– On Vitality Gestures and Embodied Diagrammatics
a book chapters written by Nikolaus Gansterer, Emma Cocker, Mariella Greil for the forthcoming publication: „Body Diagrams“, eds. Alexander Gerner and Irene Mittelberg (John Benjamins Publishing Company, Amsterdam, 2017)
– On Contemporary Code – Artistic Research
a contribution for the catalogue: ‚Contemporary Code – Artistic Research‘, Gerald Bast, Alexander Damianisch, Romana Schuler (Eds.) Cat. Exhib., University of Applied Arts, Vienna, 2015. ISBN 978-3-9504140-1-1
Reviews:
– „Expanding the Vocabulary“, Sabina Holzer, in: Corpus Magazine online (09.11.2017)
– „Die Notation des Augenblicks“, Scilog magazine, online, (28.08.2017)
– „Noting down the moment“, Scilog magazine, online, (28.08.2017)
– „Mit Kunst den wissenschaftlichen Rahmen sprengen“ in: Der Standard Spezial, Beate Hausbichler/Tanja Traxler, (17.04.2015)