Can Beauty Save You from Schizophrenia?
My feeling was that beauty yet remains in intimate situations;
that it is quite hopeless to think and act impressively in public terms.
This attitude is escapist,
but I believe it is wise, rather than foolish to escape from a bad situation.
(John Cage, “A Composer’s Confessions” 1948)
“The first thing one notices about New York is that an incredible number of things are going on.” True today, as it was in the middle of the past century, and certainly obvious not only to Cage. Like no other being on earth, a New Yorker on the daily basis is tortured by the most difficult human activity - making choices - given that so many good things are happening simultaneously. Startling simultaneity of rich and vibrant life is perhaps addictive, and the next thing one might notice is the incredible number of things taking place throughout a single performance.
During closing days of vanishing July, Lincoln Center Out of Doors Festival featured Water, a performance by Japanese New-Yorkers Eiko & Koma, in the genre that so persistently eludes “dance” or “theatre,” which I would call an act of intense intentional silence. A quite precise description of how such silence, and the intentional sound enveloping it was acted out in Water, have been promptly published by the NYTwww.nytimes.com/2011/08/01/arts/dance/eiko-koma-at-lincoln-center-out-of-doors-review.html; I have only few words as a tribute to unintentional.
The Paul Milstein Pool at Hearst Plaza, where the act of silence was happening, is a large open space, which, though surrounded by different theatres of Lincoln Center, can hardly be called a place, especially by the spectators on the periphery, as there are no complete physical walls around the “stage.” Thus, the action is really happening in the midst of the vibrating city - a feeling especially palpable for the upper row spectators on the VIP lawn (those who presumably had the best perspective on the whole scene).
In the retrospect, it seems that a whole different act of unintentional noise was planned around the intentional act of silence, - an aleatoric composition where the roles performed by the organizers were (partially) fixed and different spectators were responding to them by ear.
Eiko and Koma’s performance represents an act of silence not only in an audible sense: their movements are as scarce as the sounds, building up the spectators’ tension. However, the moment one manages to fix a gaze on the floating couple that finally joins their hands in water, a well-projected voice of a police woman on the left admonishes a late-comer that the area where he’s heading is closed. “How come closed? It was open earlier (half an hour ago, when less things were happening in the pool). I left my wife out there. - Show me your wife!” A family separation drama. As soon as you immerse in the Native American percussion drone, that is enclosing the silence, another restless soul comes in. “This area is closed! - I was sitting here before! - I don’t believe you!” A social rejection. For greater intimacy with the subject one might virtually pluck the ears, and find the reflection of visual silence in the triangular raft, so magically floating between the two actors. Alas, now policewoman engages tactility. “Why don’t you guys move to the lawn? There is a much better view there.” So we move to the lawn, for a better view of the city: the candles floating on water are now reflected in the street lights, mirroring the illumination of the surrounding high scrapers. If silence includes all the unintentional noise, is the intimate sound of bamboo flute from the pool less silent that the sirens on the surrounding streets?
The first thing one must learn in New York is to enjoy its “improvised performances” - for they are happening at every corner - funny, absurd, ironic, utterly beautiful, and always very cinematic. The first thing one notices about a true New Yorker is an unprecedented ability to grasp all at once, play by ear, and enjoy what you get - or don’t get. While visitors might have felt that the “true performance” was stolen from them by unintentional noise, the local may regard it as a bonus to the performance. New Yorkers sometimes seem to have a special skill to perceive several things at once, unless they really came to enjoy the beauty.
One might be tempted to blame the organizers for “stealing the intimacy” of the silent act by arranging it in such an open space. To me it seems that after forty years of personal relationship and artistic collaboration, having completed 37 works of close and personal performances, Eiko and Koma wanted to experience their emotion surpassing the crowd, to continue acting intimacy and preserve the happening only between the two of them despite the surrounding spectators. In any case, something more intimate was arranged for the lovers of beauty in Cagean sense - an exhibition at the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts that is open until October 30. Come to the place and experience the more intimate and most intimate space.
It follows, still, that open multi-actionable performances are meant for the ones who can easily bifurcate their minds. Those who want to escape such practice might also treat Eiko and Koma’s act of intense intentional silence as an idea for own performance, a prelude that urges us, the arts lovers, to hear silence in every sound, to stage installations in the places of our own, and perform, perform, perform - in the infinite spectacle of life.