On Vanishing: New Mythologies for Choreography in the Museum

When I was twenty-two years old, beginning studies in animation, and earning a degree in visual and media studies, I discovered that the Greeks referred to choreography as “dance writing,” from the words χορεία (circular dance) and γραφή (writing). This fascinated me, because I had always viewed choreography an act that vanishes: its remnants are commonly witnessed in the bodies of performers reproducing movements and activities. The act of choreography is private, as opposed to dance, which is communally shared, or publicly viewed. Choreography occurs, it is transmitted, and it disappears, to become dance.

The Greek etymology of the word led to a large discovery for me at the time, as it uncovered an ancient relationship between choreography, writing, drawing, and the graphic arts. It made the word “choreography” seem more permanent to me, and propelled a five-year cycle of my animations.

Ten years later, I recently located a sketchbook of mine from that time, in which I wrote a series of related goals:

Goals

My project is to develop five proposals on the continuum of choreography:

1. 1. To inhibit the act of vanishing in choreography. To capture choreography, so that it does not have to vanish.

2. 2. To intensify the relationship between choreography, visual art, and design.

3. 3. To utilize new forms of reproduction, capture, animation, and image-based media: moving images/moving bodies.

4. 4. To reconfigure spaces. To situate choreography in new relationships to exhibition space.

5. 5. To have dedicated spaces for choreography. Choreography has always been a tenant—to theatre spaces, to opera houses, to makeshift places that serve as temporary hosts. Choreography needs to own property: real estate.

Looking back, I might slightly revise these statements. Choreography taking up real estate in a museum or gallery is not the question: in actuality, choreographers are primarily concerned with the same questions as other exhibiting artists—space, visuality, temporality, and value. Issues of aesthetics, valuation, presentation, and the distortions that can occur are related topics when choreography is curated into a visual arts context.

Likewise, the transposition of ephemeral choreographic arts into visual arts institutions is not a new phenomenon. But there are multiple discrepancies between current choreographic literacy and curatorial practice in the visual arts: this is increasingly evident when current choreographies become curated or presented in museums, galleries, and public collections. From a choreographer’s point of view, each of my works analyzes the structural supports available to choreography, when presented site-specifically in museums. The venue is used as a point of departure, to suppose new mythologies for choreography.

Included here are a few examples of how recent works have occupied drawing, scoring, and at times, danced-drawings: staging a choreographic act, as an engine for new performative drawings.

Eclipse. First Drawing (2012). Nine-minute timed drawing, pre-figuring four dancers’ movements into a four-sided venue. Choreography and drawing © Jonah Bokaer. Courtesy the artist.

Occupant. Performance & Drawing 1 (2013). Dancers, objects, and actions generating a floor drawing. Choreography and Drawing © Jonah Bokaer. Dancer: CC Chang. Scenography: Daniel Arsham. Photo: © Jati Lindsay, 2013.

Occupant. Performance & Drawing 2 (2013). Dancers, objects, and actions generating a floor drawing. Choreography & Drawing © Jonah Bokaer. Dancer: Tal Adler-Arieli. Scenography: Daniel Arsham. Photo: © Jati Lindsay, 2013.

Occupant. Game Score (2013). Choreographic score, animating dancers, objects, and actions. Choreography and drawing © Jonah Bokaer. Courtesy the artist.