Common Sense, Profound Sense: A Message from Ireland

Liz Lerman has just returned from a jaunt to Ireland and England where she led workshops on Critical Response and other methods. At the Abbey Theatre studios, through the cooperation of Create, she taught and facilitated a CRP session with Irish choreographer Ríonach Ní Néill. Rionach presented her work Seandálaíocht (Archaeology), which she describes as “a highly personal exploration of the paradox of a language only spoken by one person.”

Rionach reflected on her experience with CRP in a message she sent to Liz and some of the workshop sponsors, and graciously granted permission for me to excerpt it here. I especially appreciate hearing her “next steps” and her reflections on the implications of Critical Response in an Irish cultural context. Thank you, Rionach.

“It was a privilege to me to present my work for the critical response workshop. I knew that, concerning identity and the Irish language, it dealt with a very sensitive issue in the Irish psyche and that everyone would have an opinion and an emotional response to it…. The workshop gave us the tools to engage with each other and the work, the method providing a safe place for the audience to give, and me to receive, feedback, and yet for us to be as honest and direct with our opinions as we needed. It was such an enriching experience for me. I have so much information to process and perspectives with which to revisit the work with further clarity and depth. I will be viewing the work as starting from the programme note. I will be examining how, without compromising its and my truth, it can communicate more precisely across a language barrier. And I will be enjoying performing it, as I now realise that it can say what I want to convey.

“I think the method is of particular use to us in Ireland, a point that arose in the workshop. Although words and the Irish are intrinsically linked, I think our love of the beauty of the sounds, the verbal landscapes and dances we can create with words, sometimes obscure the meanings. We use language to delight, to amuse, to dazzle, but maybe not so well to communicate. And so we are not so good at criticism, in fact, criticism here is usually equated with negativity. The method, in its polite neutrality, made us take responsibility for our thoughts, and made us focus on what we were really saying and really hearing. Common sense maybe, but a very profound sense.”

Notable Quotable: Woody Allen

This master of mordent humor might be answering the question: How do you measure success?

If you're not failing every now and again, it's a sign you're not doing anything very innovative.

The Lens of Love

Yesterday I was in Manhattan working with fabulous colleagues from Liz Lerman Dance Exchange and Facing History and Ourselves. Our two organizations co-facilitated a workshop for New York City-area school teachers.*

As with many Dance Exchange workshops, this one culminated with teams of participants showing short text-and-movement studies that they had created using tools and content shared in the day’s activities. Fabulous colleague Elizabeth Johnson (Associate Artistic Director of Dance Exchange, seen at far right in the above picture) facilitated the presentation of these Build-a-Phrase dances. In her introduction she said something like this:

You’ve worked quickly. None of us have had enough time. When you do this with your students, they will not have enough time. So, as we watch I’d ask you to keep in mind the idea of work-in-progress. I’d like you to look through the lens of love and set aside judgment for the time being. After each showing we’ll talk about what we saw, so be thinking about what is meaningful, surprising or memorable about what you are watching, or what you might want to take away.

As I listened and watched, it occurred to me that here was another answer to the question “Can you just take parts of CRP or do you have to do the whole Process every time?” For in moments like this, we often employ a modified Step One as the primary means of reflecting on the choreographic quick-studies that people have produced. It affords a shortcut to insights and learnings that both makers and watchers have gained in the course of their shared experience.

“The lens of love” is a phrase I’ve heard Elizabeth use before. Later she reminded me that it was former company member Marvin Webb who was the first to use it at the Dance Exchange. These words struck me afresh as being just right for the moment we were in. While I wouldn’t recommend it for use during a formal CRP, I think it’s a great fit near the close of a day in which a group of people, primarily new to each other, have made themselves vulnerable, stretched their comfort zones, and built community. Its affirmational spirit is balanced by the rigor of the questions that accompany it. And it names the moment nicely, because when you’ve got a room full of teachers as committed as this group, you’ve got a room full of stong, active, no-nonsense love.
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*This workshop was part of an ongoing program in which we’re combining aspects of Dance Exchange’s Small Dances About Big Ideas with Facing History’s Choosing to Participate curriculum. It offered methods for applying movement and artmaking techniques to teach about active citizenship and standing up in the face of injustice. Dance Exchange’s work with Facing History is supported by grants from the Covenant Foundation, the Nathan Cummings Foundation, and the Maxine Greene Foundation.