1995 'The Secret Agreement with Matter, 'Paris; photo
by Jean Gros-Abadie
| Butoh is a form of contemporary dance created in the late 1950s by
Tatsumi Hijikata. It is contemporary in the very precise sense of the term,
reflecting as it does the necessities and demands of the times. Butoh charged
through Japan's avant-garde scene, fueled by the tremendous power of several
dancers, first and foremost Tatsumi Hijikata with his 'ankoku butoh.' The
1980s saw butoh dancers (including myself) developing and expanding their
work not only in Japan but also in Europe, the United States and, indeed,
all over the world.
What has made butoh so significant is that not only has it opposed the rigidly prescribed forms often found in both traditional and modern dance but it has also demanded a philosophical uprooting which categorically refutes all modes of ready-made 'culture.' (Here, 'culture' includes not just the performing arts of dance, theater, mime, music, etc. but also literature and other categories.) This opposition of prescribed and ready-made culture is sustained not by the the body as a functional object as demanded by society but the body as a living and changing sculpture fashioned by life itself. We refer to this latter body as 'nikutai,' and it is a body that resounds with the desire for individual life, one which encompasses individual history and experience. Almost ten years since the death of Tatsumi Hijikata, butoh has entered a new era in Japan and elsewhere. This new era has seen the rise of dancers who, while having been influenced both directly and indirectly by Hijikata's supremely perfected method of butoh, have nevertheless been developing their own individual work and attitudes. For instance, while 'ankoku butoh' can be said to have possessed a very precise method and philosophy handed down from master to apprentice (perhaps it could be called 'inherited' butoh), I regard present-day butoh as a 'tendency' that depends not only on Hijikata's philosophical legacy but also on the development of new and diverse modes of expression. The 'tendency' that I speak of involves extracting the pure life which is dormant in our bodies. The result is not butoh as a genre but as the essential element for all expression. In this sense, there is a strong possibility that butoh is ubiquitous, existing not necessarily in every dance that calls itself butoh but in certain other types of dance not bearing the butoh label. Indeed, it is an unfortunate fact that certain dancers have been mistakenly banished from the butoh lattice on grounds of not meeting superficial and seemingly random criteria. At this point I should mention that my use of the concept 'pure life' does not indicate beauty, health, homogeneity, etc. Rather, it indicates the entire spectrum of life --- not just polar concepts such as beautiful and ugly, good and bad, bright and dark and so on. As 'ankoku butoh' lies outside my realm, I have nothing to teach about butoh as a method. Rather, I specialize in work which is dynamic and changing; it focuses on how to pinpoint and extract life itself from the body. So what is one to do when one has nothing to teach? It may come as a surprise when I say that butoh could well be dormant in your own body. My work is to discover ways to extract that butoh, that life. I should point out that, although butoh may be dormant in everyone, it may not be attainable to everyone. Whether or not you can dance butoh depends on whether or not your body encompasses desire, regret, pleasure and interest in living along with life's experiences and memories. Bodily habits are also a kind of memory. In addition, as long as butoh is a kind of expression, we must have the ability and responsibility to 'edit' those inner elements. I have no interest in those who see butoh as a kind of exotic spectacle of strange movements and bizarre gestures and who want to 'learn' it by some sort of rote process. Butoh is an ineffable kind of behavior produced by the body itself, possessing neither name nor form. Ignoring what is already in the body and concerning oneself with some exterior facet of the body is tantamount to exploiting the body as a tool of expression. This is far from the spirit of butoh. I am primarily interested in ordinary people, the people who can share in the pleasure and pain of living. I find only marginal interest in butoh fanatics who covet butoh as an oddity and the dance 'experts' whose pride hangs on the thread of conventional technique. |
1995 'The Secret Agreement with Matter, 'Paris; photo
by Jean Gros-Abadie
| My White Butoh is not intended as an antithesis to 'ankoku butoh'
(black butoh or the dance of darkness) of Tatsumi Hijikata, the founder
of butoh. Rather, by using the word 'white' I stress the philosophical
advocacy of ankoku butoh: a butoh dancer must completely expose the 'darkness
of his own existence.' In this interpretation, I amplify it and assert
that such exposure should be so complete that it comes under the 'white
sun,' meaning a perfectly clear and cloudness light.
Almost all modern dances in Western countries, or worldwide, are 'created' with the basic method of first clarifying a concept and then collecting and arranging dancers' external movements and forms to realize that concept. In contrast, one of butoh's largest characteristics is to produce --- or more accurately, 'give birth to' --- dances by guilding and drawing out the 'dance' already immanent in the dancer's body (this 'dance' may be referred to as 'original experience'; the word 'inner landscape' is often used in the butoh world). As a result, some butoh dances do not involve specific or phenomenological forms and movements as their basic element. Butoh dancers have always referred to the body with that immanent 'original landscape' ('dance') as 'nikutai,' to be distinguished from the physical body, or flesh, as a biological entity. To realize 'nikutai,' a butoh dancer must recognize and amass personal experiences, memories and bodily habits; and since butoh is an art of expression, he must also have the ability to 'montage' those personal elements. Difficulties butoh dancers are often faced with are related to the difficulties of reaizing 'nikutai.' Difficulties, or sometimes misunderstandings, on the part of butoh audiences, on the other hand, lie in their common sense, with which they seek to see 'nikutai' with the immanent 'inner landscape' only as a visible object, or as specific and phenomenological forms and movements. White Butoh's thrust, however, is to go to the very bottom of the essence of butoh which is prior to forms and movements; namely, to pursue the realities of life. It goes without saying that it is not an easy task. |