[prijevod na hrvatski niže u tekstu]
Stefa Govaart performance (40′) & an after-talk with Marko Gutić Mižimakov
I was obsessed with claiming the space of a baby for a while.
Painfully earnest, dedicated, conditioned for every sort of servitude, I understood that doing time, whether in dance school or as part of academia, amounted to acts––or, rather, passivities––of cultish subjection.
Funny enough, I did not find my truth; rendered to myself the meaning of my own struggle as desire.
Well, that wasn’t clear.
I seem averse to narrative, humor, to (familiar) referentiality à la popculture.
So the materiality of the work comes down to affect or sound––maybe technique.
Can even bringing this up be productive for an audience?
I continue to receive emails from Rachel from the time I thought Nora Turato was cool––and wouldn’t I be better?!––and so I signed up for “Rachel’s English”.
Rachel’s English is pretty impeccable.
Rachel says that the key to US-American timbre is the schwa (/ə/).
It’s everywhere she says.
Fungibility perversely manages desire.
(sic).
A sic reminds us that what was said, inclusive of its blunders, was effectively said and cannot be undone.
~
It is hoped that Unwatchable Theater wills viewers into questioning the status of 1) the performer who undergoes, 2) the performer who acts, and 3) the performer who observes. If enigma belongs to the sphere of performance, so do eccentricity and mediation. In three acts, the artist variously establishes undergoing (the interior), acting (the eccentric) and in-situ observance (the reflective). They undergo themselves, rely on audience attention/participation, and “see” seeing, attempting at frames for working across the body’s inner-, outer- and interface. At best, the audience is able to say which is foregrounded, when asked. At times, attendees will have to intervene. But generally, you can sit back and watch, passive/unobserved, noting the use of synecdoche, tautology and pleonasm as literary and performative devices that can, with some force, point to the reciprocal sliding of signifier and signified; say the same thing twice––but not. A circumlocutionary mode of speech bars the entrance to full satisfaction from coming into view. Dialectical techniques remind audiences that what they’re seeing is a performance, the fatal flaw being that you never actually forget that you are seeing one. I keep pushing into avant-garde stuff, while the Nora Turato line exposes my (non)relation to pop, and a choral group is recruited for pleasure, belief, dialogue and entrustment. I am still figuring out my relation to the archive. “Person” means “a mask or a false face”, such as those of wood or clay, covering the whole head, worn by the actors in later Roman theater. The uses and abuses of theater for life. Presented only with traditions that rejected as bourgeois, reactionary, conservative, or otherwise boring the author’s tendency to write about their “self”, who does formally interesting work? MAMA’s entry corridor is interesting.
Stefa Govaart’s work activates variously established artists, scholars and performers. Taking on the role of dancer, artist, dramaturge, pedagogue, translator and writer, collaborations include the dance performance BEGIN/The Mirror (with Bryana Fritz and Chloe Chignell), the lecture and performance series spring*meeting (with Nikhil Vettukattil, Andrea Rodrigo and Steph Holl-Trieu), and the Sex Negativity Research Group (with Marija Cetinić, Persis Bekkering and Tessel Veneboer). Govaart performed in works by Oscar Murillo, Lydia McGinchey, Eszter Salamon, PRICE, Claudia Pagès, among others. They hold MA’s in Cultural Analysis (University of Amsterdam) and Performance Studies (New York University), having previously studied dance at P.A.R.T.S. (Brussels) and SEAD (Salzburg, AT). New writing––”Them Taalneuroten/Temerity”––is forthcoming in the exhibition catalogue on Simon Asencio’s Through the Valley of the Nest of Spiders, edited by Pauline Hatzigeorgiou, and translated into French by sabrina soyer. They teach in the Theory program of P.A.R.T.S
Somatic Laboratory for Voice Matters is a research-educational program aimed at bringing together artists interested in movement, somatic practices, voice work and self-education. The idea is to establish a multidisciplinary approach to voice and to involve lecturers whose practices are directly or indirectly connected with voice work in both vocal and broader sense. Production: Lana Hosni and Multimedijalna Koliba. The program is held with the financial support of the Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Croatia and City office for culture and Civil Society Zagreb. Stefa resides in Zagreb as part of the EDENx3 project produced by Luka Švajde and DeFacto.
***
Negledljivo kazalište
Stefa Govaart performans (40′) & razgovor uz moderaciju Marka Gutića Mižimakova
Bio/la sam opsjednut/a time da na neko vrijeme preuzmem prostor bebe.
Bolno iskren/a, predan/a, uvjetovan/a za svaku vrstu podaništva, shvatio/la sam da je izdržavanje kazne, bilo u plesnoj
školi ili kao dio akademije, čin – ili, radije, pasivnost – kultne podložnosti.
Na moje iznenađenje, nisam pronašao/la svoju istinu; protumačio/la sam si značenje vlastite borbe kao želje.
Pa, to nije bilo jasno.
Izgleda da ne preferiram naraciju, humor, (poznato) referiranje à la popculture (na popularnu kulturu).
Dakle, materijalizacija rada svodi se na afekt ili zvuk – možda tehniku.
Može li već spominjanje ovoga biti produktivno za publiku?
I dalje primam mailove od Rachel iz vremena kada sam mislio/la da je Nora Turato super – i zar ne bih bio/la bolji/a?!
– i tako sam se prijavio/la na Rachel’s English (online program za učenje engleskog jezika).
Rachel’s English je prilično besprijekoran.
Rachel kaže da je ključ američkog timbra schwa (/ə/).
Rekla je da je (schwa) posvuda.
Zamjenjivost na perverzan način upravlja željom.
(sic).
Sic nas podsjeća da ono što je rečeno, uključujući pogreške, je rečeno i ne može se poništiti.
~
Nadamo se da će Negledljivo kazalište potaknuti gledatelje da preispitaju status: 1) izvođača koji se podvrgava, 2) izvođača koji glumi i 3) izvođača koji promatra. Ako enigma pripada sferi performansa, tada tome pripadaju i ekscentričnost i posredovanje. U tri čina, umjetnik/ica se na različite načine podvrgava (unutarnje), glumi (ekscentrično) i promatra na licu mjesta (refleksivno). Prolazi kroz sebe, oslanja se na pažnju/sudjelovanje publike i „vidi” sam čin gledanja, pokušavajući uspostaviti okvire za rad između unutarnjeg, vanjskog i sučelja tijela. U najboljem slučaju, kada je se pita publika može reći što je u prvom planu. Ponekad će posjetitelji morati intervenirati. No, uglavnom možete biti pasivni posjetitelji, sjesti i gledati, bez da vas se promatra te primjećivati upotrebu sinegdohe, tautologije i pleonazma kao književnih i performativnih alata koji, s određenom snagom, ukazuju na uzajamno pomicanje označitelja i označenika; reći istu stvar dva puta – ali ipak ne. Raspredanje sprečava ostvarivanje potpunog zadovoljenja. Dijalektičke tehnike podsjećaju publiku da ono što vide jest performans, s fatalnom manom da nikada zapravo ne zaboravljate da ga gledate. Nastavljam gurati u avangardne prostore, dok linija Nore Turato otkriva moju (ne)vezanost uz pop, a zbor se okuplja radi užitka, uvjerenja, dijaloga i povjerenja. Još uvijek otkrivam svoj odnos prema arhivu. “Osoba” znači “maska ili lažno lice”, poput onih od drva ili gline, koje prekriva cijelu glavu, a koje su nosili glumci u kasnijem rimskom kazalištu. Upotrebe i zlouporabe kazališta u životu. Predstavljeno samo kroz tradicije koje su autorovu tendenciju da piše o svom “ja” odbacile kao buržoasku, reakcionarsku, konzervativnu ili dosadnu. Tko zapravo radi formalno zanimljiv rad? MaMino ulazno dvorište je zanimljivo.
Stefa Govaart u svom radu obuhvaća i angažira već priznate umjetnike, znanstvenike i izvođače. Preuzima uloge plesača/ice, umjetnika/ice, dramaturga/inje, pedagoga/inje, prevoditelja/ice i spisatelja/ice, a suradnje uključuju plesnu izvedbu BEGIN/The Mirror (s Bryanom Fritz i Chloe Chignell), seriju predavanja i performansa spring*meeting (s Nikhilom Vettukattilom, Andreom Rodrigom i Steph Holl-Trieu) te Sex Negativity Research Group (s Marijom Cetinić, Persis Bekkering i Tessel Veneboer). Govaart je među ostalima nastupao/la u djelima Oscara Murilla, Lydije McGinchey, Eszter Salamon, PRICE-a, Claudije Pagès. Stefa Govaart ima magisterij iz Kulturne analize (Sveučilište u Amsterdamu) te iz Studija performansa (Sveučilište u New Yorku), a prije je studirao/la ples na studiju suvremenog plesa P.A.R.T.S. (Brisel) i na akademiji eksperimentalnog plesa SEAD (Salzburg, Austrija). Novi tekst – Them Taalneuroten/Temerity – uskoro će biti objavljen u katalogu izložbe Through the Valley of the Nest of Spiders Simona Asencija, kojeg je uredila Pauline Hatzigeorgiou, a na francuski prevela Sabrina Soyer. Također podučava u teorijskom programu škole P.A.R.T.S.
GLASNO PITANJE/ Tjelesno vokalni laboratorij je istraživačko-edukativni program koji za cilj ima okupiti umjetnike/ce s interesom za pokret, somatske prakse, rad s glasom i samoobrazovanje. Ideja je otvoriti multidisciplinarni pristup glasu te uključiti predavačice i predavače čije se prakse direktno ili indirektno povezuju s radom na glasu u vokalnom ili širem smislu. Produkcija: Lana Hosni i Multimedijalna koliba. Program se održava uz financijsku podršku Ministarstva kulture i medija RH i Gradski ured za kulturu. Stefa boravi u Zagrebu u sklopu projekta EDENx3 u produkciji Luke Švajde i DeFacta.
