2.27.18

Leading a Maya experiment:

Short Maya Description I wrote as a reminder for leading this short workshop in the techniques we are investigating in the Maya project:

Maya is an improvisational dance filmmaking project which attempts to demystify the existence of the camera frame in the room, potentially revealing it as just another compositional tool/stipulation.

We recognize that in some ways it is considered that there is an inherent power structure and politic imbued in the camera frame, its potential permanence in comparison with many dance experiences, oft ephemeral. We wonder what these things mean or how they change in a process in which we consider the frame only as a compositional tool, in a process where the cameras are a part of the exploration just as much as our other tools of improvisation: motion, time, shape, space, etc…

What happens when we approach the space that is the world created by real world images inside the camera, as just another stage?

We began this investigation with this explanation followed by a short meditation, breathing and garnering our attention.
As we honed our attention, I led us to begin thinking about the space in our bodies, the space around our bodies, and the space in the room.
We moved out into space, only walking at first, and began investigating proximity and geometry.
While this was happening, people individually walked over to investigate the way the room looked through the camera frame.
We stopped for a moment and I brought to our attention the four qualities that we are focusing on:

ATTENTION

SPACE

GEOMETRY

FRAME

With this information, we picked up moving again, starting to consider our vision as a camera frame.
Continuing this, I brought Camera A, followed by Camera B, into play for passing around and making purposeful framing choices.
We took time at the end of this to reflect on our experiences.

My own notes:
In our weekly Maya rehearsals, we are investigating with four people. In this experience, we were working with eight people. Composing with more people was very interesting: it gave us the opportunity to make way more spatial relationships, so each individual person could do so much less and still have a lot happening. Shape and space relationships with people holding the camera are easier because there can be so much stillness and so much motion at the same time with so many people. There is just inevitably greater variety of space and shape and speed.

Considering eyes as cameras the entire time makes the whole room feel more in play: makes it feel less like the only thing “happening” is what is happening in front of the camera: composing for your framem and other peoples’ frames and the camera frame.