Travel and COVID-19 /  by josie j

As you all may know by now travel is being affected by COVID-19.  Japan has been postponed for us but we are still going to go to Hawaii.  Many have projected that 2020 will be a milestone year. I do believe we will see reality unveiled and start to seem to edge towards fiction.  In such a time there is space for change, good and bad. On this edge Butoh dancers and artist see potential. An opportunity for shift is an opportunity for revelation.  Onward and upward life source finds avenues for growth. In phenomenon we find the beauty that is life. In Phenomenon we have faith that what we do is aligned with natural law.  In other words trying times make for interesting times which invite revolutionary times. We follow our heart. This is our practice.  

 

Thank you for your support.  We will continue to struggle towards creative freedom that is sensitive to natural need. 

 

-josie j

divinebrick At Bare Bones Butoh SF, Ca- 4 indiegogo supporters /  by josie j

Hello supports of the arts,

josie speaking.  For supporters of our Indiegogo you will have access to selected documentation of divinebrick current and past works .  These are b-sides with some gems (do to quality of the footage). 

Today you will have access to the latest performance at Bare Bones Butoh in San Francisco.  BBB has been produced by Bob Webb since the early 90's. It was wonderful being part of this community.   

My thoughts about the work, 

"Primaries Clipped, I Still Smell the Salt"

Sound by Mike Meanstreetz

I realize that my practice needs 360 access.  Video and stage have a different vocabulary. One in which I am learning.  I prefer the audience to find their view. I have debated the access to my face by viewers.  A critique I often hear is to show my face more. It is a valid critique. It's a behavior I try to adjust and often wonder why it still emerges that way.  There is one thing that does occur. There are times in which I am in my image and I find that an action like showing my face goes against what I am feeling and seeing.  Part of my form I think comes from the importance and the right for autonomy and privacy. I also wish to be a body not my own. I don’t wish to be a rock star. My face is mine, not an image.  Why then paint the face, and spend the time to make a separate work that is not seen? To me the viewer sees. Sees you and beyond you. Sometimes they see something no one else sees.  

Each work opens something in me I have been knocking on.  

In this piece I see clarity, but feathers that just need alignment and grooming.  

I have also found that my sacred dance is different from my “secular” dance.  I do feel that the dance is always sacred due to its age in the body, but the variables of performing: stage, captured audience, duration, make the performing arts sacred in ritual.   

I want to soon share clips from my studio practice.  Share my “secular dance”.


Thanks for your support,

-josie j

Raze the Whitebox New Team Member: Brie-Ana Laboucane /  by josie j

Raze the Whitebox New Team Member: Brie-Ana Laboucane

Brie-Ana Laboucane

Urban Butoh Clown
Choreography - Performance - Costume

Princess Granny.jpg

We Welcome Brie-Ana LAboucane to Raze the Whitebox. We met Brie Studying with Kudo Taketeru at Water in the Deserts in Portland, Oregon. She will be Raze the Whitebox international member in Vancouver, Canada.

Stay tuned for perks from Brie. She will be providing Cognitive Behavioral Therapy (online or locally) and butoh workshops (online or locally).

https://www.indiegogo.com/proj…/raze-the-whitebox-collective

-Raze the Whitebox

Living Poetics: Performance Series-Benefit for Raze the Whitebox /  by josie j

Friend,

You are invited to our first Living Poetics: Performance Series

February 21st., 7-10pm

At Collective Space 

RSVP for address at info@razethewhitebox.com

Living Poetics are words in which take on a life of their own once written.  They populate in the reader. As they are reread they further expand, building ever growing understanding.  

These Series will showcase local artists, work in progress (from our open session) and we will also provide you a chance to experience one of our meditative plays.

Meditative Play: Play as in verb, not the noun. Sometimes choreographed, sometimes improvisational: meditative plays serve as a ritualistic opening for what needs to be played out and processed in performance. A game with no set outcome.  Pre-derived seeds of characters finding their form in the game.

Our collective space has various spaces for you to enjoy this experience. An oasis in the urban desert, we will have artists occupy the lush green garden, the second story patio deck, our small dance studio, the lovely brick driveway, kitchen...we love alternative use of space so your imagination is the limit.  

Living Poetic: Performance Series


Artists:

Livia Reiner

Voice-accordian-guitar


Mike Meanstreetz/ divinebrick

guitar-loops-noise-drone-body-voice

Dendera Bloodbath

noise


Chookoo Lives 

movement, voice



Open Studio Performance

meditative play


Rain Lucien Matheke

visual arts

02-21-20_Living Poetics_HiRes.jpg


Venders:
Chookoo’s Costume Closet w/ Frio

dress up corner/ clothing pop-up


Verge

tarot readings


Food by Gloria

Pastelles (Salvadorian Empanadas)



$10-20 donation

All donations go to support our efforts to study and perform in Hawaii/Tokyo May 2020 with Harupin Ha Dance Theater and turn the space into a center for Butoh and esoteric was to work with art.

Check below for more info:

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/raze-the-whitebox-collective

Looking forward to welcoming you all into our space for an evening of multi sensory delights

Thank you for your support,

-Raze the Whitebox



Raze the Whitebox Indiegogo Campaign Launch /  by josie j

Hello friends and family!

Greetings from Raze the Whitebox, we are so excited to share with you our Indiegogo campaign that just launched this morning.

https://www.indiegogo.com/projects/raze-the-whitebox-collective

We are asking for your support to help pay for 4 members of our art collective to study and perform in Hawaii and Tokyo in May 2020 with the Harupin-Ha Dance Theater. As you can see, it is approaching quickly so we are moving even quicker! Please give this a read, skim through our perks, get involved and SHARE!

We are quickly moving from being an art collective to an esoteric art center. Please read more in the link.

Corporeal Reformation: Ankoku-Butoh Open Sessions /  by josie j

Hello friends,

We have restarted the open Ankoku-Butoh session in 2020.

Our goal is to facilitate a space in which we can come together and explore this method and others you will contribute.  In time we hope to build a group work to present.  You may still attend even if you will not be part of the work.  You are welcome to come and share the time in the space. 

We hope to see this as an open studio workshop time in which our creative method is transparent and inclusive.  This open session will be in flux as the group grows.  We will still have a similar mythos emphasizing the esoteric approach to movement, awakening the mind, body and soul.  

“We are phenomenon manifest from source.  A petrified brick of mud of a grander source in need of a break from the rigid.”

We are still looking at different times and days that work for the larger group. Let us know if you really wish to attend but the dates are not working for you.

For more info contact josie: info@razethewhitebox.com or Julia : chookoolives@gmail.com

https://www.razethewhitebox.com/about

Here are the dates so far:

Saturdays

Jan. 18 10:30-1:30pm
Jan.25 10-1pm
Feb. 1   10:30- 1:30pm
Feb. 8  4:30- 7:30pm
Feb. 15 4:30-7:30pm

* * * * *

Corporeal Reformation: Butoh Sessions:

All methods shared have a link to esoteric ways of looking at movement.  A connection that we are phenomena, extended.

As before there will be times in which the sessions will be focused on a specific work.  During these times we will be allowing others to join as we build.  We will flow and change as things are needed having your shared co-creation and presence.

During a general session we will start with a warm up, a floor cleaning guided meditation.  This cleaning "form" is the mood in which we hope to approach movement and its greater meaning in this space.   This will usually transition to strength and flexibility training, transitioning to more complex ways to awaken the body and mind while accessing the spirit.  At times there will be some partner work and guided meditations accessing the primordial darkness. 

Sessions vary reflecting the needs of the time and group.  Please come with a willingness to sweat, work, play, imagine, share, a willingness to listen to your bodies and other bodies, a willingness to speak what you feel at the moment, a sense of adventure and the freedom to get messy with a beautiful heaviness that only mother nature can provide.  All levels welcome adapt to your present body.

Expanding the group,

josie j (humbly speaking for the group)

Julia Hays (ever present ally and co-facilitator)

Harupin-Ha Dance Theater in LA (ANKOKU-BUTOH WORKSHOPS) /  by josie j

Fellow Butoh practitioners and enthusiast,

The Harupin-Ha Dance Theater will be coming back to Los Angeles Oct. 5th-6th, and Nov. 2nd-3rd, and Dec. 7th-8th to share their holistic style of Ankoku-Butoh.

There will be a photo exhibit and performance coinciding with the November workshop. More info to come.....


Techniques transcend beyond the dance studio and stage. From daily maintenance, core work, and internal imagery, techniques become useful in daily life and provide a foundation for life long learning and growth.

Feel free to invite anyone to this that you feel may be interested. It is truly a rare event to have Butoh masters Koichi and Hiroko Tamano in LA. Those of you that have studies with the Tamano's know the special experience it is.

We are still looking for a location for Oct. 5th. Any help is appreciated

Cost: 45 for one day, 70 for both. All three weekends 200

Pay on arrival

Saturday and Sunday

12:30pm-4:30pm
*Walk-ins welcomed

We Live in Space
2520 W Jefferson Blvd, Los Angeles, California 90018


To reserve a place email:
josie: info@razethewhitebox.com

*********

Harupin-Ha Dance Theater

Koichi and Hiroko Tamano were among the very first to perform Ankoku Butoh, which translates literally to “the dance of darkness.” The genre emerged in the late 1950s in post-atomic bomb Japan. It was created by two dancers, Kazuo Ohno and Tatsumi Hijikata, who sought to create a new, uniquely Japanese form of expression that completely rebelled against the Establishment, and both Eastern tradition and Western styles. Koichi joined Hijikata’s dance company in 1960, as did Hiroko a few years later. Hijikata encrouaged the Tamanos to introduce Butoh to the United States. The Tamano’s performance in the 1976 “Japan Now” exhibition at SFMOMA was the first Butoh seen by an American audience and made a big sensation. The Tamanos moved their dance company Harupin-Ha from Tokyo to Berkeley, California in 1979 with the blessings and encouragement of their teacher. For decades the Tamanos lead dance workshops in Berkeley and also operated the restaurants, Country Station and Tamasei, which served as meeting places for the dance and theater communities of the Bay Area. They are known for their holistic approach to the art of Butoh. The Mayor of the City of Berkeley, California declared March 28th, 2017 to be the “Koichi and Hiroko Tamano Day.”

dance_of_darkness2.jpg




Photo by Marion Gray *taken in 1989 at The Lab, San Francisco, of the Harupin-Ha Butoh Dance Company

*****************

If October is to far for you and SF in close....

Forwarded from Shelley Cook-Contreras:

HIROKO TAMANO DANCE BUTOH CLASS SERIES:
at The Bayview Winery Studio, San Francisco

Hijikata~Tamano Butoh Method with
Master-Teacher Hiroko Tamano,
Assisted by Shelley Cook-Contreras

WHEN: September 7th, 14th, 21st, 28th,
4 Saturdays, 12 PM~3 PM

WHERE: 3030 Ingalls Street, San Francisco, Ca 94124.

COST : $40 per class. or 140.00 for series
*Pay at the door. CASH/CHECK ONLY

CONTACT: Shelley, text/cal 661-478-9983

These classes are fun, healing to body and spirit, and appropriate to all level “movers”! It’s a rare opportunity to train with Butoh Master Hiroko Tamano, in the experimental, imaginative discipline of the Hijikata~Tamano Dance Method.
Shelley Cook-Contreras will lead Regenerative-Body Warm-ups, and Discussion, with special practices each week.

HIROKO TAMANO / co-director of Harupin-Ha Dance Company. Hiroko Tamano first studied Butoh Dance from its Founder, Tatsumi Hijikata. She is famous for her passionate and imaginative teaching style, using poetic image to inspire and direct. Her award-winning 40+year career includes performing and teaching internationally. In dance, as in life, Hiroko’s aim is to create experiences that are at once primal and universal, awakening memories immediately recognizable to each of us. Creating a landscape of sensation, the Tamano Method expands time into a dreamlike place. Hiroko and her renowned partner, Koichi Tamano, perpetuate Hijikata’s spirit in their own dance method, blending elements of Tokyo and California with the cosmos. She can be contacted at butohtama@gmail.com

SHELLEY COOK-CONTRERAS is an internationally exhibited performance artist. She earned her MFA from the San Francisco Art Institute’s New Genres Department, and has taught performance at colleges and universities.Her performance projects have been funded by the California Arts Council and the National Endowments for the Arts. Shelley trained extensively in Butoh Dance with Hiroko Tamano, Diego Pinion, and Maureen Fleming, creating many solo and ensemble works within the Butoh discipline. She sees art as the dreams of society,and , like dreams, art communicates hidden truth in its images. Her teaching blends art practice with the healing wisdom from 30 years as a bodywork practitioner, (freemotionbodywork.com) She can be contacted at freemotionbodywork@gmail.com

DIRECTIONS: The Bayview Winery Studios - 3030 Ingalls Street, San Francisco, CA 94124 (Don’t miss this chance to dance in this beautiful studio!) Please note~cats present! In SF: Between Hollister and Gilman St., go two blocks to Ingalls Street, take a right. House/Studio is on the right, big turquoise-green gate! Parking on street. 2 blocks from 3rd street rail and bus.

IF you still are cravin Butoh....

Sankai Juku will be performing in LA and in Berkeley but this is the only workshop I know of.
Forwarded from Bay Area Butoh

Berkeley, CA

SANKAI JUKU FREE BUTOH WORKSHOP
Sat, Oct 12, 2019, 10am
Center for Arts and Religion, Doug Adams Gallery (2365 LeConte Avenue, Berkeley)
Movement workshop exploring elements of butoh, a form of Japanese dance theater that encompasses a diverse range of activities, techniques, and motivations for dance, performance, or movement. RSVP requested. Please note: separate Butoh Discussion offered at 11:30am (separate registration requested).
Register Here https://calperformances.org/performances/2019-20/world-stage/sankai-juku-meguri-teeming-sea-tranquil-land.php

Patreon Launched! /  by josie j

Greetings,

It has been a long bit since I have posted. I hope you have found your way here from my old blog. If you are new, welcome.

There has been a lot of activity in the last few years. Sometimes its hard to keep up on the blog, but most things are up on my site including dates for future events. I am currently in the process of becoming a full-time artist….

This year after the last large scale work I decided to launch a Patreon. I love to provide the community with thought provoking and inspirational work but my funds are extremely limits. Even so I hope what I can provide for you will be honest.

If you have been a supporter in the past, hope to support or know the sacred place the arts provide please support my lifetime endeavor. No such thing as small support all is welcomed and appreciated. Check out the tiers (monthly donations can be canceled anytime).

www.patreon.com/razethewhitebox

DSC_6539_01.jpg


Your time is much appreciated.







Ankoku-Butoh Workshops: Sep., Oct, Nov. /  by josie j

It was a wonderful experiance working with Koichi and Hiroko Tamano and having them share the Tamano Ankoku-Butoh method. I have been working with the Tamano’s since 2010. I was delighted when they wanted me to facilitate workshops in Los Angeles. Here are some shots of the workshops. Thank you all who participated and thank you to the ones that want to continue to explore this method.

Photos by: Takeshi Kanemura

September

October

November

Ankoku-Butoh Workshop with the Harupin-Ha Dance Theater /  by DBL

The Harupin-Ha Dance Theater will be coming to Los Angeles September 15-16, Oct. 6-7, and Nov.3-4 to share their holistic style of Ankoku-Butoh.

Techniques transcend beyond the dance studio and stage. From daily maintenance, core work, and internal imagery, techniques become useful in daily life and provide a foundation for life long learning and growth. These workshop will culminate with a performance in December.

This is the first of the workshops. Feel free to invite anyone to this that you feel might be interested. It is truly a rare event to have butoh masters Koichi and Hiroko Tamano in LA.

September 15 &16 (Saturday and Sunday) 11am-3pm

October 6 &7 (Saturday and Sunday) 11am-3pm

November 3&4 (Saturday and Sunday) 11am-3pm

Cost: 40 for one day, 60 for both

To reserve a spot email:

josie: info@razethewhitebox.com

*Walk-ins welcomed

We Live in Space

2520 W Jefferson Blvd, Los Angeles, California 90018

*********

Harupin-Ha Dance Theater

Koichi and Hiroko Tamano were among the very first to perform Ankoku Butoh, which translates literally to “the dance of darkness.” The genre emerged in the late 1950s in post-atomic bomb Japan. It was created by two dancers, Kazuo Ohno and Tatsumi Hijikata, who sought to create a new, uniquely Japanese form of expression that completely rebelled against the Establishment, and both Eastern tradition and Western styles. Koichi joined Hijikata’s dance company in 1960, as did Hiroko a few years later. Hijikata encrouaged the Tamanos to introduce Butoh to the United States. The Tamano’s performance in the 1976 “Japan Now” exhibition at SFMOMA was the first Butoh seen by an American audience and made a big sensation. The Tamanos moved their dance company Harupin-Ha from Tokyo to Berkeley, California in 1979 with the blessings and encouragement of their teacher. For decades the Tamanos lead dance workshops in Berkeley and also operated the restaurants, Country Station and Tamasei, which served as meeting places for the dance and theater communities of the Bay Area. They are known for their holistic approach to the art of Butoh. The Mayor of the City of Berkeley, California declared March 28th, 2017 to be the “Koichi and Hiroko Tamano Day.”

Corporeal Reformation Exploration (@ Zorthian Ranch) /  by DBL

Body awareness, conditioning, and exploration meet up.

Please come join us at the Zorthian Ranch for this exploration. Bring water, a towel, free moving clothes, comfortable athletic shoes (the flatter the better), A yoga mat, if you got it (well be on the floor outdoors), a willingness to sweat, play and explore the environment outside and with-in yourself. Feel free to invite anyone that you feel might be interested.

The session will be divided into three section roughly one hour each.

1.Warm up

2.Flow work

3.Meditative/ Stretch

Heavily influence by butoh techniques, others are welcomed. Feel free to bring in movement ideas that will work in these areas. If you are unsure, come along and see how this session will function.

This is all levels. Listen to your body and keep your own pace.

*Next Corporeal Reformation Exploration will be August 19.

**These sessions will end in a meditative play experience/ photo / video shoot at the end of the month.*

info@razethewhitebox.com

5-10 suggested donation

11:30am-2:30pm

Zorthian Ranch

3990 Fair Oaks Ave, Altadena, California 91001

*********

josie j:

My movement practice is an extension of my search to unlock internal memory. This "built-in" info I believe will help us function in this planet not as separate individuals but as part of an organism.

I have started to collect exercises and play activities that I believe will help awaken already built in ways of healing, conditioning, and inherent ways of centering yourself.

Some of these methods include: Working with dichotomies, open eye imagining/ meditation, theories of flow, metamorphosis, athletic conditioning (endurance for ecstatic dance) sensation work (meditations to awaken sensitivity) and play (playing with forms {playing within parameters}).

When it comes to body work my background started with performance art, branched out to Butoh and now Martial Arts. I still am actively searching and wanting to learn and share new methods of body work. I am interested in the exchange of these ideas and fascinated with how lineages grow and cross pollinate.

My hopes is to build a way to become fully the animal we could be. In a way a universal way of approaching movement that is approachable and helps in everyday life, work, self defense and in play. Not animal as reactionary but adaptable and intellect, contributing to the graciousness of our ancestors.

I don't see myself as a teacher but possibly a facilitator that wishes to learn as well.

I personally use the term Corporeal Reformation, a way of saying at this moment my body needs a reevaluation, a reorganizing, a re-shifting that is deep and spiritual.

Face the Music Dance Festival /  by DBL

Butoh has influence me in ways that extend pass the imprint it has left on my body and dance.  Working with the Harupin-Ha Dance Theater is always a lesson is conscious existing.  Therefore this fest is not only a milestone for me but an honor, a gift, and a challenge...so it goes... growth stops in death,...but even death is a transition. 

Butoh Workshop in Ireland with Hiroko Tamano /  by DBL

Butoh Workshop in Ireland with Hiroko Tamano.

April 9-12. 

Full workshop (4 days): 100 euros

one day (drop ins): 30 euros

Work Shops Dates: 11AM~4PM , April 9th,10th, 11th

Location: Olympic Karate Club, 81-83, Shandon Street, Cork, Ireland Telephone:00-353-21-439766

6

Performance at same location : April 12, 2PM~3PM ( we may work Noon~4PM )

Work Shop :

Introducing " AnKoku- Butoh ( Dance of Darkness ) 12hr Workshop.

Through learning Butoh Master Koichi TAMANO's Method, you will know what body is, what mind is, why you are here in this life, a life with a limited time, a life that is in constant limbo between vitality and death, beauty and the grotesque, Joy and sorrow.

Performance : One hour performance based on Work Shop's vocabulary.

Please share if you know anyone that would be interested in this once in a lifetime opportunity to study with Hiroko Tamano Sensei, one of Hijikata Tatsumi's early bright students when he started out.

Ankoku Butoh Gathering, Life and Death Celebration March 18 /  by DBL

Come see a variety of dancers, including me, at this life and death celebration.

*****

The second annual Butoh gathering in honor of the founder of Ankoku Butoh, Tatsumi Hijikata (1928-1986). Buto, live music and a bonfire with Okkon serving local Japanese street food available for purchase.

Butoh in the Nature

1pm - 3pm : Free to Public at Live Oak Park #2 Picnic area

- Music: Caleb & Pepp Family Band

- Food:

Okkon Japanese Street Food

- BUTOH Choo choo train ride!!

- Peace Crane Origami making --> send to Hiroshima

- Seed Bomb making Muddy circle

BUTOH show case

...

4pm - 6pm

Berkeley Art Center

Tickets at the Door: $5 ~ $50

http://

www.berkeleyartcenter.org/

calendar-1/

berkeley-butoh-gathering

See More

DivineBrick @ Los Angeles + Mexico City. Open Connection With Mexico City Portals Project /  by DBL

DivineBrick will be at this event Come early and see all the artist represent their work:

Los Angeles + Mexico City. Open Connection With Mexico City

Portals Project

The Portals Project is an an open and immersive shared space for connecting with people around the world from in a gold shipping container with screens and speakers. This event will feature drop in performances and artwork being shared live with people in Bosque de Chapultepec (Chapultepec Park) in Mexico City.

sharedstudios.com

Wonder Valley Experimental Music Festival /  by DBL

The Nineth inter-ration of the Wonder Valley Experimental Music Festival, FREE, FREE camping on site. Lots to like here!

Greetings All,

Here is the line up for the WVE9. After this list I have some other notes. Be sure to scroll down.

April 1st, 2017, at the Palms Restaurant, 83131 Amboy Rd, 29 Palms, CA 92277

11:20 PM XOME

11:00 to 11:20 Set up

10:40 PM Brutal Poodle

10:20 PM Medicine Cabinet (Tracy, CA)

10:00 PM Thrall (from SF)

10:00 to 10:20 Set up

9:40 PM IGOR AMOKIAN

9:20 PM J3M5

9:00 PM Skunk Puppet

8:40 to 9:00 Set up

8:20 PM UNMOVE

8:00 PM Disappearing

7:40 PM Third Ear Experience

7:20 to 7:40 Set up

7:00 PM DivineBrick Sunset 7:14

6:40 PM X-Eyes

6:20 PM Nature’s Miracle

6:00 to 6:20 Set up

5:40 PM Justin Scheid, Brian Akenoh

5:20 PM Hongo Killer

5:00 PM phog masheeen

4:00 Load in

I could use some help setting up, tearing down and running the event. If you have an interest in participating in what is fairly un-glamorous work, please let me know.

Thanks Again,

Mark Soden

I am Not a Dancer.... /  by DBL

Some Have Influenced Me Profoundly.


I don't really connect myself to the Dancer lineage. I feel that those artist master their craft beyond what I can do, but I see now that there are and have been influential Dancers in my life. As I get older I am finding a long yet loose thread to some kind of lineage. Maybe my teenage angst is finally receding. Now I can except my elders more respectfully.

Maybe the first Dancer was Michael 'Boogaloo Shrimp' Chambers ,"Turbo" in the movie breaking. His sweep piece still sends chills through my body. Ko Murobushi, which a couple of years before his passing followed me on FB...just a lil possibly meaningless accomplishment. Of course my long time teacher/ sages the Tamano's. I learn something new each time just interacting with Hiroko Tamano. Lessons beyond movement. She is the closest I have experienced to a sage in my life. The closest that has changed it. Thank you profoundly.

Yesterday I saw one of these few influential Dancers in my life perform, Oguri. Oguri is based in Venice, Ca and like the others I mentioned has continued to develop his craft throughout his life. Seemingly ageless, something about his and the Tamano’s form that seem to not fear death but embrace the existence of the body, not to destroy it but be in it, sense in it, exist in it, understanding its fragility, and respecting it. Not to say they wish to be immortal...not at all. They stare at mortality and make it their intimate friend, not their over indulgent co-conspirator. This and their soft view on life and movement I believe slows their existence...a stroll to smell the flower on their chest.

I always have a profound experience watching Oguri. Yesterday was no different. In his form I see humanity, its ugliness, its silliness, its frailness and the way trauma can fracture it; transmuting these pieces into something wholesome, and healing. This piece I saw was about death and how our love ones from our childhood become the lovers of our present. How in dreams and memories these things blur, we embrace, this embrace becomes a holding of what was once before, a hope to remember a warmth from the past. We are just children hoping to be loved. Hoping to hold a familiar warm hand. Hoping to have someone there to tell us, it’s ok. To hold us to their chest and kiss us on our small foreheads.

Yet in life we sometimes are alone. Sometime we are scared. Sometimes we are broken. This is life, without this darkness the washing that is love would not feel so sweet.

I wonder why memory, for me, is so fresh in soreness. This lesson of memory as a warm fire, is a new one for me, it is something I am learning.

Thank you to my elders, thank you to the people I love.

My darkness finds home in your light.

Open Call: Raze the WhiteBox focus group /  by DBL



Looking for artist, performers, movers, makers, doers, and facilitators with general inclusiveness that are not afraid to question identity, self and others.
The challenge will be seeing yourself outside of yourself. A reexamining of set ways of seeing and believing.
This piece will be a remake of a historical performance.
Potential for career altering exposure to general merriment in a semi large scale.
Project to be fleshed out in the new year to be presented in late 2017 to early 2018.
Diversity in group is a must.

Contact: info@razethewhitebox.com