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From August 2000 to March 2001 RED EARTH worked towards the realisation of BREATH. Commissioned by The Canterbury Festival for October 2001 as part of ‘Japan 2001’, BREATH was designed and conceived by RED EARTH and produced in collaboration with The Canterbury Festival. A collaboration between RED EARTH and Japanese performers Hisako Horikawa, Mushimaru Fjieda, and Atushi Takenouchi together with British artist Jony Easterby, BREATH was inspired and informed by elements of Japanese culture, following R&D in Japan (see JAPAN DIARY). BREATH took place in the contained space of Canterbury castle a simple square of four high walls, open to the sky. R&D focused on the research trip to Japan to investigate possible collaborations with Japanese butoh performers, allowing RED EARTH to develop their interest in butoh and its possible connections with RED EARTH concepts and practice. It also gave RED EARTH the opportunity to investigate Japanese culture and art with in the context of BREATH (see Japan section below). R&D also included the development of project ideas including technological possibilities: discussions with Gavin Carver of Canterbury University and sound/video artist Jony Easterby.
JAPAN RED EARTH had been interested for some time in butoh and its possible application within a RED EARTH programme, as well as often unconsciously incorporating a quasi-Japanese minimalism into structural design. Shinto, the national animist religion of Japan was also intriguing, and the BREATH R&D gave the artists the opportunity to explore these potentials in a visit to Japan after having established contact with several butoh performers, located on the internet and through contacts in Japan. After receiving interest from several artists RED EARTH decided to focus on three single butoh performers whose style and philosophy seemed compatible with what RED EARTH were hoping to achieve in this project. Accordingly, arrangements were made via email and an itinerary created for a two-week visit to Japan. It is interesting to mention here that the artists were travelling specifically to meet Japanese artists, and although were obviously open to absorbing Japanese life-style and culture, did not predict the extent to which Japanese aesthetics and materials would eventually influence the final project concept. This ranged from the overwhelming abundance of Shinto shrines everywhere in Japan to the meticulous yet simple design of architecture and utensils. See JAPAN DIARY for more detail.
JAPANESE INFLUENCE on the project was perceptible on several levels: DESIGN Japanese culture is articulated through systems of layers. Traditional architecture and life style revolve around the refinement and respect for space experienced through subtle shifts leading from outer to inner spaces. The zen image of the universe - an ideal of absolute simplicity arrived at through symbolic reductionism is particularly well expressed through Japanese design, and is reflected in the design and spirit of BREATH. Specific inspirations include:
Colours
Landscape features Elegance and spectral height of tall fine cedar forests. Vertical stands of green bamboo moving in the wind. Ephemeral ghost forms of powdered snow like visible breath, blowing across frozen lake. Reflections and patterning in ice on the lake. Steam rising from hot spring. Infinite greys of mountain ranges at dawn, like a Japanese painting. SPIRIT In Japan spiritual culture is shared by Buddhism and Shinto the latter Japan’s thriving native animist philosophy illustrated by the public’s attendance at thousands of Shinto shrines around the country. Shinto is formalised into a hierarchy of national deities, but as the number of shrines indicates, at its root lies a sense of the sacred in all places, and respect for the interconnectedness between humans and the metaphysical in the natural world. Elements of BREATH would also be informed by the experience in Tokoji Temple, specifically by the intensity of voice and actions of Yugen San’s powerful Shingon fire invocation. Specific inspirations included:
BUTOH ‘Butoh can be interpreted as an effort to achieve nothingness as a mental state and, through physical experience, a sense of liberation.’ Akiko Tachiki Butoh is not so much a dance style as an attitude or philosophy initiated in 1959 with the performance of "Kinjiki (forbidden Colours)" by Butoh’s creator Tatsumi Hijikata; a performer/choreographer who broke away from the Western influence on dance with a dark, liberated dance style. "Butoh is the dead body standing straight up at the risk of life". Tatsumi Hijikata More animist than Shamanic, often less about spirit and more about matter, butoh is about becoming, about becoming the thing, the object, the space about becoming a part of the nature of place. Although this appears to remain generally true of all butoh dance forms, RED EARTH discovered through their research that these forms are quite varied. Performance styles range from elaborate stage productions to single performers working very much with the spirit of the environment, or using a neutral environment to create deeply psychological and very personal performances. VIRTUAL REALITY: STEREOSCOPIC IMAGERY/TRIGGERS/TECHNOLOGICAL ENHANCEMENT Canterbury were interested in the collaborative potential between RED EARTH and GAVIN CARVER, drama lecturer at Canterbury & Kent University who had recently been developing performances involving stereoscopic imagery (virtual reality fields of vision). RED EARTH were interested in developing in this project a system of technical interconnectivity (action/reaction through sound, video) and agreed to meet with Gavin to discuss these possibilities. The main underlying themes to be developed in BREATH were notions of connection and interconnectivity the overlay of substances in the make up of the physical universe. RED EARTH wanted to find a means of expressing these ideas through a combination of art and technology movement and gesture effecting live images and sound through aural/visual/physical triggers. Under these circumstances RED EARTH met up with Gavin Carver to discuss the possibilities VR seemed to suggest. Having already looked into alternative computer/digitally linked trigger systems, RED EARTH realised that the main discussion with Gavin was concerned specifically with virtual reality stereoscopic imagery: the possibilities available and the cost and feasibility of producing effects which would be appropriate for the project in mind. Although the idea of working with VR sounded promising, with regards to incorporating it into BREATH several problems arose which strongly effected its practical application and resulted in the withdrawal of this idea from the project:
SITE: CANTERBURY CASTLE Canterbury Festival already had the Castle in mind at the beginning of the R&D period. It is in effect a ruin: four walls open to the sky. It has a certain atmosphere, and provided an interesting enclosed yet outdoor space within which to design an installation. After an initial site visit a meeting took place in February between RED EARTH and Canterbury City Council Events Officer John Hawkins to discuss production possibilities. John Hawkins indicated that as an historic building there were several implications with regards to maintenance, safety and building protection, but that he personally would endorse the project and discuss the issues involved with the Conservation Officer. His subsequent reply at the end of the month confirmed that the fragility of the castle structure necessitated restricted use, and some non-essential ideas for the production were changed accordingly. However he also indicated that restoration work on the castle is scheduled to take place before December 2001, which may prove problematic to the production design and schedule. This is presently under investigation.
THE COAST: SANDWICH BAY AND OTHER ALTERNATIVES During the research period RED EARTH and Canterbury Festival staff visited several beaches as possible sites around the Kent- Coast. The artists were looking for a long open stretch of sand, a simple endless land and seascape, complementing or rather articulating in reality zen simplicity, a metaphor for nothingness the void. Sandwich Bay, at the end of a privately owned stretch of road, is exactly this. When the tide is out the sea recedes to the far distance revealing a liminal landscape of water/land: the remaining shallow layer of water on the wet sand reflecting the sky like a mirage creating an impression of flux: a visual metaphor for the bridge between the physical and the non-physical. In the end, logistics and funding issues meant we had to shelve this idea. The primary concept was redeveloped in a different form in GEOGRAPH (2005).
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