Gallery
OneZero Announces
Press
release San Francisco, CA - August 4, 2002: Gather together several dozen black-and-white photographs of Japanese temples and shrines, a tumbledown farmhouse in rural Nebraska, and still life assemblages. Mix gently with the humor and pathos of live Butoh dancers. Add a short film that juxtaposes Butoh with scenes from downtown Bangkok and the coastlines of Taiwan and Thailand. Combine all ingredients with a walk-in sculpture composed of luxurious morning glory vines, wire, and Kodak snapshots. Serve below a large skylight to an audience with an appetite for meditative imagery, and see what happens. This is the recipe for an evening of dance, photography, film, and improvised ritual at Gallery OneZero, an alternative artist's space in downtown San Francisco. The participants in this event come from diverse backgrounds and cultures: Nebraska, Kentucky, Burma, Japan, San Francisco. They create static images, moving images, and images composed of human bodies in motion. Like Andy Goldsorthy's transient creations from stone, water, wood, and the natural landscape, the images created by these artists are specific to a time, a place, and a way of being in the world. They ask for patience and a certain kind of humor, a willingness to sit quietly and open the eyes, the mind, and the heart. In exchange, they transport their audiences, like water flowing over the earth, to new and otherwise inaccessible enclosures, atmospheres, and sudden bursts. The
San Francisco Butoh Festival taking place this month has brought renewed
attention to this unusual dance form. Founded in postwar Japan by
Tatsumi Hijikata, Butoh incorporates many strands. Drawing on traditional
Japanese stagecraft of Noh and Kabuki, Butoh has been influenced by
Baku Ishii and modern Japanese dance, German expressionism, Isadora
Duncan, and Martha Graham, as well as the idiosyncratic contributions
of Butoh masters such as Kazou Ohno and Sankaijuku. As with some forms of meditation or martial arts, Butoh performers must undergo an inner transformation, a ripping away of everyday habits and perceptions. The contemporary master Katsura Kan says that Butoh audiences and performers are not interested in "accomplished beauty" so much as "the way to reach the human instinct where we deeply keep our personal treasure called 'an innocent soul.' " Butoh dance performance with film, photography exhibit, and discussion: TITLE: "Capture/Release" Direction & music: Terry Hatfield Dancers:
Ledoh Film by Terry Hatfield: "Of: Meditations of a Zen Novice" DATE: Friday, August 30, 2002 TIME: 7:30 PM LOCATION: Ledoh was born into the Ka Ren culture of Burma, one of the largest "minority" tribes in that country, and moved to the US as a young adult. He studied Butoh with master performer Katsura Kan, with whom he performed at Edinburgh Fringe Festival 2001 to five-star reviews. Recently featured in San Francisco Weekly, Ledoh is the artistic director of the Salt Farm group of performers and has collaborated with numerous Bay Area artists over the last decade. He is currently performing in the San Francisco Butoh Festival. Ledoh helped found Salt Farm, a group of San Francisco Bay Area performers united in an exploration of their diverse cultural roots via the art of Butoh. His heritage instilled a sense of all culture, including our modern technological society, as something organic. Working on his productions is like being part of a village preparing for a festival. His work dissolves the boundaries between life and dance, and he often performs beyond the confines of traditional theater spaces. Takami, the artistic director of Toumei, is an independent choreographer born and educated in Japan. She received her BA in Modern Dance at Nihon University College of Art. Since moving to San Francisco, she has collaborated with Bay Area artists in numerous venues, including Dancer's Group, ODC Performance Gallery, and Cowell Theatre. Takami has also performed with Butoh pioneer Akira Kasai and was one of the cofounders of D-Net and Artists Cooperative. She leads workshops and performs regularly in Tokyo under the auspices of leading Japanese dancer Setsuko Yamada at Biwakei Studio. She also appears in solo performances at Theater Yugen in San Francisco. Toumei means "clear color" in Japanese. It is a group of dancers dedicated to the concept of transforming the mind and body into clear color so one can achieve transparency to any image at any moment. Antonio Delbenes is a dancer, visual artist, and sound collage artist. He has performed at both the Seattle and the San Francisco Butoh Festivals. He works as a solo performer, as a member of the Harupin Ha Dance Troupe, and spends his time between Arizona and San Francisco pursuing his creative efforts. Heather Joy Clawson spends her time catching babies as a midwife when she's not dancing. She thanks her community and family for their support. Terry Hatfield and the Film "Of" Terry Hatfield is a dancer, actor, and video artist who has performed with Ballet Colbert, Kiroga Theatre, Peters Wright, Pearl Ubungen, Deborah Slater Dance Theater, and Katsura Kan as well as Toumei. His video work has aired on MTV. His short film "Of" will be screened during the Capture/Release performance. Shot on location in Southeast Asia, it juxtaposes scenes from the busy streets of downtown Bangkok and a white-painted Butoh dancer performing on the coastlines of Taiwan and Thailand. The transformations that water undergoes as it flows--yielding but all-conquering, escaping all obstacles, corroding iron and stone, saturating the atmosphere--are used as metaphors for the transformations of Butoh. The film was shot on 16mm Kodachrome reversal with additional camera work by Yashan Kuo. Nancy Warner and Gallery OneZero Gallery OneZero is the creation of Nancy Warner, a fine-art and portrait photographer who has lived and worked in San Francisco for 26 years. Located in her large, well-lit studio overlooking Grant Avenue and downtown San Francisco, Gallery OneZero is a unique urban space devoted to photography and other arts. Her inaugural show, "Selections: 1998 - 2002," includes forty-five gelatin silver prints: still life images created in the studio, meditations on Japanese shrines and temples, images of rural Nebraska, and some portraits. These prints set the mood for Capture/Release. For a press kit or more information, please contact Sean Cotter at 415.989.9157. |
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