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Conversations Without Walls: Joan Jonas & Eiko Otake with Judy Hussie-Taylor

September 17, 2020

Closed captions are available by clicking the “CC” button on the video.

A PDF transcript of the conversation is linked here.

This conversation was recorded on May 21, 2020 and first broadcasted on YouTube Live Saturday, September 12, 2020.

The foundation of this Conversations Without Walls (CWW) between Eiko Otake and Joan Jonas finds these celebrated artists forming a generative and collaborative new friendship. Facilitated by Danspace Project Executive Director & Chief Curator, Judy Hussie-Taylor, the two discuss the mutual influence of Japanese dance theater and literature on their work as they offer insight into making new work and connections in the maturity of their careers. Both artists have long histories of creating work that engages deeply with site and experiments with viewership; how the work is experienced and how the viewer experiences themselves within it—the performance or audience might be placed outside, observing from a long distance, or within a very small grouping—configurations of presentation that pose hopeful possibilities for future works in this unprecedented time of physical distance.

Included in this CWW

Works

PLATFORM 2016: A Body in Places curated by Judy Hussie-Taylor and Lydia Bell in collaboration with Eiko Otake (Danspace Project, 2016)
The Juniper Tree by Joan Jonas (Danspace Project, 1977)
Moving Off the Land II by Joan Jonas (Danspace Project premier, 2018)
Nova Scotia Beach Dance (1971) and Delay Delay (1972) by Joan Jonas
Event Fission (excerpt) by Eiko & Koma (1980, 50 min), produced by Creative Time, Hudson River Landfill, Art on The Beach series
Song Delay (excerpt) by Joan Jonas (1973, 18:35 min, b&w, sound, 16 mm film on HD video)
White Dance (1976) by Eiko & Koma
Organic Honey’s Vertical Roll (excerpt) by Joan Jonas (1972, 15 min, b&w, sound)
Mirror Piece I: Reconfigured (excerpt) by Joan Jonas (1969/2010), at Kulturhuset, Stockholm, Sweden
Eiko with Octopus, Eiko with Convex Mirror, Eiko Fortune Teller by Joan Jonas and Eiko Otake

Literature

The Diary of Vaslav Nijinsky (1953), Vaslav Nijinsky
The Letters of Vincent van Gogh (1914), Vincent van Gogh
Kadensho (“The Book of Flower”), Zaemi Motokiyo
Labyrinths, Selected Stories & Other Writings, Jorge Luis Borges (1962)
The Tale of Genji by Murasaki Shikibu (c. 978 – c. 1014)

People

Koma Otake, Performance artist and collaborative partner to Eiko Otake
Douglas Crimp (1944 – 2019), American Art Historian
Pat Steir, American painter and printmaker
Sam Miller (1952–2018), Leader in Arts Administrations and Arts Advocate, Co-Founder of ICPP at Wesleyan and former President of the Danspace Project Board
Lydia Bell, Former Danspace Project Associate Curator, Program Director
Zeami Motokiyo (c. 1363 – c. 1443), Japanese Noh playwright and philosopher
Chikuha Otake (1878-1936), Japanese painter and Eiko Otake’s grandfather
Kazuo Ohno, Japanese dancer and choreographer and a founder of Butoh dance theater
Simone Forti, American Italian Postmodern dancer and choreographer

Forms

Kabuki (Classical Japanese dance theatre)
Noh (Classical Japanese dance theatre)

Places

Japan (Tokyo, Kyoto, and more)
New York, NY, US
Berlin, Germany
Nova Scotia, Canada

Learn more about the Conversations Without Walls 2020 digital series

The CWW with Jonas and Otake was recorded in May 2020, but only days after the program was slated to launch, George Floyd died at the hands of police in Minneapolis. Danspace Project postponed the release of this pre-recorded conversation to prioritize urgent action in direct response to the Black Lives Matter movement and to address issues of equity and anti-racism within the organization. This work continues and informs. Since this conversation, both artists have been reflecting on the continuing pandemic and the movement for Black lives. Read some of their offerings here:

June 9. A funeral for Mr. Floyd is held today. I danced in my mother’s house. I moved thinking of you, mourning you.

6000 miles away from Minneapolis. I tried to make the distance malleable.

6700 miles away from Houston. I heard eulogies.

6780 miles away from New York, my home and friends. I heard your voices on the streets, loud and clear, despite the pandemic. I moved thinking of you.

(Excerpt from Thinking of You, Eiko Otake)

https://www.eikootake.org/virtual-studio-thinking-of-you

—

Looking at the past. Do things change?

We hear the voice of George Floyd

I hear the voices outside my window

In protest.

We must change.

Love from Joan

(Excerpt from MoMA’s Performing at a Distance Project, Joan Jonas)

https://www.moma.org/magazine/articles/364

Joan Jonas is a world-renowned artist whose work encompasses a wide range of media including video, performance, installation, sound, text, and sculpture. Joan’s experiments and productions in the late 1960’s and early 1970’s continue to be crucial to the development of many contemporary art genres, from performance and video to conceptual art and theatre. Since 1968, her practice has explored ways of seeing, the rhythms of rituals, and the authority of objects and gestures. Joan has exhibited, screened, and performed her work at museums, galleries, and in large scale group exhibitions throughout the world. She has recently presented solo exhibitions at Hangar Bicocca, Milan; NTU Centre for Contemporary Art, Singapore; the United States Pavilion for the 56th edition of the Venice Biennial; Tate Modern, London; TBA21 Ocean Space at the San Lorenzo Church, Venice; and Serralves Museum, Porto. In 2018, she was awarded the prestigious Kyoto Prize, presented to those who have contributed significantly to the scientific, cultural, and spiritual betterment of mankind.

Raised in Japan and a resident of New York since 1976, Eiko Otake is a movement–based, interdisciplinary artist. She worked for more than 40 years as Eiko & Koma, but since 2014 has been working on her own projects. Eiko & Koma created numerous performance works, exhibitions, durational “living” installations, and media works commissioned by institutions such as American Dance Festival, Brooklyn Academy of Music Next Wave Festival, the Whitney Museum, the Walker Art Center, and MoMA. Eiko has performed her solo project, A Body in Places, at over 40 sites including a month-long Danspace Project PLATFORM (2016) and three full-day performances at the Metropolitan Museum of Art (2017). Currently, Eiko is directing her multi-year Duet Project and Virtual Creative Residency at Wesleyan University. www.eikootake.org

Tags: Conversations Without Walls, CWW, Eiko Otake, Joan Jonas, Judy Hussie-Taylor