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Takao Kawaguchi's About Kazuo Ohno
From Takao Kawaguchi's About Kazuo Ohno "Tango/Bird"
About Kazuo Ohno (2013)
On the one hand a faithful reproduction, on the other a bold reinterpretation of legendary Butoh dancer Kazuo Ohno created by "totally copying" his movements. Since its premiere in 2013 it has been performed in 38 cities worldwide, and nominated for a Bessie Award after its New York showing in 2016.
“Tango/Bird”
A scene from Kazuo Ohno's Admiring La Argentina (1977). In the show's premiere, he danced this scene with a live tango band. The most graceful part of the performance, Ohno himself once described this as "the height of my dance".
ABOUT BECOMING
Takao Kawaguchi is not a Butoh dancer. He has never met nor danced with Kazuo Ohno. He may not even necessarily like the white painted faces and the typical costumes. And yet, rarely has one seen such a fine Butoh-ist. It is perhaps because Takao Kawaguchi started from outside in: without and within. He was an outsider to the community, to this art form, to its soul. So he watched and watched hours and hours of Ohno’s archives. He dissected every movement, every gesture and he patiently and painstakingly imitated it. Many dance styles are learnt like this these days.
But how can one learn Butoh, the very dance of interiority, by copying from the outside? If one starts with the form, how can the soul be found? The eye is treacherous, it only perceives the surface. The mind is even more so, as it commands habits and patterns. It is only the body that knows, as it does. So, movement after movement, gesture after gesture, Takao Kawaguchi put aside his soul, in order to become (an)other.
Making room from within, Takao Kawaguchi emptied himself of his own self and the body became an empty vessel - it was no tabula rasa, but a powerful organism ready to vibrate with new movement. One may say that this is a classic Butoh exercise, of plunging into one’s interiority; some others may see it as an act of total self-erasure. An abdication of the body so that someone else’s corporeality can inhabit it, in every pore and (in)to the bone. Its original contours only a presence of absence. Each time he feels a movement arrive too easily, Takao knows it is no good (yet). The process is relentless. The work is never done.
And yet, in this relentless doing, with focus and acuity, the movement becomes right. And in its re-birthing within another body, it becomes anew. It is perhaps in this sense that butoh is about interiority, but also about becoming. Becoming one with one’s self, the real self, a complete de-selfie-sation of sorts, a body centered not on the self but by its temporary suspension. It is about finding at once what is and what else can be.
When Takao Kawaguchi dances Kazuo Ohno, one can easily see Kazuo Ohno. Rarely has there been a finer more masterful rendering of the great master’s dances. When Takao Kawaguchi dances Kazuo Ohno, one can see how, from the copy of a copy comes a movement that cannot be more authentically original. Never has there been a more embodied re-activation of an archive. When Takao Kawaguchi dances Kazuo Ohno, one may choose to see one’s self – butoh is an invitation to look within oneself, to accept what one may find, to agree to become more.
（February 2021）
Angela Conquet
She is former Artistic Director/CEO of Dancehouse Melbourne (2011-2020). She is now an independent dance curator and consultant, a member of Asia Network for Dance AND+, co-editor of Dancehouse Diary and a PhD candidate at the University of Melbourne. She presented Takao Kawaguchi’s work in Melbourne twice: About Kazuo Ohno (Asiatopa, 2017), Touch of the Other (2020) and interviewed him for Dancehouse Diary.
Takao Kawaguchi (1962~)
A member of Dumb Type from 1996 to 2008, began creating solo works in 2000. Kawaguchi explores a wide range of performance possibilities through theatre, dance, film and art. In recent years, he has been creating performances about Butoh, such as The Sick Dancer and About Kazuo Ohno, and has received high acclaim all over the world.
http://www.kawaguchitakao.com/
Satsuki Hoshino
A pianist based in Paris, specialising in improvisational performance influenced by all kinds of musical styles from pre-Baroque to modern. While studying at the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse de Paris, she became the first female pianist of the Jerome Seydoux Pathé Foundation. As well as working on her own performances, she appears every year at film festivals in France, accompaning silent films and exploring new possibilities of expression in music and art.
https://www.satsukihoshino.com/
Takao Kawaguchi's About Kazuo Ohno
Concept/Direction/Performance: Takao Kawaguchi
Choreography: Tatsumi Hijikata, Kazuo Ohno
Costume: Noriko Kitamura
Video & Editing: Naoto Iina
Music: Satsuki Hoshino
Graphics: Nobutaka Kitakaze (Young Soul)
