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Costume
Kazuo Ohno in Ka-Cho-Fu-Getsu, with Etsuko Ohno
About Ka-Cho-Fu-Getsu
Ka-Cho-Fu-Getsu was first performed at the Teatro Comunale Ponchielli in Cremona, Italy in 1990. It was a short, one hour dance piece performed by Kazuo and Yoshito Ohno, and directed by Yoshito Ohno. Cremona is a town known for its lutes, and was home to the famous luthier Antonio Stradivari. In response to the city’s wish for a piece to be created that was associated with lutes, the Ohnos stayed for a short residency. They visited and rehearsed at a lute factory in the city. The lute craftsmen would choose the trees to be used in making the lutes by going into the woods and listening to the voices of the trees with their bare hands. The title Ka-Ka-Cho-Fu-Getsu [literal translation: flower-bird-wind-moon] came from this method of listening to nature with the body, which seemed to resonate with Japanese sensibilities about nature. This does not mean they wanted to bring flowers or birds to the stage, but rather that they were exploring the relationship between humans and nature. Arts residencies were not so common at the time, and so it was a comparatively short period of creation, but the welcoming soft shadows of Cremona made for a quiet and unforgettable stay.
In the scene featuring this costume, Kazuo Ohno danced to “Songs My Mother Taught Me” by Antonín Dvořák and “The Danube Blues” by Johann Strauss. Kazuo had not danced had much experience dancing to violin music before this, but this Dvořák piece was played on a violin. The costume became known as the “girl’s costume”.
There is another “girl’s costume” in Kazuo’s works, which was used in the “Death and Birth” scene in Admiring La Argentina. These two costumes have a few similarities; they both made use of white tissue headdresses and clothes pegs. The costume for the Ka-Cho-Fu-Getsu girl had the hem turned in to show its voluminousness, with four or five clothes pegs humorously pinned to the front. The “Death and Birth” costume was a peach dress of double layered semi-transparent silk, incredibly delicate and difficult to put on. To do so, the head of costume would always hold the straps together with clothes pegs and help Kazuo put the dress on to make sure it didn’t become tangled. The costume was complete once the arms passed through the straps and the clothes pegs were removed. One time however, having dressed Kazuo Ohno and sent him onstage, the clothes pegs were nowhere to be found. On the stage a girl wearing clothes pegs was dancing. It was a grand mistake, how must the audience have felt about it? The costume for Ka-Cho-Fu-Getsu was based on this unique experience.
Etsuko Ohno
Born in Yokohama in 1938. Graduated in Fine Art from Bunka Gakuin. After meeting Yoshito Ohno during junior high school, she married him in 1962. Assumed responsibility for Yoshito’s costumes in 1969 when he danced his first solo performance Yoshito Ohno DANCE EXPERIENCE. She later also became responsible for designing Kazuo Ohno’s costumes, as well as dressing him and doing his makeup, starting with Admiring La Argentina in 1977.
花鳥風月
語り手 大野悦子
聞き手 溝端俊夫
撮影・編集 飯名尚人
協力 大野一雄舞踏研究所