I  discovered Butoh today.

This form of dance-with roots in mid century Japan- I am unable to describe easily with words. All I can say is it instantly resonated with me to my very core so deeply (conceptual imagery, art modeling, movement, beauty, pain, physical strength & expression)  that  I feel compelled to learn more. It is unlike anything I have seen, except in my own imagination and dreams, or perhaps a Kirasowa’s “Sunshine Through the Rain”

Do you know when something has changed your life the first few moments it touches you? I was profoundly aware of an internal shifting today-one I’ve not not felt  since 2009-when I met an artist online who shifted my entire self-perception (or since 1995 when I first developed a photograph in a darkroom) Viewing Butoh was like watching someone take  my own insides  & put them up on a stage. Never before has what I was feeling internally & longing to express with movement & imagery-so acutely depicted.

For an artist, these things are like earthquakes that forever alter our landscapes

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

* World famous butoh performer Hiroko Tamano considers modeling for artists to be butoh, in which she poses in “impossible” positions held for hours, which she calls “really slow Butoh” http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Butoh