the darkside of openess

dramatic title eh?  i stole it.  i guess i made it a title, but this phrase, idea, proposal of some sort came about twice this week.  marten spangberg.  he is this tall, typically hipster looking swedish person who i gave 6 hours of my brain to this week.  long, straight, slightly greasy hair (no bangs) that he pushes back with his hands a lot.  clear, big frames for his glasses.  skinny black jeans, 43 years old.  a choreographer and philosopher- (an avid delleuzian), among other things of course, or i guess. oh yes, and the director of an mfa program for choreography in sweden.  a critical education theorist. he's also weird, and often inappropriate.

me and 25 other performers came to his workshop on monday- an afternoon workshop, where we sat and listened to him talk for 4 hours.  he told us in the beginning that he observes and assumes that we move a lot, and so we would not move at all.  he said that he thought that there was a lot of important things that we should know, and that he was going to talk as fast and as much as he could in 4 hours.  most things were out of my reach/ understanding.  but a lot of things stuck with me too. since i have been here, i have realized that i have exposed myself to lots of situations with a hope of being passionately persuaded or motivated.  nothing has been quite like that- i more feel, something between indifferent and the feeling you feel when you shrug your shoulders- which i don't have words for, and would rather not find them either.

some things that he said: bare with me- or skip over them- just three things he talked about that i am not eloquent about. at all.

1) the aforementioned title- the dark side of openness.  in education, in art.  ppl's desire or push to be "open", to be "tolerant".  thought of perhaps to be a rebellious strategy to break down walls and push boundaries.  tolerance as a dangerous word- makes its own walls, and consolidates an authoritative position.  people engage or talk about, or put energy into things that are within the realm of tolerance.  he argues, when someone calls someone creative- it inherently places you within that realm- which is mediocre- and limited. he argues, that we should not push for more openness in dance/choreography- that it is inherently open already.

2) political art.
Kant argues that an art object can not have utility and that it must be autonomous. it must not depend on relationships.  so "conceptual" artists accepted this notion, but then wanted to make the art object politically active. this is theoretically impossible if the object can not have utility. so how to look at it?  it is not a dead end, but an opportunity to look at how you labor in the politics of making your object. ie.. "i'm not interested in making political films, but i'm interested in making film political."
**also- marten is taking a position to not just situate himself in the notion that the body is inherently political, and thus- everything from there is..*** but he is also from a super homogenized european background- which is really different from growing up in the states during a time when identity politics merged with radical "politics"- particularly if you were looking to be or were a part of those radical discussions.

3. "my job is to always leave behind what i can."  (his abilities and belonging, groups, identities, etc)
this one really gets me.  there are things that really resonate with where i currently find myself out here.  so, he explained/my take on this is that- you don't abandon these things for something else, it's for not something else.  this not something else can not be found until the moment of leaving it behind.
i don't know why this feels so different to me, but it really does.  i applied this notion directly to the immediate resistance i had to his lecture.
a white, straight? european artist who is super educated in philosophy and critical studies...talking at a group of people for 4 hours.  furthermore he asked nothing of anyone else, or our names and referred to us by physical markers- "hat girl over there", etc.  it's so easy for me (particularly when it comes to white males), to just list the reasons why something is not ok.  my critiques have become jargon, and are not full expressions of who i am, and the conflict i feel so often in my life.  but i keep them, probably for a number of reasons.  because they associate me with an identity, a group, and also maybe because i don't want to spend the energy to expand those critiques, or maybe i'm too afraid to throw them away? or maybe because i don't think i'm smart enough to come to any other conclusion, and i've got that one down?
i've been coming up to this alot out here.  particularly in the art scene here, since it seems the most accessible to me at hte moment.  people ask me what i think, i ask myself what i think, what i felt about that completely fucked up or amazing experience i just had, and i don't even want to open my mouth.  because i;m tired of what i know my questions are.  even more so- they are just not serving me anymore. the questions don't do shit for me.  i ask the same questions, and they frame the responses in the same way each time.  so i'm not getting new perspectives that i yearn for. ache for really.  it's time for new questions, and if i don't leave the other one's behind to an extent.. how do i find the other one's?  the old one's are apart of me, for better or worse, so i dont think i have to be too scared of forgetting them. but it is hard. cracking yourself open.

the darkside of openness.  i confront it outside of the philosophical realm of course.  in my gut, in my heart, in my nagging mind.  i went to a "gathering"the other night.  tessa's house.  i think she is a part of hte burning man community i am told.  from england, really well spoken and smart. friendly, has a funny, totally unfashionable bowl haircut, and i believe is married to a gay man for love.   the house is beautiful- like nothing i have seen in the area for someone who is not rich.  the house reeks of pot, so you know it's growing, and there is a view of the city. (which i find breathtaking by the way).  there is also a hot tub.  there are ten people there.  all dancer/dance maker folk.  i knocked a bottle of whiskey over earlier in the night.  i was embarrassed by the attention it brought.  cause you know- i am the new person in town.  i had weird interactions with this person laura that makes me sad- cause we use to be friends- and she is someone that you should get along with in the dance community- cause she makes a lot of things happen in a really admirable underground kinda way.

anyways- the night proceeds and it gets slightly less awkward for me, as  i push myself to be friendly- open, and exciting or something.  we have dinner- talk- i begin to feel a little more relaxed with a couple o glasses of wine slugged back.  and so we all cram into the hot tub.  nudity isn't huge for me- so i feel ok about it.  but the closeness- the proximity of our bodies in the hot-tub is hard for me.  my mind starts tricking me to start spacially organizing the people together according to affinity, and consistently leaving me out on the side- like how i do in my dances- obsessed with the periphery and not the middle space.  i am the weird box on the end of the crossword puzzle word- the "s" that pluralizes something, but wouldn't change much if it were there or not.  low airplanes fly overhead- and there is crazy wind and mist in the air.  so cold that if you lift your shoulders out of the water you shiver immediately.  it's kinda magical,  amongst ten other bodies in this moment- only inches separating our flesh, sometimes none at all.  i am there, because i have told myself that it would be a good idea to put myself out there- to make myself open to people and make friends.  and in the wind and magic, i longed for two simultaneous things- to be alone in the hot tub- and to be with you all- my loves- my family that make me feel so held and wonderful- that i cannot even describe.  i got out of the hot tub and knocked someones bowl to the ground and it shattered.  the second piece of glass i had knocked over that night.  i got a ride home with some nice folks and went to bed, and felt like i made a good effort.  i tried to be open, but i sure as hell felt alot of darkness in it:)

i guess i can say that things are moving.  there are some things i have no choice to leave behind in a sense, because i keep finding myself without them.  but they are a part of me, so i am not afraid of forgetting them.

forgive my rambling- thought i would just go for it ya know?  miss yous.  come visit soon.  think about ya'll every day.  for realz.

all my love,
dr. sara