Gestures of Dance – Dance as Gesture
Cultural and Aesthetic Translations in International Co-Productions by the Tanztheater Wuppertal
Head of Project: Prof. Dr. Gabriele Klein / FB Bewegungswissenschaften / Performance Studies
Duration: 2013-2017
Funded by: German Reasearch Council (DFG)
The research project examines cultural and aesthetic processes of translating gestures based on 15 international coproductions by the Tanztheater Wuppertal. The focus lies on (urban) everyday gestures, which the ensemble experienced and investigated in the specific cultural contexts of the co-producing countries and then subsequently integrated into their choreographies.
With the help of exceptional empirical material (performance excerpts and choreographic “paratexts”, visual and written rehearsal notes), i.e. as yet unpublished archive material, which the Pina Bausch Foundation has offered to provide for this project, as well as further empirical data (audience surveys, interviews with dancers, personal notes made during rehearsals, online film and other visual material), the research project will examine the production of cultural knowledge and the forms and framings of intercultural understanding in and through dance gestures. This will be analyzed on three levels: the scenic performances of the dancers, the solo and group dances and the choreography, its temporal-rhythmic and spatial-architectural and interactive-figurational aspects.
Instead of approaching the subject of gesture from an anthropological perspective, the research project seeks, on the one hand, to fundamentally contribute to a cultural and social theory of the gesture in the fields of dance studies and cultural sociology by examining the cultural and social aspects of gesture and their potential to permit intercultural understanding. On the other hand, the research project also aims to develop a conceptual understanding of gesture as a fundamental term of dance theory against the backdrop of whether cultural understanding is at all possible. By questioning the relationship of everyday gestures and dance gestures, i.e. artistic gestures, as that of a “second construction” of gestures (Brandstetter 2010; Fischer-Lichte 2010), the subject of gesture will be investigated in terms of its use in intercultural understanding with a main focus on the performative and corporeal aspects of the gesture.