Hold the Clock
by Yoshiko ChumaSaturday, December 5, 2009 at 7 pm
Admission by donation
Performed by Yoshiko Chuma, Ursula Eagly,
Jun Kim & Mina Nishimura
Images by Rie Ono, Sound by Kohji Setoh
in Japanese with English subtitles
CRS invites you to join us for a first public reading (with projected subtitles and sound design) of Yoshiko Chuma's HOLD THE CLOCK. Inspired by the writing of Japanese student radical Genichiro Takahashi, HOLD THE CLOCK continues Ms. Chuma's multi-year investigation of the aesthetic and philosophical questions and responses that arose during the revolutionary movements across the globe during the 60's and 70's. Takahashi was arrested as a student radical and spent half a year in prison, a harrowing experience that rendered him incapable of reading or writing for several years. His subsequent first book, Sayonara, Gangsters, captured the era's punk lyricism and irreverent upheaval of social convention and took the Japanese literary establishment by storm.
This work-in-progress showing of HOLD THE CLOCK is the culmination of a residency at CRS made possible in part through a grant of public funds from the Manhattan Community Arts Fund, supported by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs and administered by Lower Manhattan Cultural Council. With additional support from NYSCA and from the Performing Arts Japan Program of Japan Foundation, this work will have its official premiere as part of the 92nd St Y Harkness Dance Festival Anniversary Season: Past-Future-Now March 19−21, 2010. This production is part of the Performing Revolution in Central and Eastern Europe, a performing arts festival marking the 20th anniversary of the fall of communism in Central and Eastern Europe, presented by the New York Public Library for the Performing Arts in partnership with key New York City cultural organizations and academic institutions, November 2009—March 2010. www.performingrevolution.org
About the Artists
Writer Genichiro Takahashi was born in Onomichi city, Hiroshima prefecture, Japan and attended the Economics Department of Yokohama National University without graduating. As a student radical, he was arrested and spent half a year in prison, which left him at a loss linguistically. As part of his rehabilitation, his doctors encouraged him to start writing. Since April 2005, he has been a professor at the International Department of Meiji Gakuin University. Takahashi's current wife, Tanikawa Naoko and former wife Murai Yuzuki were also both authors. Takahashi's first novel, Sayonara, Gyangutachi ("Sayonara, Gangsters"), was published in 1982, and won the Gunzo Literary Award for First Novels. It has been highly regarded by critics as one of the most important works of postwar Japanese literature. It has been translated into English, Italian and Brazilian Portuguese. In addition, his Yuga de kansho-teki na Nippon-yakyuu ("Japanese Baseball: Elegant and Sentimental") won the Mishima Yukio Award in 1988, and his Nihon bungaku seisui shi ( "The Rise and Fall of Japanese Literature") received the Itoh Sei Literature Award. His other works include Penguin mura ni hi wa ochite ("Sunset in Penguin Village", 1989), Wakusei P-13 no himitsu ("The Secret of Planet 13", 1990), and Gosutobasutazu ("Ghostbusters", 1997). Other novels by Takahashi include "John Lennon vs. The Martians", and "A*D*U*L*T." He is also a noted essayist, covering a diverse field of topics ranging from literary criticism to horse-racing. Also a literary critic, he is the author of the "Maybe-It's-Not-Literature Syndrome."
Director Yoshiko Chuma (yoshikochuma.org), Conceptual Artist/Choreographer/Artistic Director of The School of Hard Knocks, has been a firebrand of New York's downtown dance scene since arriving in 1978. She has created more than 60 full-length company works, commissions and site-specific events for venues in 35 countries, constantly challenging the notion of performing for both audience and participant. Her work has been presented in such diverse venues as Joyce Theater, the Eiffel Tower, Newcastle Swing Bridge, City Center, Lincoln Center, the former National Theater of Sarajevo, the perimeter of the Hong Kong harbor, and an ancient ruin in Macedonia, among many others. She has received fellowships and awards for choreography and career work from John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, NEA, New York Foundation for Artists, Japan Foundation, Meet the Composer Choreographer/Composer Commission and Philip Morris New Works. Chuma has led workshops and master classes and been commissioned to create new work in East and West Europe, Asia, Russia and the U.S. She received a 1984 BESSIE award for choreography and four more Bessies were awarded to her productions in 1992 and 1998. In 2007 she received a Bessie for Sustained Achievement. Chuma was Artistic Director of the Daghdha Dance Company in Limerick, Ireland from 2000-03 and continues to work in Ireland as a guest teacher/choreographer in the Dance MA program of the Irish World Academy of Music and Dance.
Under the artistic direction of Yoshiko Chuma, The School of Hard Knocks is a New York-based collective of choreographers, dancers, actors, singers, musicians, designers, and visual artists. Since premiering at the 1980 Venice Biennale, this award-winning company has created and performed over 60 original works in the United States, Asia, and Europe. The School of Hard Knocks takes its name from the American idiom meaning to learn things the hard way on the proverbial "street," and was first used as the title of a performance at the 1980 Venice Biennale. Over the course of the company's history, more than 1,500 people have performed to wide critical acclaim under Chuma's direction in theatrical dance concerts, street performances, grand parades, large-scale spectacles and intimate living rooms. Since 2006 the company has been developing and presenting the ongoing dance/installation A Page Out of Order in countries including Albania, Macedonia, and the Manipur region of India. The most recent chapter, called POONAC (not about romania cinema), was presented by Danspace Project at St. Mark’s Church in June of 2009, following a tour of Romania in May.
Performer Ursula Eagly has been working with Yoshiko Chuma since 2006. As a core performer in Yoshiko's A Page Out of Order series, she has collaborated with awe-inspiring artists in Albania, Japan, Macedonia, and Romania. Ursula also makes her own performances, and her most recent piece, "Fields of Ida," premiered at Dance Theater Workshop in October.
Performer Jun Kim, a native of Japan with Korean heritage, has performed in Japan, Holland, Germany, Singapore, Russia, and US. His theater credits include, “Saran ~people~” in Tokyo. Japan, “Marie Galante” by Kurt Weill with Opéra Franais de New York, the One man play “Dust Storm” by Rick Foster, “Natsu Matsuri” with Nakamura Kanzaburo’s Heisei Nakamuraza Kabuki Theater performed at the Lincoln Center Festival directed by Kazuyoshi Kushida, “Foreign Exchange” with Playwrights Theatre of New Jersey, “Luna”, “Portrait”, “Ballad of Yachiyo” by Philip Kan Gotanda, “Benten Kozo” directed by Jim Simpson(Obie), “The Return of the Chocolate Smeared Woman” with Karen Finley, “Cellophane” by Mac Wellman, “Handel’s Messiah” directed by Eric Fraad, “Sotoba Komachi” by Yukio Mishima, “Velvet Rat”, “Sake with the Haiku Geisha”, “The Country Girl”, “Splatter”(opposite of Jacqueline Brookes) directed by Terese Hayden and more. He was the original member of the Bat Theatre Company and worked 6 productions with Jim Simpson. His Film and TV credits include “Manbiki G-man” with Nana Kinomi in Japan, “The Living Wake” with Jesse Eisenberg, “Limousine Drive”, and “L Train to Brooklyn.” As a director, he has directed “the Uniform” by Kobo Abe, Kayoko Sakoh Dance’s “Heart to Heart” dance performance in Japan, and “Kutsukake Tokijiro” by Shin Hasegawa in New York.
Performer Mina Nishimura is a choreographer and performer based in New York. She has been dancing and working as an assistant for Kota Yamazaki/Fluid hug-hug since 2002. She was born in Tokyo, Japan and moved to NYC in 2001 and received a certificate under scholarship at Merce Cunningham Studio in 2005. In New York, she has performed with independent choreographers including DD Dorllivier, David Gordon, RoseAnne Spradlin, Daria Fain, Leah Morrison, Chantal Yzerman and Satoshi Haga. She also played a principal role in Harry Parch’s opera, Delusion of Fury, at Japan Society directed by John Jesurun in 2007. In 2003-2004, she held three residencies in Senegal to work as an assistant for the creation of FAGAALA choreographed by Germaine Acogny and Kota Yamazaki. FAGAALA went on to win the New York Performance and Dance Award (Bessie Award) in 2008. Upon her return from Senegal, she started making her own work and presented at Joyce Soho, Cunningham Studio, Danspace Project/Out of Space, Movement Research Spring Festival, Movement Research at Judson, DTW/Studio Series, LIT, the Harlem Stage/E-Moves 9 and The Kitchen/Dance and Process. She was invited to dunaPart, performing-arts festival in Budapest, on DTW’s Suitcase Fund Program for research and exchange in 2008, and also selected to participate in danceWeb program 2009 at Impuls Tanz in Vienna. The past two springs, she taught at Bennington College for seven weeks as a guest faculty member. Her latest work, "Timmy's Idea," was presented at Dance Theater Workshop this fall.
Image Designer Rie Ono has designed lighting for dance, theater, and opera productions all over the world. Most recently, she toured throughout Romania and Jordan with the choreographer Yoshiko Chuma. She has collaborated with Chuma since 2007, using lighting design and photography to create visual environments for Chuma's multi-year A Page Out of Order project. Rie has received the Ettinger Award for Excellent Designers and the Freddy Award Nominees for Best Lighting Design. She was the 2003 Japan Representative of Prague Quadrienale and holds MFA in Lighting Design from NYU. She has also served as a lighting director for international festivals and productions including Lincoln Center Festival. Rie just presented her first installation work Portrait/Water at Danspace, and continues to explore the creative possibilities of photography as well as lighting design.
Sound Artist Kohji Setoh, after graduating from Keio University's Faculty of Letters in Aesthetics and Art History, completed doctoral coursework at Keio's Graduate School of Media and Governance in Computer Music / Media Art. He is a full-time lecturer for the Department of Music at Ferris University and a part-time lecturer concurrently for Keio University. Besides releasing music works on labels such as Sonore (France) and SoupDisk (Tokyo), he is often invited to act as a DJ at clubs and festivals worldwide. In addition, as a main member of the media art group flow, he has presented media art works worldwide in exhibitions such as for MoMA (New York) and Batofar (Paris). Not limited to activities as an artist, Setoh is a director of ROOT CULTURE, an artist collective based in Kamakura. The capital of Japan from 1192 to 1333, Kamakura has many historical temples and shrines, and has been the home to renowned cultural figures, such as Nobel Prize author, Yasunari Kawabata. To rediscover and cultivate the charms of Kamakura where opposite values -- old and new, natural and advanced -- can coexist, ROOT CULTURE considers what can be done, and acts upon it. In 2007, Yoshiko Chuma visited them for the first time. Then in October, 2008, The School of Hard Knocks and ROOT CULTURE collaborated in successful performances of "A Page Out of Order: Kiritosh/the Living Room Project."
