15
Oct, 2010
10
Oct, 2010
Creation
Creating work means following feelings as far as one can as well as using accumulated technique to express those feelings. There is an interaction between the feeling and technique, and each feeds the other. Unless it is a set classical piece, learned technique may not match the feeling/meaning/expression that is desired. So, one has to experiment. For me, the starting point is in the classical training I received. Because the expressive range is so rich, I feel that it is
6
Nov, 2009
Giggle and Jiggle: Shaking my Booty
Sri Susilowati is a Performing Diaspora Resident Artist at CountePULSE. See her at weekend 2 of Performing Diaspora, November 12-15. Buy tickets now! As an Indonesian choreographer who has trained in my own country and the U.S.A, I am interested in looking at a social relation from a third world perspective, and in particular a third world women's perspectives. When first I moved to the States years ago, my artistic mission/intention was to introduce Indonesian dance to Americans and to
2
Jun, 2009
Traditional dance does not put the “no” into innovation (with apologies to the shredded wheat commercial)
The essence of the esthetics of Indonesian dance, and that particularly from the islands of Java and Bali, can be explained through three words: wirama, and wirasa. Wirama means the harmony and internal rhythm of the movement. Wiraga is the intensity and fullness of the movement not in term of its external power, but more along the lines of being filled with chi (in Chinese) or prana (Sanskrit). Soft and delicate movement can be wiraga while movement that is seemingly strong and powerful can lack it altogether. Wirasa is the feeling of the movement. The word “feeling” here is used not in sense of emotion or passion, but in term of the sensation when emotion and mental construct are set aside.