15 MINUTES OF FRAME

DANCE

22 Mar

Recently landed: 15 Minutes of FRAME

Gracia’s written response to An Afternoon of Work-in-Progress Studio Showings with choreography by Prue Lang, Yuiko Masukawa, Sandra Parker, and Lilian Steiner, Presented by The Australian Ballet as part of FRAME festival, especially for Fjord Review.

This time yesterday I was sat on the floor. This time yesterday, at 3pm, in the van Praagh studio, named after Peggy van Praagh, the Australian Ballet’s founding artistic director, at the Primrose Potter Australian Ballet Centre, I was unsure what I’d see, in the truest and best sense of being uncertain. Having taken the lift to level five, the path ahead was unfixed, something of which many tales of curiosity require. I was there to experience An Afternoon of Work-in Progress Studio Showings presented by the Australian Ballet as part of the inaugural 2023 FRAME festival program.

On a Sunday, in a space I do not normally inhabit, nor see, in the orbit of a small group of people waiting to encounter similar, would I see ideas spark, hide from my viewpoint, only to be coaxed forward once more? What shape would a collage of inquiries make? What would I feel? What can be revealed in 10- or 15-minute time frames? All those unknowns. The excitement, and shared nerves felt through proximity. In the second of two sessions, this was a rare thing, this moment, this time yesterday, to see, feel, be present to works-in-progress.

The illustrious location played its part. This was some debut! Hallowed surrounds and all. And so, in the van Praagh studio, I sat and watched choreographer Yuiko Masukawa’s Yūgen. Masukawa, a former principal with Melbourne City Ballet, introduced her piece which had been intended for two performers, Samuel Harnett-Welk and Jessica Thompson, but owing to Harnett-Welk sustaining an injury, was presented as a piece for one. On the floor near to where I sat, Harnett-Welk’s costume was laid out neatly in its various components.* Present, still. In this work, Masukawa is interested in exploring the concept of yūgen in traditional Japanese aesthetics influenced by Buddhism, and so an “empty” space is never really empty, but a space of potentiality and depth. A space in which “to contemplate the flight of wild geese seen and lost among the clouds;” a walk in a forest with no thought of return, as described in the 14th century by Motokiyo Zeami.