ABOUT THIS SITE >>> This site is a blog as well as an archive. It gives visibility to the continues working of radical_hope, its current move to radical_house, the research project Distraction As Discipline (2016 - 2019) and the process of OTÇOE - works for passers-by, a working trajectory (2013 and 2014).
radical_house is a long term project and has a threefold nature: it presents a physical place, a framework and a logic. When in 2013 teaching and mentoring became an extension of Langsdorf's artistic practices now radical_house stems from her pedagogical experience where 'being in dialogue' with others is her main principle.
Distraction As Discipline is
an investigation into enactivist principles in art and education
(research trajectory at KASK School
of Arts Ghent 2016-19). It considers the potential of performance art and
pedagogy in general, in resisting the current and massive
desubjectivation, by critically reclaiming both, attention for the moment and participation in a process.
OTÇOE - works for passers-by was the development of radical_hope's artistic practice in the city and questioned how and by whom this practice (and its bodily, social and economical aspects) is perceived. The title refers to the public of a city and to how we encounter and register most things on our way through the city: Out of The Corner of Our Eyes. OTÇOE.
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SITTING WITH THE BODY 2013 ...
sitting with the body (research 2013-2014) was investigating two things at a time. The construction of choreographic images in an urban context as well as work and practice as such: how do we spend our time and what does it serve?
At ZSenne art lab, a gallery space in the centre of Brussels, Renée Copraij and Heike Langsdorf introduced the research by presenting a first image – their two sitting bodies – three times a day. Then Langsdorf also started to work with other interested Brussels residents on this image.
During several months movement material, which all departs from this first image, was developed.
All choreographic images were inspired by the Buddhist practice of self-observation zazen (also 'just sitting' or 'sitting with the body') and stand vis-à-vis the daily routines of the city. They were executed several times during the day and always in a space with large windows giving out on the street, like an art gallery or a shop. Passers-by could thus face another sense of time and a different kind of bodily work.
In February 2015 the choregraphy sitting with the body 24/7 was premiering during the Burning Ice Festival at the Kaaitheatre in Brussels:
sitting with the body 24/7 is a group choreography, performed in a space in the centre of a city, open during one entire week, around the clock. Depending on the time of the day, passers-by can observe the performers at work from outside through display windows or physically join
Since then sitting with the body was adapted to smaller-scale interventions and workshop formats. It also serves as a practice to initiate, host and maintain the relational works and spaces radical_hope is co-creating.
As such it became a sort of ‘cantus firmus’ of Langsdorf’s working ethic which demands the capacity to approach whatever context not through the will for action but the search for dialogue. The latter demands the activity/passivity of listening and receiving.
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>>> more on sitting with the body__________________________________________________
>>> www.zsenne.be__________________________________________________
>>> Orit Sen-Gupta on sitting with the body__________________________________________________