<BR><small>'Eidos-Telos'</small><P>This must be one of the most exciting dance events in this or any year as Ballett Frankfurt, one of the most innovative and skilled dance companies in the world, visit London for the second time. After the 'taster' programme of three works that we saw three years ago, this time William Forsythe's Company bring two of their most famous full-length works - 'Artifact' and 'Eidos-Telos'. For some of us the question is not, 'Which one will I go to,' but, 'Is one time for each enough?' <P><BR>Here are the details from the <A HREF="http://www.sadlerswells.com/whats_on/autumn2001/frankfurt.asp" TARGET=_blank><B>Sadler's Wells website</B></A><P>Here are the calendar details from the <A HREF="http://www.danceumbrella.co.uk/menu.htm" TARGET=_blank><B>Dance Umbrella website</B></A>. Click on the coloured dates for programme information and on the venue name for theatre details.<P><p>[This message has been edited by Stuart Sweeney (edited September 28, 2001).]

<BR><small>Ballett Frankfurt in Forsythe's 'Artifact'; Dancers: Stephanie Arndt, Anders Hellström<BR>photo - Dominik Mentzos</small><P><BR>Here is a selection of articles about this remarkable dance company:<P>Stuart Sweeney's review of the <A HREF="http://www.criticaldance.com/features/forsythe.html" TARGET=_blank><B>Ballett Frankfurt Study Day at Sadler's Wells</B></A><P>David Slade shares his <A HREF="http://www.criticaldance.com/ubb/Forum4/HTML/000329.html" TARGET=_blank><B>detailed thoughts about the Company</B></A>. Scroll down a few postings in the thread to reach David's article.<P>Here is our thread on the recent piece <A HREF="http://www.criticaldance.com/ubb/Forum4/HTML/000277.html" TARGET=_blank><B>"Workwithinwork"</B></A> <P>Here are some reviews from the UK Press:<P>Nadine Meisner on Forsythe's work for <A HREF="http://www.times-archive.co.uk/news/pages/tim/99/04/16/timartdan03001.html?1135482" TARGET=_blank><B>Paris Opera Ballet as well as his own company</B></A>.<P>Ismene Brown is a big fan and from the time of the Sadler's wells visit in 1998, here is her <A HREF="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=000148269364269&rtmo=rEEF3b2X&atmo=99999999&P4_FOLLOW_ON=/98/11/26/btfran26.html&pg=/et/98/11/26/btfran26.html" TARGET=_blank><B>review</B></A> and an <A HREF="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=000148269364269&rtmo=a5Cdh5qJ&atmo=99999999&pg=/et/98/11/21/btfors21.html" TARGET=_blank><B>interesting feature with interviews</B></A> with Royal Ballet dancers who perform Forsythe's work.<P>Debra Craine also<A HREF="http://www.times-archive.co.uk/news/pages/tim/98/11/26/timartdan03001.html?1376249" TARGET=_blank><B>reviews the Sadler's Wells programme</B></A>.<P>These last three articles are from the period before criticaldance was established and were found using the ballet.co database, which remains an unparalled resource for UK dance for the past 5 years for researchers and fans. Here is the link to the page where you can <A HREF="http://www.ballet.co.uk/links/index.htm" TARGET=_blank><B>access the databases</B></A>. <P><p>[This message has been edited by Stuart Sweeney (edited September 28, 2001).]

Ballett Frankfurt are performing 'Eidos : Telos' as part of the Melbourne Festival. To read about the impact down under of this large scale avant-garde work, go to the thread in our 'Ballet' section:<P> <A HREF="http://www.criticaldance.com/ubb/Forum4/HTML/000277.html" TARGET=_blank>http://www.criticaldance.com/ubb/Forum4/HTML/000277.html</A> <p>[This message has been edited by Stuart Sweeney (edited October 19, 2001).]

This was posted by Hans de Kretser of Sadler's Wells elsewhere on the board and I've copied it here as well:<P>***********************************<P>There is a new video clip from Eidos:Telos to tempt anybody who has not booked for Ballett Frankfurt at Sadler's Wells already.<BR> <A HREF="http://www.sadlerswells.com/whats_on/autumn2001/frankfurt.asp" TARGET=_blank>http://www.sadlerswells.com/whats_on/autumn2001/frankfurt.asp</A> <BR>Enjoy<P>Hans de Kretser<BR>Sadler's Wells<BR>

The video-clip mentioned above is worth a look. It's a form which still has a way to go, but this took under 3 minutes to download on my standard phone line. The image is tiny and not as high resolution as the clips from the Preljocaj website. Nevertheless it gives a taster of what part of 'Eidos: Telos' will look like - breathtaking.

<P><BR><B>BALLETT FRANKFURT: THE CURIOUS DANA CASPERSEN</B><P>WHO: BALLETT FRANKFURT<BR>WHEN: SAT 3 - SAT 10 NOVEMBER<BR> Artifact Sat 3 - Mon 5 Nov <BR> Eidos:Telos Thu 8 - Sat 10 Nov<BR>WHERE: SADLER'S WELLS<BR>TICKETS: 020 7863 8000<P> <BR>Dana Casperson in 'Eidos : Telos'<BR>Photo: Dominik Mentzos<P><BR>Dana Caspersen was born in Minneapolis, Minnesota USA. She studied in New York with Maggie Black, Kim Abel and Erick Hawkins, and performed with North Carolina Dance Theater, before joining the Olivier Award-winning Ballett Frankfurt in 1988. She has written about her experiences in the company for the journal Choreography and Dance, volume 5, part 3. Also check out the excellent website <A HREF="http://www.frankfurt-ballett.de" TARGET=_blank>www.frankfurt-ballett.de</A> for more information.<P>Caspersen performs in Artifact and the three-part Eidos:Telos, the pieces being presented at Sadler's Wells. Both are non-narrative works of monumental intelligence which contain spoken text and startling theatrical effects amidst some stunning dance. For the latter she wrote her own monologue. Caspersen won a Bessie Award for Eidos:Telos when it was performed in New York.<P>Donald Hutera: Was dance a part of your childhood?<BR>Dana Caspersen: My grandmother said I was always dancing around the house. I took some classes but was more interested in gymnastics.<P>DH: What was your early training?<BR>DC: In high school I attended a theatre school, so I had quite an eclectic dance training, primarily focused on ballet. I also studied piano intensively.<P>DH: How did you come to start dancing for William Forsythe and Ballett Frankfurt?<BR>DC: I came to Frankfurt by accident. I was travelling around looking for work and had a friend here and was sick of youth hostels. I'd never heard of Bill, but was thrilled by what I'd stumbled across.<P>DH: What does he look for in a dancer, and expect of those in the company?<BR>DC: Bill speaks of the company as a choreographic ensemble. Often the dancers are involved in several sides of the creative process. So he looks for artists and colleagues who are interested in his work, but who also have their own art hearts and minds and don't wait for orders. These are people who have what I would term dance intelligence: curiosity, fearlessness and the desire to continuously reapproach dancing. Physically he looks for the ability to coordinate in highly complex ways, using isolation and extreme articulation of head, neck, hips, torso and limbs. People also need a strong balletic technique, although if someone is extraordinary in other ways that isn't necessarily a deciding factor.<P>DH: What are the pleasures and challenges of working with him?<BR>DC: I once came across a quote from the 17th-century Japanese Zen master Takasui, who said: "You must doubt deeply, again and again, asking yourself what the subject of hearing could be." This is the way Bill works. He doubts with a tenaciously curious delight. He instinctively investigates and explodes the layers of ossification that seem to occur naturally in institutions and in the wake of success. He never hangs onto things, so the works are always changing in substantial ways. He has a joyous physical genius and an extraordinarily fluid and ungrasping mind, which allows both the sublime and the grotesque to move through him. He knows how to inspire and explain to others the mechanics and spirit that moves him. He is curious in areas of blindness and sorrow as well as joy, and tends to respond to obstacles and failure as opportunities to re-see, he trusts himself, but he never assumes that he knows.<P>DH: What are his typical working methods?<BR>DC: They differ vastly from piece to piece. His role in each new one varies, but he almost always functions as a catalyst and editor. There are many levels of collaboration between Bill and the company within that framework.<P>DH: What happens in Eidos:Telos - what do we see and hear?<BR>DC: I would say it is a detailed cataclysm. Everywhere is dance, and I appear in the middle section in a danced monologue which is woven through the archetype of Persephone/Demeter and acts as a detonator. As I was working on my text, I was reading about the Grandmother Spider in Native American traditions. She's a figure who both creates and destroys, who weaves the world and 'thinks us as we are being.' The piece itself thinks about this - a constant re-weaving. There are other texts Bill has made, which are characters in the underworld. And there are are three trombonists and a violinst onstage who are processed electronically, live.<P>DH: What is it like being inside Artifact?<BR>DC: I perform two roles, one as a dancer and the other a speaking role as the 'Woman in the Historical Dress.' The piece is like a vast crystalline structure which constantly re-forms itself around you, taking you with it. It has a tremendous, deep beauty and rage and sadness and letting go, and as a dancer some of the most extraordinary pas de deux work I've ever done.<P>DH: How much is dancing a form of acting?<BR>DC: Well, I often dance and act (in the sense of speaking) at the same time, so on some level they are the same. Both are methods of propulsion which give form to ideas. But, if pressed, I would say that acting is more like moving on land and dancing is more like moving in water.<P>DH: What kind of dancer are you?<BR>DC: I don't know. I do all kinds of things and find it untrue and uninteresting to insist on distinctions.<P>DH: Why do you dance?<BR>DC: Dancing is a channel for a particular kind of fierce joy, as well as fierce sorrow, anger, ambivalence, laughter, curiosity. It's a state where you can be aware of many different, and sometimes contradictory, things happening at once.<P>DH: If you weren't a dancer, what might you be doing?<BR>DC: I also work as a choreographer and director. But if I weren't working in the theatre at all I would maybe be studying medicine or physics. I'm also very interested in writing. Right now I'm reading about shamanism because I'm curious about how humans seem to live in a constant state of metaphor or, as Oliver Sacks says, seem to be dreaming all the time.<P>DH: What's the best thing about living in Germany?<BR>DC: The arts are well-supported!<P><P>------------------<BR>This interview was posted by Stuart Sweeney on behalf of Donald Hutera.<P>Donald Hutera writes regularly on dance and arts for The Times, Evening Standard, Time Out, Dance Europe, Dance Magazine (US) and Dance Now. He is co-author, with Allen Robertson, of The Dance Handbook.<P>This interview first appeared in either the Spring or Autumn 2001 editions of Dance Umbrella News. <BR> <BR>Join Dance Umbrella's mailing list to receive future editions of Dance Umbrella News. <BR>Call: 020 8741 5881 <BR>Email: mail@danceumbrella.co.uk <BR>Web: <A HREF="http://www.danceumbrella.co.uk" TARGET=_blank>www.danceumbrella.co.uk</A>

Here's another Forstythe thread:<P><A HREF="http://www.criticaldance.com/ubb/Forum4/HTML/000530.html" TARGET=_blank><B>Paris Opera Ballet dance Forsythe</B></A>

<B> The luckiest person in dance: Choreographer William Forsythe tells Sarah Fraterhow he came to be teaching the Kirov, and explains that, radical though he is, he still appreciates what tutus do for the body <BR>Financial Times; Oct 27, 2001<BR>By SARAH FRATERHOW</B><P><BR> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>Improbable as it may seem, William Forsythe is related to Eileen Ford. That might need saying again. The celebrated Director of Ballett Frankfurt, routinely hailed as the greatest living choreographer, is related to the greatest ever model agent. While Forsythe was transforming classical ballet into radical art making, his father's sister was promoting the likes of Christie Brinkley, the former Mrs Billy Joel and original Uptown Girl.<HR></BLOCKQUOTE> <P><A HREF="http://globalarchive.ft.com/globalarchive/article.html?id=011027001510&query=dance" TARGET=_blank><B>more...</B></A><P>

Forsythe at The Kirov - I can imagine various people on both sides of the Atlantic running from the room screaming. <P>There are a lot of interesting things here:<P>'Even company wannabes beat a path to his door. "They just sort of show up," he says coyly.' Forsythe had agreed to meet a dancer I know, but there was a long afternoon rehearsal with an evening performance to follow a couple of hours later. My friend said that he understood and would come back another time, but Forsythe said - No, let's do something now - and gave up 50 minutes of his break. <P>I have enormous respect for the German Arts funding system that provides inexpensive access to Arts of all sorts and in Frankfurt and Pina Bausch's Tanztheater Wuppertal support 40-strong avant-garde dance companies.<P>Good to hear that MacMillan was so supportive. 'Don't worry about the critics,' he said. It's still good advice for a young choreographer.<P>To say that there is a sense of anticipation for the imminent arrival of Frankfurt would be something of an understatement.<p>[This message has been edited by Stuart Sweeney (edited October 27, 2001).]

Article in The Sunday Times<P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>When the Kirov Ballet toured Germany last month, it wasn't booked to go to Frankfurt. But that didn't stop the company's artistic director, Makhar Vaziev, from packing his top ballerinas onto a plane and sending them there, as bribe and tribute, to dance for William Forsythe. Or perhaps the dancers were running away from home. "All I know," says Forsythe, a day before their arrival, "is that they're coming here to show me what they can do, in the hope that I'll make something for them." <P><HR></BLOCKQUOTE><P><A HREF="http://www.sunday-times.co.uk/news/pages/sti/2001/10/28/sticuldnc01001.html?" TARGET=_blank> <B> MORE </B> </A>

"Yes, it's complicated, but we live in times of detail and intricacy, and the richer ballet is, the more we'll like it. I don't think anyone likes simple ballet any more. Do they?" <P>In this quote from the fasciating article above, Mr Forsythe is being provocative or perhaps refecting tastes in Germany. If he is thinking of 'Coppelia' and 'Le Corsaire' thay still have a big following in the UK. What do other people think?<BR>

<B>Forsythe plays his cards right<BR>William Forsythe is bringing his Frankfurt Ballet to the London stage for the first time. Nadine Meisner of the Independent anticipates epic innovation</B><P> <BLOCKQUOTE><font size="1" face="Verdana, Arial">quote:</font><HR>When George Balanchine died in 1983, a void appeared at the creative centre of classical ballet. Already for years people had been looking about them, had noted the increasingly grizzled mien of other grand master-choreographers, and wondered where the next generation could be. It wasn't surprising they hadn't noticed the new generation, because the new generation was a pretty limp lot, dancemakers in sub-Balanchine and sub-everyone else mould. So, when an American working in Europe started causing Richter-scale earth tremors, the ballet world paused and focused its gaze on him<HR></BLOCKQUOTE><BR><A HREF="http://www.independent.co.uk/story.jsp?story=102683" TARGET=_blank><B>more...</B></A><P>Stuart editted the URL<p>[This message has been edited by Stuart Sweeney (edited November 02, 2001).]

Life's like that. On the phone today, my Mum mentioned that she had seen an article about Forsythe in the Telegraph, which didn't ring a bell for me. When I ran a search, lo and behold, we missed a preview from last week. In addition another interesting one came up from three years ago:<P><B>The body artist</B><BR>William Forsythe is one of only a handful of key figures in the evolution of classical ballet: a daring, thrilling talent who has pushed the human form to new physical extremes. Ismene Brown, for The Daily Telegraph, meets a great iconoclast.<BR> <BR> <BR>DO this: stand up, bring your elbows together in front of you, and use them to outline a large doorknob on an invisible door. Now, with a mighty swipe, send the doorknob flying with your elbow, with a follow-through that sends your body spinning.<BR> <BR>Clever turns: the three-act Eidos: Telos is one of Forsythe's more cerebral works, which Ballett Frankfurt is to perform in London next week <BR>You have taken a step towards becoming a William Forsythe dancer. It would help, of course, if you could tuck your leg behind your ear and stand on pointe - perhaps even doing that while you knock the doorknob flying.<P>For what Forsythe demands of his performers in the Ballett Frankfurt takes ballet into a new physical arena, more extreme than has ever been seen before. <P><A HREF="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=005760794236107&rtmo=V1G5ZkPx&atmo=rrrrrrrq&pg=/et/01/10/27/btib27.html" TARGET=_blank><B>click for more</B></A><P>*************************<P>Here's a review by Ismene Brown in The Daily Telegraph of <A HREF="http://www.telegraph.co.uk/et?ac=005760794236107&rtmo=V1G5ZkPx&atmo=rrrrrrrq&pg=/et/99/8/18/btfest18.html" TARGET=_blank><B>'Artifact' by Dutch National Ballet</B></A>.<P>

<B>'Artifact' - a couple of words</B><P>An astonishing visual experience with humour and brilliant invention. A quick message that there is a performance Sunday evening and the good citizens of London clearly find this a shock to the system as there are plenty of seats left. I was given an indication that there will be concessionary stand-bys for Students, citizens, UB40s. I suggest you ring late afternoon (020 7836 8000) for confirmation. Stand-bys go on sale from 6.30. <P>

THE INS & OUTS OF 1984 IN ENGLAND, 2001<P>Ballett Frankfurt: Artifact (Sadler’s Wells 3 – 7 November 2001)<P>'Artifact' was the first full-length piece that William Forsythe choreographed for Ballett Frankfurt in 1984. When shown in England today, it still manages to shock thousands of British audience, who are often so-called, ‘in’, i.e. into trendy shows and cultures. Why?<P>000. Let us begin by looking at the curtain calls of this typical 19th century four-Act performance. They rebel against the norm by starting with the non-dancers’ révérence.<P>001. Rewinding the performance a step backward: Act IV is danced with some dancers facing upstage, which reverses the traditional performer-audience relationship. <P>0011. Conventions are further broken down by a non-dancer elderly knocking against the floor while traditional balletic steps are executed. <P>0012. Two powerful straight lines are formed by dancers facing one another. Yet only the stage-right line manages to dominate by discriminating against dancers of certain body height. <P>0013. Dancers on stage left simply ignore such rule. Men partner each other during this Act, dismantling the deeply-rooted balletic sexist order.<P>002. Continue to reverse the order of the performance: The logical disorder in Act IV contrasts the chaotic setting in Act III, an Act which begins with the curtain lifted during the conventional twenty-minute interval. Audiences return to their seats while the theatre lights are still on. Some worry that they have missed the 'formal' beginning of Act III, while others try hard to figure out the 'official' ending of the interval. This sense of chaos is intensified by an old man in his shirt and jeans shouting through the megaphone, mixing the order of 'inside', 'outside', 'dark', 'bright', 'always', 'never', 'far' and 'near'. Using grammatically correct sentences, he argues senselessly with a non-dancer woman dressed in historical costume. Interestingly, the hidden rule within chaos is further reinforced by individuals 'stepping in' and 'out' of several paper screens, creating a pattern that whenever a screen falls, a woman will be dancing in front of the screen immediately behind. The existence of law and order is further evidenced by the 'delayed' curtain drop after the 'end' of the Act, which echoes its 'early' uplift at the Act’s beginning.<P>003. Take one more step behind the performance’s sequence: The chaotic establishment in the third Act reverses the artificial harmony in Act II, which is performed with the structured Bach’s Chaconne in d-Moll. <P>0031. Within this neat setting, two pairs of men and women partner with the women skillfully tilt off the balletic vertical line, sharing gravity with the men. <P>0032. Behind the couples are lines of background dancers who uniformly follow the authority of a leader downstage. This system is, however, shattered by the curtain going down. Within seconds, it is lifted again, with background dancers forming entirely different lines, altering the stage pattern completely. <P>0033. This formula of changing scenes is repeated over and over again within the Act. Yet it is not without exception. Before Act II ends, the background dancers no longer follow the leader; the couples merge with the two lines of dancers and exit the stage.<P>Confusing, isn't it? You are not alone. In fact, 'Artifact', on one hand, 'steps out': it tries to create chaos OUT of structures. On the other hand, it does not completely deviate from rules; it still observes certain essential structures WITHIN the disorder. In other words, it 'steps in'. This way of deconstructing dance was devised more than fifteen years ago. Yet, when demonstrated in England today, it still manages to shock the British audience. Thanks to the stagnant (or outstandingly ‘in’) British (dance) culture.<P><BR><p>[This message has been edited by jwcw2 (edited November 07, 2001).]