associated with a change concerning the perception of death
--> bandage creates a contemporary image of death, giving a form to that which is invisible and culturally repressed
--> as a creative method, the imitation built by the 3D model becomes a modern image of death, because old representations of the dead body are beyond our contemporary experience and perception
--> The absence of the corpse — a peculiar negative — is revealed by obscuring it, giving shape to death while removing its signs from the sight of the living.
Transformation and Transition: Bandages can evoke the idea of transition and transformation, particularly in relation to death. They can be seen as a bridge between the living and the deceased, representing a liminal state or passage. Bandages can also be interpreted as a way to conceal or protect the body during the process of decay or preservation, symbolizing the transformation of the physical form.
Description of the work:
In this digital animation, a bandage gradually unfolds in an undefined space to reveal the shape of an invisible hand. The choreography of the moving roll is based on the instructions for applying a dressing on the hand, which may be associated with preparations for a boxing fight. A female voice reads out a text paraphrasing a quote by Kelly Oliver, an American philosopher and continuator of Jacques Derrida’s thought: And for better and worse, we are left holding signifiers, detached, asking what they mean and where is the body. The time of interpretation, in between time, signaling something, but what? The bandage in Still Point creates a contemporary image of death, giving form to that which is invisible and culturally repressed. As a creative method, the imitation built by the 3D model becomes a modern image of death — because old representations of the dead body are be-yond our contemporary experience and perception. The absence of the corpse — a peculiar negative — is revealed by obscuring it, giving shape to death while removing its signs from the sight of the living.
Derrida:
the bandages signify death / they are a sign that needs interpraetation /
bandages as interruption. they interrupt time
they flag an odd moment, a sort of limbo, in between life and death / like scraps, that make us ask where the body is
Mummified human bodies - dead yet preserved, eternal, yet inactive.
kara śmierci i religia są ze sobą związane, reprezentowane przez bandaże straconego i Zmartwychwstałego Chrystusa
Title:
Still point T.S. Eliot (excerpt) --> title taken from poem
Go, go, go, said the bird: human kind
Cannot bear very much reality.
At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor
fleshless; Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance
is, But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity,
Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor
towards, Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still
point, There would be no dance, and there is only the dance.
‘And for better and worse, we are left holding signifiers, detached, asking what they mean and where’s the body. The time of interpretation, in between time, before we know what it means, signaling something but what?’
—> found archival photographs → beautiful, shiny bandages
→ create 3d model based on archival photographs, add the movement - wrapping and unwrapping
→ add audio based on the a quote by Kelly Oliver on Derrida
Understanding of architecture:
embodied experience of architecture/phenomenology/everything is architecture
--> bodies, objects and gestures of which it is composed
--> bodily encounter that consists of all gestures and movements around the diseased body
--> redefined and reformulated with each new encounter, formed through human actions
* oddziaływanie architektury na ciało --> architektura oddziałuje na zmysły i uczucia/ciało reaguje na cechy architektury
*invisible architecture - touch, smell
architecture= movements + objects in the space
*embodiment
Theory :
Juhani Paalasmaa - phenomenological aspects of multisensory perception of the human body
--> architecture as a bodily encounter. Redefined and reformulated with each new encounter,formed with human activities. // architektura jako cielesne spotkanie
Maurice Merlau Ponty - phenomenology of perception => concept of "lived body"
[our perception of the space is shaped by our bodily experiiences]
Gaston Bachelard - relatiionship between human body and architectural spaces
Hans Hollein - "Alles ist Architektur" => it argues that architecture should encompass all aspects of the build environment, including objects and systems beyond traditional buildings
relationship between architecture and objects => he suggests that objects can be seen as a form of architecture
Casey, E. (1987). Remembering: A phenomenological study
Kinetic Memories: An Embodied Form of Remembering the Personal Past
Marina Trakas
"The objects that surround my body reflect the possible action that my body can exert upon it. - Henri Bergson wrote. It is the potentiality of action that distinguishes architecture from other art forms. As a consequence of this possible action, corporeal reaction is an intrinsic aspect of the experience of architecture.(...) The "elements of architecture" are not visual units or gestalts; they are encounters, juxtapositions that react with memory. "In such memory, the past is embodied in action. Instead of being encapsulated separately somewhere in the mind or brain, it is an active component of bodily movements that perform a specific action," Edward Casey wrote about the play between memory and actions.
//
„Przedmioty, które otaczają moje ciało, odbijają możliwe działanie, jakie moje ciało może na nie wywrzeć. - pisał Henri Bergson. To właśnie potencjalność akcji odróżnia architekturę od pozostałych form sztuki. W konsekwencji tego możliwego działania cielesna reakcja jest nieodłącznym aspektem doświadczenia architektury.(...) „Elementami architektury” nie są jednostki wizualne czy gestalty; są nimi spotkania, zestawienia, które reagują z pamięcią. „W takiej pamięci przeszłość jest ucieleśniona w działaniach. Zamiast być zamkniętą oddzielnie gdzieś w umyśle czy mózgu, stanowi ona aktywny składnik ruchów ciała, które wykonują konkretne działanie” - pisał Edward Casey o grze pomiędzy pamięcią i czynnościami.”
short description:
In Choreography of Care (2022), two women perform a dance composition inspired by the gestures and movements of nurses in hospitals. Tenderness, care and sacrifice are the leitmotif of the dance performance. The stage is a barren room that is only open at the top. Light penetrates from above; the light source remains offstage - an allusion to the operating theatre and to a metaphysical beyond at the same time.
Text of the song from hugarian singer Hofi Geza that the nurses were singing together in Geriatric clinic in Budapest :
Hey, hey, hey, old warrior,
Don't overstretch your bow,
Hey, hey, hey, your heart of stone will break
notes on care/embodiment
Care
--> gestures/performances of touch
--> performed with calm and smooth movements, it looks like a dance
--> enact relationships of care/how care can be enacted in gestures
“The body that supports the other body”
“Body that supports the other body is the choreographic expression of a relationship of solidarity between people” Bill T. Jones
How body movement can define spatial form ? odpowiedzią jest praca artystyczna
Hospital
a separate world, so to speak, a culture that is different from the "real world," one might even say a reversal of normal life, hidden and inaccessible to the eyes of the healthy
o hospicjum --> śmierć głównego bohatera
Przestrzeń hospicjum jest sceną przygotowaną przez członków ruchu hospicyjnego dla osób, które będa w niej odgrywać glówna rolę. Powinna być ona wyposażona w odpowiednie dekoracje i rekwizyty aby nadać temu przedstwieniu jakim jest śmierć głównego bohatera, zarówno odpowiednią rangę jak i oprawę (Paklepa, 1998, s 182)
I often work with archival materials as a starting point for projects. So while conducting research, I found very interesting instructional archival footage depicting nurses performing the activities of transferring and lifting a sick body. I also collected several archival videos on this very topic while conducting research at the University of Granada earlier.
During my residency at aqb budapest, I established a collaboration with the Geriatrics Clinic and Nursing Learning Center (part of Sammelweis Medical University in Budapest.) I had the opportunity to participate in the life of the clinic for 7 days. I conducted field research, observing and documenting the work of the nurses and physiotherapists. I focused on analyzing gestures and aspects of the human body in the space.
All the observations I made, combined with the archival material I collected, led me to make a video in collaboration with two Budapest choreographers - Tamara Zsófia Vadas and Júlia Vavra.
some explanation of the process:
The dancers mimic the movements, but the choreography is an interpretation rather than a reconstruction of the movements around the sick body in the space. The basis is a combination of archival photos and videos, observation and documentation of the nurses’ work at the clinic, and several instructional videos found online. Together with Tamara and Julia we sort of extracted 10 components from all the materials I managed to gathered. Then from that point we built a choreography. Some positions are modified and taken further into a more playful
approach. For example, there was a position in which two caregivers were helping a patient to stand. One of them was belaying the other, which from an outsider perspective looked like they were forming a circle. So we focused on that adding repetition and playfulness to the position. While watching a video we are confronted with the spectacle of touch, which is usually hidden from our view, in which the main actor - the one being touched - is absent. I wanted to concentrate fully on the movements around the sick body, on touching and caring, on how care can be enacted in gestures. When you remove the body and stay with this abstract way, which when performed with calm and smooth movements can be really beautiful it starts to be more visible and strong in a way.
the architectural design and the final effect of hospital buildings, and finally it is the relationship health and illness shares with stone, cement, glass and the area where they meet.
W następnym łóżku lezała taka pani w bardzo cięzkim stanie ją przywieźli, to mi się wtedy udzielało, postawili parawan abym nie widziała (...) ten parawan był, ... zasłaniał; pamietam jeszcze jak moja pani doktor szła i mówi : niech się pani nie denerwuje, bo ja to wszystko słyszałam. Ja tak czułam, że ona jest umierająca i ja nie widziałam, że ona później zmarła, za tym parawanem leżała ... a ja tu obok i przyszła pielęgniarka za ten parawan (...) a potem przyjechał ten kwiczący wózek i zabrali te zwłoki ... ale to było przeżycie
Tanatobjekty
ARCHITEKTURA MÓWIĄCA / SPEAKING ARCHITECTURE --> Claude Nicolas Ledoux
--> architecture novel --> parasite group
--> architecture as scenography - series of objects / possible architectures
Tanatobiekty
--> objects/materiality of the hospital
--> architektura jako bodies, objects, gestures it is composed of
--> objects --> projektowanie as a care
I'm enjoying the way we're able to tease out this overlapping layers of care. There is an invisibility to the care that underlines my design practise. Woven through a performance are strands of micro decisions, the layout of a stage, the heigh of the step. These are the manifestations of a hidden ethical architecture (...) in which the detail of out bodies and lived experiences is taken seriously ... and playfully (Bethany Wells)
