Hostname: page-component-89b8bd64d-z2ts4 Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2026-05-10T11:35:38.870Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

Having a Personal (Performance) Practice: Dance Artists' Everyday Work, Support, and Form

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 April 2019

Anne Schuh
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Abstract

Personal Performance Practice (PPP) refers to a regular activity—differentiated from training and production—popular among contemporary dance artists. Against the backdrop of contemporary neoliberal working conditions, this article analyzes PPP by applying the ambivalent notion of “support” in order to show how PPP makes the daily work of dance visible, encouraging a discussion on the sustaining systems of dance. Framing this argument is the notion that in the long run, practice brings about shifts in style and in the aesthetics of dancing. The article thus calls for an acknowledgment of dance artists’ everyday work.

Keywords

personal performance practicesupporteveryday workformcontexttrainingneoliberal aestheticsdance artists’ perspective

Information

Type
Articles
Information
Dance Research Journal , Volume 51 , Special Issue 1: Work With(Out) Boundaries: Precarity and Dance , April 2019 , pp. 79 - 94
Copyright
Copyright © Dance Studies Association 2019 

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

Article purchase

Temporarily unavailable

Footnotes

Special thanks to Gabriele Brandstetter and Kai van Eikels for their insightful comments and careful consideration of previous drafts. Thanks also to Nils Güttler, Daniela Hahn, Veronika Heller, Katarina Kleinschmidt, and Julia Sittmann. Funded by the Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG, German Research Foundation) - 244509707, 319305163.

References

Works cited

Agulló, Diego. 2018. “Injecting the Anomaly: Practicing in the Subway.” Theoros, February 22. Accessed March 30, 2018. https://diegoagulloworkshop.wordpress.com/2018/02/22/injecting-the-anomaly-practicing-in-the-subway/.Google Scholar
Bales, Melanie. 2008a. “Introduction: Deconstruction and Bricolage, and Other Themes of the Post-Judson Era.” In The Body Eclectic: Evolving Practices in Dance Training, edited by Bales, Melanie and Nettl-Fiol, Rebecca, 1–3. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Bales, Melanie. 2008b. “A Dancing Dialectic.” In The Body Eclectic: Evolving Practices in Dance Training, edited by Bales, Melanie and Nettl-Fiol, Rebecca, 10–21. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Bales, Melanie, and Nettl-Fiol, Rebecca. 2008. Preface to The Body Eclectic: Evolving Practices in Dance Training, edited by Bales, Melanie, and Nettl-Fiol, Rebecca, vii–xi. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Bien, Günther. 1989. “Praxis, praktisch.” In Historisches Wörterbuch der Philosophie, Vol. 7, edited by Ritter, Joachim and Gründer, Karlfried, 1277–1307. Basel, Switzerland: Schwabe & Co.Google Scholar
Boon, Marcus, and Levine, Gabriel, eds. 2018. Practice. Cambridge, MA: MIT Press.Google Scholar
Brandstetter, Gabriele, van Eikels, Kai, and Schuh, Anne eds. 2017. DE/SYNCHRONISIEREN? Leben im Plural. Hannover, Germany: Wehrhahn Verlag.Google Scholar
Bröckling, Ulrich. 2015. The Entrepreneurial Self: Fabricating a New Type of Subject. Los Angeles: Sage.Google Scholar
Brown, Wendy. 2005. Edgework: Critical Essays on Knowledge and Politics. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.Google Scholar
Condorelli, Céline. 2014. “In Support: A Theoretical and Practical Investigation Into Forms of Display.” Ph.D. diss. University of London. ProQuest Dissertations Publishing.Google Scholar
Cvejić, Bojana, and Vujanović, Ana. 2012. Public Sphere by Performance. Berlin: b_books.Google Scholar
Eddy, Martha. 2002. “Somatic Practices and Dance: Global Influences.” Dance Research Journal 34 (2): 46–62.Google Scholar
Eddy, Martha. 2009. “A Brief History of Somatic Practices and Dance: Historical Development of the Field of Somatic Education and its Relationship to Dance.” Journal of Dance & Somatic Practices 1 (1): 5–27.Google Scholar
Fortin, Sylvie. 2002. “Living in Movement: Development of Somatic Practices in Different Cultures.” Journal of Dance Education 2 (4): 128–136.Google Scholar
Fortin, Sylvie. 2017. “Looking for Blind Spots in Somatics’ Evolving Pathways.” Journal of Dance & Somatic Practices 9 (2): 145–157.Google Scholar
Foster, Susan Leigh. 1997. “Dancing Bodies.” In Meaning in Motion: New Cultural Studies of Dance, edited by Desmond, Jane C., 235–257. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Foster, Susan Leigh. 2019. “Deborah Hay's Solo Performance Commissioning Project.” In Movements of Interweaving: Dance and Corporeality in Times of Travel and Migration, edited by Brandstetter, Gabriele, Egert, Gerko, and Hartung, Holger, 155–173. London: Routledge.Google Scholar
George, Doran. 2014. “A Conceit of the Natural Body: The Universal-Individual in Somatic Dance Training.” Ph.D. diss. University of California: Los Angeles.Google Scholar
Gies, Frédéric. 2008. “Dance (Praticable). September 2005–2008.” In Booklet Supplementing the Score of the Chorography Dance (Praticable) by Frédéric Gies, edited by Frédéric Gies, 25–33. Printed by author.Google Scholar
Gil, Diego. 2014. “Practicing Experience.” Critical Dialogues 3: 8–15.Google Scholar
Ginot, Isabelle. 2010. “From Schusterman's Somaesthetics to a Radical Epistemology of Somatics.” Dance Research Journal 42 (1): 12–29.Google Scholar
Hanna, Thomas. 1986. “What Is Somatics?” Somatics 5 (4): 4–9.Google Scholar
Hardt, Yvonne. 2016. “Praxis begreifen. Eine praxeologische Perspektive auf Praktiken und Episteme des Wissens und Forschens im Kontext tänzerischer Vermittlung.” In Tanzpraxis in der Forschung—Tanz als Forschungspraxis. Choreographie, Improvisation, Exploration, edited by Quinten, Susanne and Schroedter, Stephanie, 155–169. Bielefeld, Germany: Transcript Verlag.Google Scholar
Hardt, Yvonne, and Stern, Martin. 2014. “Körper und/im Tanz: Historische, ästhetische und bildungstheoretische Dimensionen.” In Der Körper des Künstlers: Ereignisse und Prozesse der Ästhetischen Bildung, edited by Lohwasser, Diana, and Zirfas, Jörg, 145–162. München, Germany: kopaed.Google Scholar
Harrell, Trajal, and Evans, Moriah, eds. 2010. “Cover Artist: Chrysa Parkinson.” Movement Research Performance Journal 37.Google Scholar
Hay, Deborah. 2001a. “Performance as Practice.” Dance Theater Journal 17 (2): 25–26.Google Scholar
Hay, Deborah. 2001b. “Performance as Practice.” Movement Research Journal 23: 8.Google Scholar
Honneth, Axel. 1992. “Soziologie. Eine Kolumne. Ästhetisierung der Lebenswelt.” Merkur 46: 522–527.Google Scholar
Inter-University Centre for Dance. n.d. “Bachelor of Arts (BA) Dance, Context, Choreography.” Accessed July 6, 2018. http://www.hzt-berlin.de/?z=2&p=8&lan=en.Google Scholar
Jackson, Shannon. 2011. Social Works: Performing Art, Supporting Publics. New York: Routledge.Google Scholar
Kleinschmidt, Katarina. 2018. Artistic Research als Wissensgefüge: Eine Praxeologie des Probens im zeitgenössischen Tanz. München, Germany: epodium Verlag.Google Scholar
Koch, Marion. 2012. “Tanz als Beruf.” Der Tagesspiegel. August 12. Accessed July 6, 2018. https://www.tagesspiegel.de/wirtschaft/tanz-als-beruf/6989200.html.Google Scholar
Lorey, Isabell. 2010. “Becoming Common: Precarization as Political Constituting.” e-flux journal 17. Accessed July 8, 2018. http://www.e-flux.com/journal/17/67385/becoming-common-precarization-as-political-constituting/.Google Scholar
Martin, Randy. 1988. Critical Moves: Dance Studies in Theory and Politics. Durham, NC: Duke University Press.Google Scholar
Matzke, Annemarie. 2012. Arbeit am Theate: Eine Diskursgeschichte der Probe. Bielefeld, Germany: Transcript Verlag.Google Scholar
Mirowski, Philip. 2013. Never Let a Serious Crisis Go to Waste: How Neoliberalism Survived the Financial Meltdown. London: Verso.Google Scholar
Monten, Joshua. 2008. “Something Old, Something New, Something Borrowed … : Eclecticism in Postmodern Dance.” In The Body Eclectic: Evolving Practices in Dance Training, edited by Bales, Melanie, and Nettl-Fiol, Rebecca, 52–67. Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press.Google Scholar
Parkinson, Chrysa. 2008. “Chrysa Parkinson.” In everybodys self interviews, edited by Ingvartsen, Mette and Chauchat, Alice, 81–90. Accessed March 30, 2018. https://archive.org/details/EverybodysSelfInterviews.Google Scholar
Parkinson, Chrysa, and Peeters, Jeroen, eds. 2014. “The Dancer as Agent Collection.” Accessed July 6, 2018. http://oralsite.be/pages/The_Dancer_As_Agent_Collection.Google Scholar
Quinlan, Meghan. 2017. “Gaga as Metatechnique: Negotiating Choreography, Improvisation, and Technique in a Neoliberal Dance Market.” Dance Research Journal 49 (2): 26–43.Google Scholar
Ramadan, Noha. 2014. “Editorial: Why Practice?” Critical Dialogues 3: 4–6.Google Scholar
Sabisch, Petra. 2017. “For a Topology of Practices: A Study on the Situation of Contemporary and Experimental Dance, Choreography and Performance Art in Europe (1990–2013).” In Independent Theatre in Contemporary Europe: Structures—Aesthetics—Cultural Policy, edited by Brauneck, Manfred and ITI Zentrum Deutschland, 43–184. Bielefeld, Germany: Transcript Verlag.Google Scholar
Ellen, Söderhult, and Vujanović, Ana. 2018. “Movement Research as a Performance Practice.” Movement Research Performance Journal 51: 150–157.Google Scholar
Spradley, James P. 1979. The Ethnographic Interview. New York: Holt, Rinehart & Winston.Google Scholar
Standing, Guy. 2014. A Precariat Charter: From Denizens to Citizens. London: Bloomsbury Academic.Google Scholar
TanzRaumBerlin. n.d. “Agenda Tanz.” Accessed July 2, 2018. http://tanzraumberlin.de/Agenda-Tanz--1825-1.html.Google Scholar
van Eikels, Kai. 2017. “Was trägt? Wiederstand und politische Bewegung.” In Widerspenstiges Design: Gestalterische Praxis und Gesellschaftliche Verantwortung, edited by Weltzien, Friedrich and Kapp, Hans-Jörg, 190–205. Berlin: Dietrich Reimer Verlag.Google Scholar
Vujanović, Ana. 2017. “Performance Practice: Between Self-Production and Transindividuality.” In Performance und Praxis: Praxeologische Erkundungen in Tanz, Theater, Sport und Alltag, edited by Klein, Gabriele and Göbel, Hanna Katharina, 295–311. Bielefeld, Germany: Transcript Verlag.Google Scholar
Warstat, Matthias. 2017. “Ästhetik der Anwendung: Thesen zur gegenwärtigen Relation von Theater und Alltag.” In Kunst und Alltag, edited by Heinicke, Julius, Kalu, Joy Kristin, and Warstat, Matthias, 26–41. Berlin: De Gruyter Verlag.Google Scholar
Zacharias, Siegmar. 2012. “WOW—WE WORK HERE: Dear women on work.” Performance Research 17 (6): 87–93.Google Scholar