Research Catalogue

DESENHO E PERFORMATIVIDADE (WORKSHOP#3)

In progress Dorsal Practices — Murky Back Thinking is a collaboration between choreographer Katrina Brown and writer-artist Emma Cocker, for exploring the notion of dorsality in relation to how we as moving bodies orientate to self, others, world. How does cultivation of a back-oriented awareness and attitude shape and inform our experience of being-in-the-world? The dorsal orientation foregrounds active letting go, releasing, even de-privileging, of predominant social habits of uprightness and frontality — the head-oriented, sight-oriented, forward-facing, future-leaning tendencies of a culture intent on grasping a sense of the world through naming and control. Rather than a mode of withdrawal, of turning one’s back, how might a backwards-leaning orientation support an open and receptive ethics of relation? How are experiences of listening, voicing, thinking, shaped differently through this tilt of awareness and attention towards the back?

"New ideas might be conceived and developed more rapidly in disciplines that are more abstract. The inductive methods of experimental innovators in painting makes their enterprise resemble the more empirical disciplines considered by psychologists, while the deductive approach of the conceptual innovators makes theirs resemble the more abstract disciplines." David W. Galenson, "The Life Cycles of Modern Artists", NBER Working Paper Series, 2003. My use of the diagram and the image aims to convey the simple message that art strives for evolution; meaning to strengthen the mind, to research capabilities, to communicate a disinterested, though not necessarily apolitical, view of social changes, to overcome banality and offer an alternative way of looking at the world.

As musicians, we work in a variety of different spaces, some of which are unfamiliar and with their own dynamics. But in order to be as productive as possible, we have internalized the notion that, particularly as performers, we must keep our personal and professional lives apart. In my personal case, after moving to the Netherlands to begin my master's program and finding myself without a place to live, I became aware of how much this circumstance affected my playing. Despite the initial negative impact of the situation, I was able to see potential for an artistic endeavor, leading me to embark on the creation of an interdisciplinary piece titled "The space we are in" – a composition for amplified viola, tape, and video – in an attempt to materialize the feelings and thoughts surrounding my personal situation. In this study, I documented each stage of the artistic development process, alongside an analysis exploring the philosophical and psychological connotations of the concept of space, and contrasting it with the idea of place. Additionally, I delved into intriguing concepts such as Kathleen Coessens' artistic web of practice and examined various artistic works where the interaction with space plays a significant role. While working on this project, I discovered a specific interaction with my environment that not only helped me adjust to my new living situation but also –and this is something that I hope to share with the readers of this research– increased my sensitivity and helped me comprehend my artistic vision.

To be a contemporary music performer today is to have a deeply fragmented practice. The performer’s role is no longer simply a matter of mastering her instrument and executing a score. Music practices are increasingly incorporating new instruments and technologies, methods of creating works, audience interaction and situations of interdependence between performer subjects. The performer finds herself unable to keep a sense of mastery over the performance. In other words, performing is increasingly precarious.

This website provides musical examples linked to my analyses of Eugène Ysaÿe's annotations on scores of César Franck's 'Sonate pour piano et violon'. It is an appendix to the article: Joanna Staruch-Smolec, 'Reinterpreting Ysaÿe’s Annotations. Musical sources relating to Franck’s Sonata in Viola Mitchell’s collection (Juilliard School Library)', Revue belge de Musicologie, 2025.