Ouvrir la boîte and La danse de Hanako – Hanako’s Dance

December 9, 2020

In this virtual launch held on December 9, 2020, some 20 dance artists, writers and visual artists shared their experiences in two publications: La danse de Hanako – Hanako’s Dance and Ouvrir la boîte. Regards sur les boîtes chorégraphiques et la documentation en danse.

These two very different publications reveal the multiple ways we can reflect on documentation and living archives in dance.

They may be downloaded free of charge in PDF format. Hard-copy versions are available for purchase ($10 each). Shipping costs in Quebec: $7. To enquire about purchases and shipping (Quebec, Canada, international), contact: admin@fjpp.ca.

Thank you to Romy Snauwaert for her editing and proofreading, and to Emilie Allard for the graphic design.
We would also like to thank the Department of Dance at UQAM for providing logistical support throughout the publication process.

Project

Openings

November 30, 2023

For Openings. Perspectives on Choreographic Toolkits and Documentation in Dance, Lise Gagnon invited close to 20 dance practitioners (dancers, choreographers and researchers) to examine the choreographic toolkits from a meta perspective by opening them, interrogating them and unpacking them, in order to view them from…

La danse de Hanako — Hanako’s Dance

2020

Coordinated by Catherine Lavoie-Marcus and designed by Emilie Allard, this fanzine features the traces (notations, drawings and accounts) of ten writers and illustrators who responded in real time to an improvised dance by Hanako Hoshimi-Caines. It is a perfect example of documentation as a creative…

Documents

Event recording

Virtual launch – December 9th, 2020

Launch of the zine La danse de Hanako – Hanako’s Dance and Ouvrir la boîte. Regards sur les boîtes chorégraphiques et la documentation en danse. Some 20 dance artists, writers and visual artists share their experiences in these two publications.
Publication

Openings: Perspectives on Choreographic Toolkits and Documentation in Dance

For Openings, Lise Gagnon invited close to 20 dance practitioners—dancers, choreographers and researchers—to examine the Espace Perreault’s choreographic toolkits from a meta perspective by opening them, interrogating them and unpacking them, in order to view them from different angles and explore their immense potential.

Publication

La danse de Hanako  –  Hanako’s Dance

This fanzine invites you to follow the traces of a ghost-like dance. The dance by Hanako Hoshimi-Caines was performed before a select few, and was not filmed or photographed. Yet its sensory content was methodically captured in this multi-authored work.    

Archives

Ouvrir la boîte

For Ouvrir la boîte. Regards sur les boîtes chorégraphiques et la documentation en danse, Lise Gagnon invited close to 20 dance practitioners—dancers, choreographers and researchers—to examine the FJPP’s choreographic toolkits from a meta perspective by opening them, interrogating them and unpacking them, in order to view them from different angles and explore their immense potential.

The book begins with a brief description of the origin of the toolkits as imagined by Ginelle Chagnon, and the adventure of putting together this digital collection. Several of the collaborators then engage in a lively discussion fuelled by questions such as: How and why were the toolkits created? Who should document works? Where to find desire and pleasure in documentation? How to imagine an open-ended toolkit?

Ouvrir la boîte then proposes new avenues for reflection on documentation in dance: revealing what the toolkits conceal; questioning the use of video as a documentation tool; imagining other ways to document a work; using the choreographic toolkits in a dance school; displaying them in a museum and imagining their many possible offshoots; and, finally, thinking about choreographic toolkits as a creative tool.

This unique project brought together many participants: Clarisse Bardiot, Lucie Boissinot, Ginelle Chagnon, Danièle Desnoyers, Geneviève Ethier, Lise Gagnon, Lucie Grégoire, Kim Henry, Anne-Laure Jean, Brigitte Kherhervé, Catherine Lavoie-Marcus, Nasim Lootij, Alexandre Michaan, Sophie Michaud, Katya Montaignac, Josée Plamondon, Isabelle Poirier, Romy Snauwaert and Marie Tissot. Thank you all so much!

La danse de Hanako – Hanako’s Dance

This fanzine invites you to follow the traces of a ghost-like dance. The dance by Hanako Hoshimi-Caines was performed before a select few, and was not filmed or photographed. Yet its sensory content was methodically captured in this multi-authored work.

Spring 2019: Researcher Catherine Lavoie-Marcus gave the impossible yet energizing task of archiving dance in real time, using paper and pencils, to writers Nicholas Dawson, Lise Gagnon, River Halen Guri, Patrick Poulin and Nora Rosenthal; visual artists Clément de Gaulejac, Véronique Lévesque-Pelletier, Christian de Massy and Youloune; and notator Nasim Lootij. The artists followed Hanako in her dance, hurriedly capturing it in words and sketches, like trying to catch a train already in motion.

The fanzine is a collection of all the written traces that came out of this joyful, urgent exercise. It is also proof that dance is inseparable from what it does to us. Here we see how it acts on bodies, pencils, space, memories and inner experience. Dance moves us in every sense. The moment it is shared, dance shatters into a thousand pieces, a thousand subjective impressions. With these traces in hand, we invite you to divine the work, to make it reappear. Through your eyes, Hanako’s dance is continually recreated.