Kuzuo Ohno's World: from without & within.Kuzuo Ohno's World: from without & within By Kazuo Ohno Kazuo Ohno (or Ohno Kazuo, 大野一雄) (b. October 27, 1906) is a Japanese dancer associated with Butoh. He has become a guru and inspirational figure. It has been written of him that his very presence is an 'artistic fact'. and Yoshito Ohno; translation by John Barrett Middletown, CT: Wesleyan University Press Wesleyan University Press, founded (in present form) in 1959, is a university press that is part of Wesleyan University (Connecticut). External link
Kazuo Ohno's World, by the seminal Japanese butoh Butoh (舞踏 butō) artist Kazuo Ohno and his son Yoshito, is a moving, hybrid work. It's part biography and interpretation of the senior Ohno's career and part transcripts of workshop comments by the now 99-year-old dancer, complete with translator John Barrett's endnotes and valuable appendices. Few books on the market so eloquently argue for the value of authenticity and spontaneity in movement or how to achieve these elusive qualities, while still being of interest to scholars. Among its attractions are dozens of stunning black and white photos of the wiry wir·y adj. 1. Resembling wire in form or quality, especially in stiffness. 2. Sinewy and lean. 3. Filiform and hard. Used of a pulse. , possessed dancer who survived imprisonment Imprisonment See also Isolation. Alcatraz Island former federal maximum security penitentiary, near San Francisco; “escapeproof.” [Am. Hist.: Flexner, 218] Altmark, the German prison ship in World War II. [Br. Hist. in New Guinea's jungles during World War II. He returned from war already trained in Western modern dance to forge a brand of pure expressionism expressionism, term used to describe works of art and literature in which the representation of reality is distorted to communicate an inner vision. The expressionist transforms nature rather than imitates it. fusing Noh traditions with German Ausdruckstanz. Ohno began giving public performances in 1949, but butoh wasn't officially born until 1959. That is when Ohno joined forces with Tatsumi Hijikata in a violent, sexualized performance inspired by the writings of Yukio Mishima that scandalized Japanese society. The two men together continued to perform this new dance, ankoku butoh (dance of darkness), for nearly a decade, with Ohno championing pure expression and improvisation and Hijikata letting content follow form. From Ohno's commitment to the supra-rational, he created a dadaist style that took him into the worlds of flowers, bugs, ghosts, stone, or his beloved flamenco diva, La Argentina. His philosophy? "To dance onstage is to put your life on the line." |
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