Seanshuuraku
photo by Miranda Meyer
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A play on the Japanese word for ‘concluding performance' ('千秋楽' or senshuuraku), this new dance work situates the stage and live performance as opportunities for self-expression and transformation. Specifically, this dance proposes a means for the titular Sean to imagine and build an environment where bodily agency, presentation, and safety are all possible and probable. Can this dance be the final occasion where they use the theater and the edge of the proscenium to take refuge from the outside world? Using improvisational scores, task-based choreography, and interpretive movement, the adjoining cast of dancers will negotiate differing situations both as individual bodies and as members of a larger group. As experiments, these dance scores prescribe limitations that alter their performance: the successes and failures in each iteration are made visible to the performers and viewers alike. In lieu of protective armor when addressing the potential dangers and embodied traumas of the outside world, Seanshuuraku's ensemble devises and explores other modes of adornment and self-couture to develop blueprints to best outfit themselves for the world.
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Sean Thomas Boyt
Master of Fine Arts Thesis Performance at The University of Iowa Performed April 13-15, 2022 at Space Place Theater (Iowa City, IA) |
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Cast
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Production Team:
Stage Manager: Hallie Patterson
Costume Design: Juliana Waechter Lighting Design: Jim Albert |
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photos above by Braden Ernst
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photos below by Miranda Meyer
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This dance work was built by the people in the room, their experiences, intelligences, and fantasies. Credit must be given to former ensemble dancers/previous project members Maddison Bullman, Kaitlyn Rogers, and Brady Van Patten, as well as and Mia Nagl, Maggie O’Gorman, and Carson Simpson as deck crew. Fellow thesis candidates Katie Phelan and Darrius Gray II were integral in composing this concert and situating its works amongst each other. Administratively, this affair came into fruition primarily through contact with Briana Maxwell (production stage manager), Kristan Hellige (marketing manager), and Molly Dahlberg (academic coordinator). Sage advice, outside eyes, and generative angles came from Lauren Linder, Ian Perkins, Mariana Tejeda, my colleagues in the graduate program, the faculty of the Department of Dance, and of course friends, family, and my students who I choreograph with every day.
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STBDancing
Sean Thomas Boyt's collection of choreographic, artistic, and collaborative work.
Header photo by Braden Ernst
