It is a normal sleepy Saturday morning in Seattle. Overcast. Yet, this has turned out to be a pretty monumental day at OtB. Downstairs in the Studio Space, Judson Church choreographer Deborah Hay began a two day workshop while upstairs on the Mainstage, butoh master Akira Kasai held an informal conversation for close to thirty participants. As I sat listening to Akira talk, still with visions of Deborah’s performance last week in Portland in my head, I couldn’t help thinking about the similarities between these two artists.

Clearly, both artists are regarded as legends, having helped influence significant change in their respective corners of the world and for all of contemporary performance in general. That said, their particular styles of dance are particularly challenging for audiences, seemingly emanating from deep internal territory and manifesting outwards through the entire body in unexpected and even quirky ways. At times it feels as though both artists are performing dance at its purest, most unadorned form; at other times it doesn’t feel like they are dancing at all. This combination can make viewers anxious as it confounds expectations and plays with assumptions about the very nature of performance. Another confusing factor seems to be their mutual relationship to improvisation as a source for making dance. It is easy, I think, to confuse both of their dancing as improvisation when in fact it is much more specific and considered. And while both artists seem to freely incorporate improvisation into their performances, they then rely on repetition in rehearsal and choreography during performances to give their art structure. One only has to spend a little bit of time with each to glean the density of information that informs both of their approaches.

It is interesting that both artists have arrived at the solo as their chosen form of investigation. At this mature stage in both of their careers, it feels as though they are painting waterlillies and channeling expression from deep within the cosmos. This makes it particularly heartwarming to witness the way they freely dispense information to younger artists. We talk a lot here at OtB about newness and innovation, and yet, it isn’t lost on me the role experienced artists continue to play in shaping how the next generation of artists thinks of their work. I often hear while expounding the virtues of some new artistic talent something along the lines of "oh, people were doing that 30 years ago." Often, it is assumed that experimentation that occurred in the past, is therefore, completed or obsolete, when in fact, current generations may need to continue certain paths of inquiry and artmaking such as Akira’s take on butoh and Deborah’s unique memory/concept mode of choreography. I wish the kind of transference of information that has taken place here today at OtB could happen more.

Last night, I sat with a huge crowd to watch Seattle's 33 Fainting Spells present the latest incarnation of OUR LITTLE SUNBEAM at Portland's Winningstad Theater as part of the TBA Festival. I was amazed to see how much the piece has progressed since its premiere at OtB this past May. Dana, Gaelen and guest artist Linas Phillips have totally pushed their examination of Chekhov and the US Space Program into a fully wrought meditation on the act of processing human lives through live theater. As I've had the opportunity to watch this work from the outset, I've been fully aware of the challenges that have existed: making work on a shoestring budget; negotiating the balance between how much dance and how much theater gets incorporated into a piece of dance theater; and the introduction of Linas, a definite x-factor of an artist that appeared to profoundly affect and change the usual 33 dynamic. When the piece opened this past May, I thought it was polished and interesting, and I was pleased that OtB supported this important company on the occasion of their 10th anniversary. What I hadn't anticapted back then was that this wasn't the end of the story.

In subsequent touring to the Walker, Jacob's Pillow and the Philadelphia Live Arts Festival, The Spells + Linas delved into the difficult territory of really making art--the kind of stage where an artists steps away from the painting, smokes a cigarette and asks really hard questions. This is what good artists do. And really, really talented artists then summon the ability within themselves to make the kind of adjustments, additions, edits, reassociations, etc. that leads to profound art. This is what 33 has accomplished. SUNBEAM is now a fascinating piece of theater about making theater. The Spells have become the astronauts they riff on looking back at earth with ham spread in hand, simultaneously commenting on life below AND the act of commenting on life below. They've now pushed the energy and characterizations in the piece to the level where even I as someone who has probably seen between 8-10 workshops or performances of the work, felt nervous and caught off-guard. Linas's development and growth over the past 12 months has been dramatic. He now fully owns all aspects of the work. He has finally managed to push his off-the-charts theatrical presence into the red zone while not overwhelming the ladies Hanson. What results is really difficult, messy and brilliant stuff. If at times SUNBEAM becomes a bit self-referential, it is only because the artists are willing to explore difficult places. I couldn't be prouder of these guys.

Judson Church ledgend and choreographer Deborah Hay rocked the group of visiting French presenters with whom I've been sharing time here in wet Portland. My French peers loved Deborah's idiosyncratic yet specific method for activating performers bodies so much that they returned to see THE MATCH for a second time. This was a revelation to me on several levels. For starters, I'm psyched to see Deborah and her work in front of live audiences given that she'll be appearing in a performative lecture on November 20th at OtB. While her work can appear improvised and quirky on the surface, it is through a very specific and deliberate process of practice and repetition that allows the performers to free themselves and fully own the act of transposing and translating Deborah's choreography. Her appearance at OtB will not only give audiences a glimpse at her philosophy and approach but it will also be an excellent opportunity for seeing the structure and depth that supports extraordinarily abstract work.

The real epiphany, though, was hearing why the Frenchies are so smitten by the Judson era of creative investigation. When traveling to Europe over the past year, I've been astounded by how dance there in general seems to be firmly lodged if not stuck in the kind of experimentation that took place decades ago. I certainly felt that this past June in France. But what I've gone on to learn is that many French artists over the last 15 years or so reached a similar point of dissatisfaction and questioning as did the Judson pioneers. Emmanuelle Huyhn, Boris Charmatz and several other young dance artists in the late 80's/early 90's while studying Laban notation began examining existing strictures of dance writing, production, documentation, and criticism. At this time, an influential group called Quotor Knust began resetting Judson era pieces by Steve Paxton and Yvonne Ranier as well as Nijinsky's "Afternoon of the faun" (do I even know what I'm talking about here?). These events apparently helped create a momentum that has continued today as the then young artists have matured into influential artists in France.

Some times I think we get stuck on the idea of the new and the hip and the edgy. As a result, we quickly dismiss anything we identify from the past as already having happened, a been there, done that sort of thing. What we don't allow for is the possibility that the research begun during the Judson era maybe was only the latest manisfestation of a kind of research that still has relevance and territory to explore. I think this is what is happening all over Europe today. Maybe it isn't for everyone but it shouldn't be so quickly dismissed.

I've had the good fortune of hanging out with a visiting delegation of French Presenters over the past 24 hours. This group is being co-sponsored by the National Dance Project and the French Embassy in New York as part of a new initiative attempting to encourage exchange between French and American choreographers and the presenters/producers who program them. I visited France this past June as part of the exchange and got to meet the same people who are now visiting Portland.

This morning, we had a meeting with Seattle's own 33 Fainting Spells to prepare the group for seeing their newest work, OUR LITTLE SUNBEAM, on Friday evening. After 33 discussed their work, the Frenchies then took turns describing their organizations and what they do, which I found more than intriguing and even inspiring. Of course their language seems to have the amazing capacity to make everything sound better but I've been particularly impressed with how embedded the idea of pursuing research and critical dialogue is in the collective fabric of their organizations. At times, I think arts administrators in America merely function as administrators and facilitators, and fail to participate in and help define the way art is created, presented and discussed in their respective organizations.

Yvane Chapuis from Les Laboratoires located in Aubervilliers in the North of Paris talked of her organization's function as a producing lab that offers artists the choice of whether or not they want to engage audiences. Presentation is not taken for granted as the ultimate end of a creation. Research and discourse are just as if not more important.

Guy Walter from Les Subsistance in Lyon which is a large arts campus on the grounds of a former 17th century convent (really fabulous!) talked at length about their desire to expose contemporary art ideas to the larger population of Lyon, not just to a smaller intelligentsia.

Serge Laurent from Centre Pompidou said that the curators at the museum use the term "contemporary creation" when discussing work so as not to become overly concerned with one particular discipline versus another.

Then there's Emmanuelle Huyhn who is the new director for the Centre national de danse contempraine in Angers, one of the main spaces in France devoted to training choreographers. And Olivier Bertrand from Theatre de la Bastille, which I think of as the On the Boards of Paris, which I clearly would have a reverence for. And Claire Verlet from the Centre National de le Danse in Paris which just reopened after a significant renovation and now features 12 state-of-the-art danse studios for creating and developing new works.

While I know these folks worry about getting butts in seats (attendance) just like everyone else, I still feel in talking with each of them that there is a subtle or even not so subtle difference in the way they priviledge art making and ideas about art making, and I think this is inspiring stuff.