Rosemary Butcher’s retrospective ‘Moving in Time: Making Marks and Memories’ at the Akademie der Künste in Berlin is a unique chance to get acquainted with an impressive body of work that the British choreographer has developed over the course of her career spanning more than 30 years.Butcher’s dance aesthetics are influenced by Judson Dance Theater, active in New York in 1962-1964, and especially Steve Paxton’s ‘Contact Improvisation’ technique.In Paxton’s arrangements, the bodies of dancers follow the limitations and directions imposed on them by the physical laws of gravity, inertia and momentum. Similarly, Butcher’s composition ‘Body as Site’ (1993, film directed by David Jackson) explores the relationship between dancers’ bodies, while also focusing on the movement of the bodies in an enclosed space.She frequently collaborates with visual artists, architects and designers to create elaborate settings for her pieces. For example, for ‘Imprints’ (performed at Riverside Studios, London, 1981), Butcher enlisted the help of an artist Heinz Dieter Pietsch, who designed two screens which create a v-like gap at the centre of the stage. The dancer’s symbolic search for connection and understanding is overshadowed by the daunting emptiness at the core of their performance. For Butcher, bodies are important visual signs whose meaning is reinforced by the setting in which they appear.The exhibition presents a wealth of material, including photographs, videos of works performed by dancers, as well as sketches and interviews with Butcher. The choice and arrangement of the works give the viewer a really good impression of Butcher’s aesthetics and theory, showcasing the choreographer’s abstract but beautiful style. ‘Moving in Time: Making Marks and Memories’ runs until August 30.
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