Hypermedia Day Ten - Another Angle

So, right before we left for Paris i was reading a review of a film exhibit (which i plan on seeing after i'm back in DC) that's on display right now at the Hirshorn. The article, while it detailed a few of the films on display in particular, mostly focused on the idea that none of the abstract aspects of the exhibit could really be described in the review, only the basic facts of what happens in each film - that in itself being near pointless.


The article made an argument for the theory that all the concrete aspects of a piece of art (in this case, a film, so: the characters, plot, visuals, etc.) are only there to give the veiwer's consious mind something to attach to and consiously analyze so that their subconsious mind can drift among the abstract elements of the artwork. Now, this certianly isn't what i would present as my primary understanding of what the veiwing-of-art process is, but the more i think about it, the more i can at least connect with this theory's practical applications.


So let's use it to look at dance, yes?


It seems that if we accept this this "theory of watching" (let's call it) to be true, that then the question of "how do we present our work in the best way possible" shifts from being about the concrete specifics of the piece to being about degree of those specifics.


The question then becomes,

"How much concrete information does and audience need (want?) to best access the abstract details of the piece. What is the ratio?"

Now, i think it's important here to distinguish that (in this context) providing more information about the concrete details of the piece isn't an attempt to "explain" the piece, only provide them with more of the "superficial" details so that they (aha!) can connect with the piece's abstractions. So again, the question becomes the amount.

Is it enough for our audience to simply "see what they see?" (as seems to be prefered by many of my fellow choreographers from SLC). For even in that they will undoubtably see more than we could hope to "tell" them. Or is it more effective for our audience to be thinking about the formal elements of the piece (as i felt that i was being led to do watching a piece such as Sara Rudner's last work)? Is additional process-oriented and relational information about the work helpful (for example, from my piece/hyperemdia, that i saw the "venn diagrams" duet as both men being the same person and Rowan saw it as brothers and MCF saw it as lovers) or is it just too much information?

Regardless, i think it's an interesting way to analyze this question. To me, the most important thing to any anwser (whether you're a formalist, "see-what-they-see-ist", hypermedist, or anything in between) is the follow up question:

"if that's the best way to access the abstract, then is the way that we are making and presenting dances supportive of that? If not, what needs to change?"