Lin Hwai-min Lin Hwai-min. Choreographer Lin Hwai-min: “In many Eastern cultures, “Rice” means “Mother Lin hwai-min
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Director
Lin Hwai-min
Biography:
Lin Hwai-ming was born in 1947 in Taiwan. ABOUTfounder and art director of the Taiwanese Heaven's Gate Dance Theatre. Studied the Chinese opera movement in his native Taiwan, modern dance in New York, classical dance in Japan and Korea. He founded the troupe in 1973. The well-known choreographer of international renown often uses the techniques of traditional Asian culture, which does not prevent him from creating works of innovative forms and modern sound. Lin is noted by many international awards and awards. In 2003, he was declared a "Distinguished Citizen of Taipei". The magazine "Dance Europe" presented Lin as "The Choreographer of the 20th century", and the international magazine "Ballet International" in 2000 chose him as "Person of the Year" along with Merce Cunningham, Jiri Kilian, Pina Bausch and William Forsyth. Lin - famous writer, his novel "Cicada" (Cicada) is a genuine bestseller in Taiwan, several of his works have been translated into English language and published in the USA. Lin established a dance department in Taiwanese National University Taipei Arts in 1983 and worked as a department head there for five years. In 1996, Lin Hwai-min made his debut as an opera director. He successfully placed opera house the Austrian city of Graz, the opera Rashomon. In 2002 - " T osku" with the National Symphony Orchestra Taiwan, which has become an event in Taipei. Since 2000, Lin has been Art Director of the Novel Hall New Dance» ( Novel Hall New Dance Series) , which represents famous avant-garde groups and outstanding dancers of the world.
Movies by Lin Hwai-min:
The development of the art of dance in Taiwan reflects the difficult history of the island. In the second half of the twentieth century, a key role in the formation modern dance played in Taiwan by Ling Hwai Ming.
The year 1947, when the future choreographer was born, was not easy for both his family and Taiwan as a whole. The return of the island to Chinese rule after Japan's defeat in World War II sparked an uprising that was violently suppressed, and martial law introduced that year was maintained for four decades. By the time Lin was born, his parents had lost most of the family business, however, the family did not live in poverty. He spent his childhood in the small picturesque town of Chiayi. Being intelligent people, the parents gave their son a good education. The house had a lot of paintings, books - both Japanese and Chinese, my father was passionate about drawing, my mother - music. Lin felt the craving for art already in his teens - he was only fourteen years old when his stories and poems began to be published in newspapers and magazines. In his youth, he was interested in various literary phenomena - from the novels of Leo Tolstoy and Ernst Hemingway to the modernist movements of Taiwan. Cinema attracts his attention, especially dance films, and after serving in the army, Lin became interested in dancing. He attended seminars for dancers who studied in the USA, but at first he did not connect his future with this profession. He intended to become a journalist, and for this purpose he left for the USA in 1969 to study at the university.
Lin Hwai Min studied in Missouri, then in Iowa. But not only study occupied him at this time. At Marcia Thayer's courses, he studied modern dance, and then performed as part of an ensemble led by her. Modern dance arouses more and more interest in him, and at the end training course in Iowa, he went to New York, where he studied with, as well as with. At the same time he studied contemporary literature visited theaters and museums. To make a living, he had to earn money in restaurants, and yet three years in New York were the happiest time for Lin, but this cannot be said about his homeland: Taiwan, internationally recognized as part of China, lost sovereignty, which was major shock to its inhabitants. Lin Hwai Min - like many of his compatriots who studied abroad at that time - returned to his homeland, striving to be with his people at such a difficult time.
Having started his activity as a choreographer in his homeland, the choreographer set out to create modern choreographic productions based on national music. In 1973, he created the first modern dance theater in Taiwan, the theater was named Cloud Gate ("Cloud Gate"), in honor of the oldest Chinese dance, which has a history of five thousand years. In his first productions - for example, "The Tale of the White Snake" - the choreographer used many elements of the traditional Chinese culture: circular movements (the circle plays an important role in Chinese philosophy), a fan symbolizing love, an umbrella as a sign of separation. Early period the choreographer described his work as "very Chinese".
In 1978, Ling Hwai-Min created the epic Continuity, which tells the story of settlers who left China for Taiwan three centuries ago to build new life. The choreographic action contains elements of gymnastics, Chinese traditional dances and even karate. The works of subsequent years - "Nirvana" based on Buddhist philosophy, "Dream in the Red Chamber" based on the Chinese novel of the same name and others - are aimed at searching for national identity.
The activities of the troupe were interrupted for three years in 1988 due to financial problems. During these years, the choreographer traveled a lot. He visited Korea, Japan, Bali, India, Nepal. The impressions gained during the travels were reflected in the works of subsequent years - for example, "The Song of Wanderers" is associated with a visit to the Indian area, where, according to legend, Gautama Buddha attained enlightenment. WITH Buddhist philosophy the ballet "Moonwater" is also connected - its title echoes the saying: "Flowers in the mirror and the moon in the water are illusory." At the same time, this name is associated with Tai Chi, an ancient Chinese complex of psychophysical exercises. Within this system, the ideal human state to aspire to is described as follows: "Energy flows like water, the spirit shines like the moon." The fifty-minute ballet with its "flowing" plastique is exceptionally contemplative.
Not limited to creating performances, the choreographer is engaged in pedagogical activity, and it is not limited to vocational training. Along with the choreographic department of the National Institute of Arts, he founded more than twenty schools in different cities of Taiwan. In these schools, which are attended by children, adults, and the elderly, his followers teach according to the system he developed, which he called "Pause of Life", it is designed to help a person, through the knowledge of his body, come to harmony with both nature and other people.
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On May 21 in Moscow, within the framework of the Chekhov Festival, the premieres of two productions by Taiwanese choreographer Lin Hwai-Min - "White Water" and "Ashes" were held. Contrasting in content and performance, both productions were presented in Europe for the first time last year at the Movimentos arts festival in Germany. A year before the festival, Lin met with its organizers in Dresden to discuss the program. It was then that he remembered String Quartet No. 8 in C minor” by Dmitry Shostakovich (the composition was written in 1960 in Dresden). Thus was born "Ashes", the second name of which is "Requiem". According to Lin, the production is a kind of catharsis from the horrors of the past and current centuries: wars, genocides, repressions, ecological catastrophes. As the choreographer later learned, Shostakovich conceived his work as a requiem.
On the stage of the Moscow City Council, they first showed a 55-minute "White Water" to the music of Sati, Roussel, Saigun, Oana and Iber. Like many productions by Lin Hwai-Min, this one is about nature, and therefore about life in general. White water is a seething (of a stream, a waterfall), water foam. The dancers, respectively, in white or light gray loose robes, as is customary with Lin, synchronize on their own breath, and not on the music - as if the music is born from their movement, and not vice versa. The abundance of jumps, wrapped inside the feet and running on half-bent - all this classic "Cloud gate" is also present here. Having become the water of a river or a waterfall, which seethes on the video projection on the back of the stage, the dancers either rapidly mix up, or slow down the movement so much that it seems that time has flowed differently. Compositional rearrangements and technically rich solos immerse you in a Zen-Buddhist state of mind - a contemplative one.
The complete opposite is the 22-minute production of Ashes. It is impossible to recognize those refined creatures in snow-white robes with straight backs and bright eyes in the twisted zombies crawling onto the stage. Hair is tousled, faces are as if smeared with soot, instead of clothes - black rags, the body seems to be broken in all joints. They move their limbs, some one by one, some supporting the other, fall like dry branches, their bodies are reduced by an epileptic spasm. As burning ashes toss and turn on the ground from the wind, the dancers, as if slowly burning down, roll around the stage. Either they tremble convulsively, wringing their hands unnaturally, or they stiffen in terrible clumsy poses. Before the lights went out, they stood with their mouths open, a silent scream that still echoed in the darkness. When the lights came on again and the hall burst into applause, the dancers stood like a wall, hand in hand, with stern faces, not moving. The light went out and turned on again - they stood, the audience applauded harder and shouted "Bravo!", The curtain closed and opened - not a single muscle moved on their faces. This reinforced the sense of the seriousness of the topic and the feelings that it evokes - this is not a joke, not a theater. They never bowed.
Both performances are white and black in the yin-yang sign. "White Water" - about life, movement, light, "Ashes" - about death, suffering and cruelty of the world. Lin Hwai-Min seems to be saying - look at life, it is fleeting and beautiful, you can’t take it away, burn it, turning it into ashes.
culture
On Thursday, June 11, Voronezh journalists were lucky enough to talk to the cult Taiwanese choreographer Lin Hwai-ming at the Kommuna art center. His dance troupe became the first professional group in China. The legendary director brought to the Platonov Festival a work jointly with the Cloud Gate dance theater with the laconic title "Rice".
Lin Hwai-ming began the press conference with a story about the origins of the production:
The idea of this performance came to me when I visited the most interesting Asian village, where farmers are engaged in subsistence farming. In this place, time seems to be frozen, there is not even electricity, but there is close attention residents to nature and landscape. A multi-hectare field opened up to my eyes, on which rice grew, and the beauty of all this literally captivated me. I saw in all this a certain plasticity that I wanted to embody on stage.
Lin Hwai-ming said that he even sent a cameraman to that village specifically to film different stages rice ripening. The resulting material was used as a background video installation for the performance.
I wanted to convey in my production the cyclical nature of life, its continuity. We put an equal sign between all living things: the artists of the troupe depict growing rice bushes, but at the same time it can be perceived as a metaphor for the maturation of a person.
The director also shared his experience of interacting with martial artists who personally worked with the dancers of the Cloud Gate Theater:
When I first turned to them for help, they gave me a resolute rebuke: we do not teach dancing. But I managed to convince the masters that it is important for me to prepare artists spiritually and physically, to teach them the style of plasticity. And in the end, we achieved impressive results, and I emphasize that the integrity of the performance is largely not my merit, but a consequence of the fruitful joint work of the dancers and martial arts gurus.
Although, after premiere“Risa,” when we received a standing ovation, one sensei first came up to me, surrounded by friends, and said, “Congratulations, the audience is delighted.” However, when everyone left, he became indignant: “You did everything wrong!” But this is his professional scrupulousness - we did not have a goal to transfer martial arts on stage unchanged.
Lin Hwai Min is sure that the dance aesthetics of any country is a reflection of its culture. classical ballet, according to the choreographer, is a product of those European cultures who aspired to build high cathedrals. Therefore, there are so many vertically directed pas in it. But the Asian culture, associated, among other things, with the collection of rice in a bent position, was reflected in an unusual contemporary choreography eastern countries.
And in general, for China, Indonesia and many other states, “rice” acts as a synonym for the word “mother”. I have met singers who sing in praise of the goddess of rice, who gives offspring in the form of a crop. This motive, by the way, found a plastic reflection in our production.
Interestingly, one dance art Lin Hwai-ming's life is not limited. He is a comprehensively developed person - at the age of 14, the choreographer published a book of stories:
Being a young writer is great. Especially because you continue to receive royalties throughout your life. True, I forgot the words a long time ago, so it is unlikely that I will return to verbal creativity. Now my language is dancing.
It is believed that the principle "saw one - saw everything" applies to the performances of Khwai-Min, and such an opinion, it must be admitted, is not entirely unfounded. Cloud Gate regularly arrives in Moscow, different names are brought, but in terms of format, plastic solution, and even more so conceptually, one production is not much different from another, regardless of whether they are talking about the intricacies of calligraphic writing or the difficulties of growing rice. As a rule, the theme is stated in the title, while the actual choreography is not rich in finds, is universal and is applied to it more or less mechanically, only the costumes and video pictures on the back change. Usually, however, the performance of the Taiwanese dance theater is a one-act, for an hour or so performance, and in this case- a diptych (premiered in 2014) of two independent opuses, and this alone seemed curious.
Just as Hwai-min's "Rice" shown at Chekhovfest last year was about rice -
- "White Water", it's not hard to guess, is dedicated to water. On the back screen, video installations alternate unobtrusively and unhurriedly with images of river flows, and on the stage, corps de ballet episodes alternate with solo and duet episodes. A fifty-minute action consists of a dozen and a half short fragments to the music of piano miniatures French composers the beginning of the 20th century - mainly Satie, but also Roussel and Iber, and in addition to them a few works of obscure Asian authors in the same spirit. Girls in white sarafans, young men in wide trousers and sleeveless T-shirts, fabrics and limbs "flow", in general dances, if desired, you can see a hint of "currents" and "stones", pretty female solos and amusing male duet under Sati are completely abstract, but one way or another - and the dramaturgy inherent by all means in the most "plotless" ballet performances, Khwai-min is missing here as a fact, and this is a conscious attitude to the rejection of any development. "White Water" cannot even be called a divertissement, for this the episodes are not contrast enough. There are a little less calm and a little more expressive, but on the whole, the event is not for everyone: it does not rattle or splash in a stormy stream, but it flows quite smoothly, without clearly marked splashes and whirlpools, sometimes slowly, sometimes a little faster, without gushing and without delaying, although, perhaps, such pure contemplation is also capable of pleasing the eye, especially if out of habit.
"Ash" is built on similar movements, slow and performed on half-bent, but laconic and in its own way "software". It was set to the music of the 8th Shostakovich Quartet, and is dedicated to a certain (non-specific) mass tragedy, a humanitarian catastrophe: the consequences of a bombing or genocide committed without the involvement of aviation, or maybe a nuclear strike, the "end of the world" on a local or global scale, man-made or spontaneous, but, in any case, the picture is supposed to be unambiguously post-apocalyptic. All the participants in the performance are in "dirty" make-up, rag suits, in contrast to the "flowing" plasticity of "White Water" here in "Ashes", the movements are sharp, angular, convulsive, the light is muffled and there is a lot of smoke. But most importantly, there is no place for solos and duets, if any individualized soloists, couples stand out from the mass, clinging hands, then not for an independent dance "number", but only in order to emphasize total suffering, including and physical pain, physical abuse, not just mental anguish. This task, however, is solved by the simplest means in about thirty seconds, and a twenty-minute performance, again initially without any dramatic development, immediately turns into a semi-performance, semi-installation, whose timing is determined not by internal logic, not by plastic saturation, but exclusively by duration. piece of music, which served as material for the soundtrack. Contemplation in Ashes is by no means as blissful as in White Water, but it is clear in advance: it is useless to expect that a diamond will flash from Ashes, the artists do not open their hands on bows, as if demonstrating that we are rich at once, but pasaran .
