Vanessa Skantze
PERFORMING AT SOMEDAY
Saturday, Jan 20 › 9pm › $5
GEKIKAI: post-asiatic salon starring BILL HORIST, VANESSA SKANTZE, DOUGLAS RIDIGNS, SHERI BROWN, NOAH MICKENS, IN THE DEEP MUSEUM, and NEQUAQUAM VACUUM.
"Gekikai" is a Japanese term, meaning both "The World of the Theater" and "The Ways of the Barbarian". Thus Gekikai is the name of our post-asiatic salon: a performative cultural space at the interstices of the radical and traditional arts of Asia and the West. Butoh, odissi, raga, jazz, noise—filtered through a post-modernist and distinctly Western perspective.
This installment of Gekikai revisits a long-form improvisation that happened earlier this year in Seattle. Bill Horist, arguably the world's great virtuoso of the prepared guitar, heads up a cast of post-asiatic musicians who interact both physically and sonically with dancers from the P.A.N., Death Posture, and Societas Insomnia.
About the artist
Vanessa Skantze began performing spoken word in 1993, touring the U.S. with Lydia Lunch and Exene Cervenka. In 1997, Vanessa founded Teatro de la Psychomachia, (Theater of the SoulStruggle) whose first production was "I AM A CITY BESIEGED BY THE ARMY OF THE DEAD: An Incarnation/Invocation of the writing of Antonin Artaud", performed by Vanessa, Sal Muolo and an array of percussionists. In 1998 Vanessa was a featured performer at the 1998 MULTIKULTURNITEDEN festival in Maribor, Slovenia with her original piece "LITANIES/INCANTATIONS". She performed numerous solo works in which her writing, songs and movement intertwined. Vanessa incarnated "MEDEA" in a new adaptation of the Euripides play by New Dramatists playwright Joe Goodrich, which had its premiere in New York at Six Figures Theatre Company's Artists of Tomorrow Festival in September 2002.
Her passion for improvised movement led her to collaboration with musicians. She created a solo piece with the legendary bassist Peter Kowald in 2002. At the same time she co-founded The Death Posture with two experimental guitarists, Donald Miller (Borbetomagus) and Rob Cambre. Dancer Alex Haverfield became an integral part in 2003. They have also worked with experimental percussionist Tatsuya Nakatani and many others. The essence of The Death Posture is the communion between musicians and dancers. Live improvisational music that impacts and responds to the bodies and voices creates a sonic ocean in which the physical creations find inspiration for their birth and mutation. Vanessa was graced to study with butoh master Atsushi Takenouchi in the summer of 2003 at the ex...IT! festival in Broellin, Germany, where she danced in a group performance with him. She continued to work with Atsushi in 2004 and performed in his piece GEN at the Angel Orensanz Foundation in New York. She continued her training and perfroming with Atsushi in Paris in early 2006 with the work butoh/byo and several street performances outside the Pompidou museum.
Since relocating to Seattle in late 2004, Vanessa has created works with Alex Haverfield and many butoh dancers and musicians in the community. She has taught workshops culminating in performances at the Fremont Solstice parade and recently at Tashiro Kaplan weaving through eyes the dew of flames where she created a soundscape for the piece with her trio In the Deep Museum and danced a solo.
Performer links
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