A choreographers creative process in real time Wayne McGregor
as you might imagine I’m absolutely
passionate about dance I’m passionate
about making it about watching it’s
about encouraging others to participate
in it and I’m also really passionate
about creativity creativity for me is
something that’s absolutely critical and
I think it’s something that you can
teach I think the techni cities of
creativity could be taught and shared
and I think you can find out things
about your own personal physical
signature your own cognitive habits and
use that as a point of departure to
misbehave beautifully I was born in the
1970s and John Travolta was big in those
days grease Saturday Night Fever and he
provided a fantastic kind of male role
model for me to start dancing my parents
were very up for me going they
absolutely encouraged me to take risks
to go to try to try I had an opportunity
and access to a local dance studio and I
had an enlightened teacher who allowed
me to make up my own and invent my own
dances so what she did was let me make
up my own ballroom in lots of American
dances to teach to my peers and that was
the very first time that I found an
opportunity to feel but I was able to
express my own voice and that’s what’s
fuelled me then to become a
choreographer I feel like I’ve got
something to say and something to share
and I guess what’s interesting is that I
am now obsessed with the technology of
the body I think it’s the most
technologically literate thing that we
have and I’m absolutely obsessed with
finding a way of communicating ideas
through the body to audiences that might
move them touch them help them think
differently about things so for me
choreography is very much a process of
physical thinking it’s very much in mind
as well as in body and it’s a
collaborative process it’s something
that I have to do with other people you
know it’s a distributed cognitive
process in a way I work often with
designers and visual artists obviously
dances and other choreographers but also
more and more with economists
anthropologists neuroscientists
cognitive scientists people really who
come from very different domains of
expertise where they bring their
intelligence to bear on
different kind of creative process and
what I thought we would do today live a
bit is explore this idea of physical
thinking and we’re all experts in
physical thinking yeah you all have a
body right and we all know what that
body is like in the real world so one of
the aspects of physical thinking that we
think about a lot is this notion of
proprioception the sense of my own body
in the space in the real world so we all
understand what it feels like to know
where the ends of your fingers are when
you hold out your arms yeah you
absolutely know that when you’re going
to grab a cup or that cup moves and you
have to renovate it so we’re experts in
physical thinking already we just don’t
think about our bodies very much we only
think about them when they go wrong so
when there’s a broken arm or where you
have a heart attack then you become
really very aware of your bodies but how
is it that we can start to think about
using choreographic thinking kinesthetic
intelligence to arm the ways in which we
think about things more generally and
what I thought I’d do is I’d make a TED
premiere I’m not sure if this is gonna
be good or not I just continue I I
thought what I do I’d use three versions
of physical thinking to make something
I’d usually this is Paulo
this is Catarina they they have no idea
what we’re going to do so this is not
the type of choreography where I already
have in mind what I’m going to make
where I fixed the routine in my head and
I’m just going to teach it to them and
these so called empty vessels are just
going to learn it that’s not the
methodology at all that we work with but
what’s important about it is how it is
that they’re grasping information how
they taking information how they’re
using it and how they’re thinking with
it I’m going to start really really
simply usually downsize a stimulus or a
stimuli and I thought I’d take something
simple Ted logo we can all see it’s
quite easy to work with and I’m gonna do
something very simply where you take one
idea from a body and it happens to be my
body and translate that into somebody
else’s body so it’s a direct transfer
transformation of energy and I’m going
to imagine this you can do this too if
you like but I’m going to just take the
letter T and I’m going to imagine it in
mind and I’m going to place that outside
in the real world so I absolutely see a
letter T in front of me yeah it’s
absolutely there I can absolutely walk
around it and I see it yeah it has a
kind of a grammar I know I’m going to do
with it and I can start to
scribe it so I can describe very simply
I can describe it in my arms right so
all I did was take my hand and then I
move my hand I can describe it well in
my head yeah okay I can do also my
shoulder yeah it gives me something to
do something to work towards if I were
to take that letter T and flatten it
down on the floor here maybe just off
the floor all of a sudden I can do maybe
something with my knee yeah
so if I put the knee and the arms
together I’ve got something physical
yeah and I can start to build something
so what I’m gonna do just for one and a
half minutes or so is I’m gonna take
that concept I’m gonna make something
and the dancers behind me are going to
interpret it they’re going to snapshot
it we’re gonna take aspects of it and
it’s almost like I’m offloading memory
and they’re holding onto memory yeah and
we’ll see what we come up with so just
have a little watch about how they’re
how they’re accessing this and what
they’re doing and I’m just gonna take
this letter T the letter E and the
letter D to make something okay who goes
get myself in the zone
for some whales so all I’m doing is
exploring this space of T and flashing
through it with some action I’m not
remembering what I’m doing I’m just
working on my test and my tax this T
gonna watch it from this side so we’re
starting to build a phrase so what
they’re doing let’s see something like
that so what they’re doing is grasping
aspects of that movement and they’re
generating into a phrase you can see the
speed is extremely quick I’m not asking
them to copy exactly they’re using the
information they receive to generate the
beginnings of a phrase I can watch that
and that can tell me something about how
it is that they’re moving in a super
quick right so I’ve taken this aspect of
Ted and translated it into something
that’s physical some dancers when
they’re watching action take the overall
shape the arc of the move but the
kinetic sense of the movements and use
that for memory some work very much in
specific detail they start with small
little units and build it up okay but
something there’s one more thing
so they’re solving this problem for me
having a little they’re constructing
that phrase they have something and
they’re gonna hold on to it yeah one way
of making that’s gonna be my beginning
in this world premiere okay from now I’m
gonna do a very different thing so
basically I’m gonna make a duet I want
you to think about them as architectural
objects so what they are just pure lines
yeah I no longer people just pure lines
and I’m gonna work with them almost as
objects to think with yeah so what I’m
thinking about is taking a few physical
extensions from the body as I move and I
move them and I do that by suggesting
things to them if then if that’s okay so
here we go just grab this on can you
place that down into the floor can you
go underneath that site yeah can you
rotate boom to go back to the beginning
you go ready and bam bake hey ba boom
hey babe at once hey great
okay so you’re both getting up you’re
both getting up here we go good then so
from there from there we’re both getting
up we’re both getting up being in this
direction going underneath underneath
whoa underneath whoo yeah I’m doing jump
underneath jump power kick don’t care
where kick kick the place change your
leg kick the place change the leg yeah
okay okay almost get his head almost
gets head Wow after it maybe whoa Oh
grab a waist
well come up back into first one spin
turn oh haha
great okay little go for the beginning
of that slow let me slow down ago by the
first thing having eight
fancy fancy having eight hours with me
in a day and slightly it’s baby too much
so here we go ready and BAE BAE BAE on
hey hey hey hey hey hey hey
nice good job yeah okay okay not bad a
little bit more yeah just a little bit
more here we go from that place separate
face of Brunton separate face of fun
imagine that there’s a circle in front
of you
yeah avoid it avoid it boom kick it out
of the way kick it out of the way throw
it into the audience one throw into the
orders again we’ve got mental
architecture we’re sharing it therefore
solving a problem
they’re enacting it let me just see that
little bit ready and go bum hey hey hey
hey hey okay okay for the beginning can
we do off phrases first and then that
I’m gonna build something now organize
it the phrases here we go nice and slow
ready and go hey hey hey hey hey hey hey
the US starts pump fake hey hey hey hey
wait hey hey hey hey that one Bay and
that one bait and Daffy Duck Bank Bay ha
ha hey up yeah ok good ok so that was
mother that was a second the second way
working the first one body to body
transfer yeah with an outside mental
architecture that I work with that they
hold memory with for me the second one
which is using them as objects to think
with their architectural objects I do a
series of provocations I say if this
happens them that if this if that
happens I’ve got lots of methods like
that but it’s very very quick and this
is a third method they’re starting it
already and this is task based method
where they have the autonomy to make all
of the decisions for themselves so I’d
like assisted you we’re gonna do a
little mental dance a little in this
little one minute so what I’d love you
to do is imagine you can do this with
your eyes closed or open and if you
don’t want to do it you can watch them
it’s up to you just for a second think
about that word Ted in front of you so
it’s in mind and it’s there right in
front of your mind what I’d like you to
do is transplant that outside into the
real world so just imagine that word Ted
in the real word world I’d like you to
do with that his take an aspect of it
I’m gonna Zone in on the e and I’m gonna
scale that e so it’s absolutely massive
so I’m scaling that you so it’s
absolutely massive and then I really
give it dimensionality I’m going to
think about in 3d space so now instead
of it just being a letter that’s in
front of me it’s a space that my body
can go inside of I now decide where I’m
going to be in that space so I’m down on
this small part of the bottom rib of the
letter e and I’m thinking about it and
I’m imagining this space that’s really
high and above if I asked you to reach
out you don’t have to literally do it
but in mind reach out to the top of the
e where would you reach if you reach
with your finger where would it be if
you reached with your elbow where would
it be if I already then said about that
space that you’re in let’s infuse it
with the color red what does that do to
the body if I then said to you what
happens if that whole wall on the side
of the collapses and you have to use
your weights to put it back up what
would you be able to do with it
so this is a mental picture I’m
describing a mental vivid picture that
enables dancers to make choices for
themselves about what to make okay you
can open your eyes if you have them
close so the answers have been working
on them so just keep working on the
little second so they’ve been working on
those mental architectures in the here
I know I think we should keep them as a
surprise so he goes will premier dance
yeah here we go Ted dance okay here it
comes I’m gonna organize it quickly so
you’re gonna do the first so that we
made
yeah blah blah blah blah we go into the
duet yeah blah blah blah blah the next
solo blah blah blah blah
yeah I’m both at the same time you do
the last solutions okay okay ladies the
gentleman will premier Ted dance three
versions of physical thinking well clap
afterwards let’s use any good yeah so
let’s clap laughs yeah let’s clap up
this you go Catarina big moment you go
one BAE BAE ah hey Bay Bay bar babe um
baked Bay Bay Bay Bay de boom baye baye
baye baye baye baye baye baye baye baye
ah batten down and out and out and out
and bath Bay hey bath batten bay de dum
babe babe at bay bounce here it comes
cat batbabe at bay bay baby baton baton
batbabe at bakes pala go Bombay last you
through low Bombay that act everyone you
made Bombay bait bait uh eh uh eight ay
ay ay ay ay ay ay ay ay ay
hey Bay Bay bar well done okay good
super so-so
thank you so
three three virgins
Oh three three versions of physical
thinking yeah three versions of physical
thinking I’m hoping that today what
you’re going to do is go away make a
dance for yourself and it’s not that at
least misbehave more beautifully more
often thank you very much
we go