November of memory: Poland remembers those who ... - Krakow Post

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14 The Krakow Post A L T E R N A T I V E C O N S U M E R NOVEMBER 1-NOVEMBER 7, 2007 Butoh dance performance pairs the sublime with the macabre Cremaster tours Poland Encounters with Jewish Culture Monday, November 5th, 2007, 6:00 p.m. Religion and the Questions of Boundaries – A meeting with Prof. Tomasz WĘCŁAWSKI and Beata POKORSKA of Questions of Boundaries Research Group, University of Poznan. Fear – A meeting with Prof. Jan T. GROSS and presentation of the Polish edition of his book; organized jointly with the ZNAK Publishing House. Thursday, November 8th, 2007, 6:00 p.m. Opening of an exhibition of drawings and prints by Ryszard BILAN (France). Wednesday, November 7th, 2007, 6:00 p.m. BAYIT HADASH ARKA NOEGO Our restaurant is located in one of the oldest buildings in Kazimierz. We serve all kinds of Jewish cuisine, based mostly on local recipes. Come to enjoy delicious Jewish dishes. Live klezmer music every night at 20:00. Open daily: 09:00-02:00 ul. Szeroka 2 +48 (12) 4291528 arkaszerok2@op.pl www.arka-noego.pl Philip Palmer Staff Journalist Last Tuesday, Swieta Krowa played host to a complex and emotionally charged but ultimately beguiling performance of Butoh dance by Seattle-based expert and instructor, Joan Laage. She was joined by regular collaborator, Tomek Choloniewski, on an unconventional percussion kit, partially composed of upside-down pots and pans and Krzysztof Trzewiczek, on electronics. Laage lived in Krakow for a couple of years before returning recently to the States, and the audience contained many ex-students and acquaintances, lending the whole event a bizarre homecoming aura. Butoh is a hybrid Expressionist dance form that emerged in traumatized post-war Japan and combines elements of theater, improvisation and traditional Japanese performance art in an attempt to discover what it means to be human. Reality is often grotesquely distorted in an attempt to get to the heart of the matter and anger and pain, and the other raw primeval emotions that we share with our cousins in the animal world are unleashed and allowed to roam free or snuffed out as the performer sees fit. In order to further emphasize humanity’s increasingly tenuous relationship with nature (and by implication, cast off the twin curses of modern society, technology and progress), some performers attempt to “transform” themselves into other beings. Many performers also have an ambiguous attitude towards their sexuality while performing and this is probably why the fetal state and old age have an important symbolic significance in many performances. A very basic narrative sequence was decided before the performance. Laage started off nestled inside an alcove above the stage in fetal position, a spindly finger gesturing mysteriously, and ended up making her way through the audience to a raised platform behind the seating area, encouraging participation as she went. Everything that happened in between was freely improvised. The musicians and dancer had agreed before the performance to try not to follow each other, so sometimes the music matched the dancing, sometimes it didn’t, which led both to moments of glorious serendipity when the music perfectly seemed to mirror or add something extra to the dance and moments of alienation, where frenetic stage activity was accompanied by momentous silences or tender moments by cacophony. Further distance was created by Laage’s use of reality-distorting contortions and flickering reptilian movements. She explained to me after the performance that it is assumed that in a standing position, we are perfectly balanced, but, in fact, “stillness is an illusion,” and through using minute movements, she believes it is possible to discover life’s rhythm, our bodies and our internal state. As she transformed herself into different states of being, often portraying various emotions in the process, what had happened before was conveniently forgotten. At one point she shielded her face in terror from the lamp that hung above the stage. Later, she playfully dangled it below her face, which was plastered in the customary white Butoh face paint, giving it a ghostly aura. She removed her sailor’s cap to reveal a fluffy parrot that was carefully placed on the pipe that ringed the stage, and sat there for the rest of the performance, forlorn and unloved. As she removed her top layer of clothes, her emotions changed. With her pants, went her prudery and a sensuous interlude followed involving splayed legs and a red rose. With her jacket, went her cocksureness, to be replaced by a beseeching childlike wonder. Laage told me after the performance that she hoped I had discovered more about my own body. I am not so sure about that, but the performance certainly challenged staunchly-held assumptions in a very original way and somehow managed to draw the audience in, despite the numerous distance-creating effects. INTERNATIONAL WOMEN’S ASSOCIATION OF KRAKÓW The International Women’s Association of Krakow (IWAK) is a multicultural, social and family oriented organization providing friendship, advice and support to its members, either in Krakow area temporary or permanently. There is a wide range of interest groups which you are welcome to participate in: Book Club, Cooking Club, Kids Club, Playgroup, Bible Studies, Tennis, Aerobics Club, Dance Club, Craft Club, Charity Group. Any one is welcome to share their talents with others and start a new group/club. Throughout the year, there are many social events on either a monthly basis or specific dates for special occasions. Our monthly newsletter is published to keep you informed of IWAK activities and tips about life in Krakow. Our web site: www.iwak.pl Soren A. Gauger STAFF JOURNALIST A typical problem when faced with contemporary art: half an hour into the first (of five) installments of Matthew Barney’s “Cremaster” film series, which is “on tour” in Poland this month and played at Krakow’s Pod Baranami Cinemas Oct. 29-31, the university professor sitting next to me whispers in my ear: “Do you think they’re trying to make fools of us?” This anxiety of the modern art viewer – afraid to be delighted in case the artist is playing a joke on their lack of sophistication, afraid to boo in case lurking under all the glitzy nonsense is something brilliant that they haven’t perceived – this is a situation, I believe, that is fairly unique to the history of art, and which has reached pathological proportions of late. The average visitor to a contemporary art gallery adopts a stony face, and does his/her best to show no response whatsoever to anything on display. Matthew Barney is a 40-year-old native of San Francisco who is already considered part of the canon of American visual art. He started making video art in 1990, earned a reputation as an enfant terrible, moved on to film and performance, and to top it all off married Icelandic pop sensation Bjork. The Cremaster series is already being touted as his “masterpiece,” and was made between 1994-2002. On a more provincial note, I have never seen the Pod Baranami cinemas more clogged with fashionable young people desperate to get their hands on tickets. In our first film two blimps fly over a technicolor-blue (all colors here are highly-saturated) football field, upon which dance a team of women in odd harlequin costumes. The blimps are peopled by bored stewardesses, tables filled with grapes and with centerpieces of a statue that might be disfigured phalli or the legs of satyrs, and women in lingerie under the tables. The women under the tables eat grapes, the grapes come out of their high-heeled shoes, and then they rearrange these grapes into different patterns, which are then mimicked by the harlequin-women on the football field. This is repeated many times, for over half an hour. And that’s it. Anyone putting forth an interpretation of this film, treating the content seriously, will indeed probably end up making a fool of himself. This is not because the film is non-narrative: Roy Andersen’s Songs from the Seventh Floor and Sokolov’s Russian Ark are only two examples of non-narrative films about which there is a great deal to say. The strange feeling of emptiness one gets in watching Cremaster 1 and 2 must come from somewhere else. It partly comes, no doubt, from Barney’s palette. These films are hyper-stylized, a blend of video art, high-budget commercial, and music video aesthetics. Every hair-do, manicure, cosmetics job and piece of furniture is the subject of the most meticulous detail. As such, these films give the impression of being “designed” (some might prefer to say “sculpted”), and for the first five minutes there is a certain intoxicating effect that comes in watching them. But ultimately a non-narrative film depends a great deal on the director’s intuition, and though any judgement of this must be enormously subjective, the Cremaster films do not impress here. Cremaster 2, which is more interesting than the first, depends on a series of cloaked or literal bee metaphors, many of which are only wrapped up together by a short speech by a man playing Houdini. Barney may succeed in playing some interesting tricks with his honeycomb symbols, but the overwhelming impression is that it adds up to nothing. And many of the individual scenes (a phallus ejaculating honey, a death-metal vocalist covered in swarming bees, etc.) reveal an artist with a fairly second-rate capacity for creating a metaphor. Somewhere in Barney’s promotional materials, one no doubt finds a line like: “Barney takes all the refuse and detritus of modern civilization and spins it into gold.” America is currently filled to the brim with artists working on this project, of course, but Barney is rare in his sincerity. He really would like you to find mythology in a Goodyear advertisement, beauty in a gas-station uniform. Warhol would never have gone this far: Barney is painting Campbell’s Soup cans and wants you to find poetry, not irony. There is, of course, the possibility that I am guilty of watching these films the wrong way, and that one need turn off the critical part of your brain while watching Barney’s films and simply delight in their candy-colored over-abundance. But if this is the case, things are very badly off for America’s contemporary art, indeed.
NOVEMBER 1-NOVEMBER 7, 2007 C L A S S I F I E D S The Krakow Post BUILDING & REPAIR ANGLO-POLISH EXPERT BUILDERS Specialists in Interior Renovations. Quality, Efficiency and Reliability. In Poland and Across Europe. References Available. Please Call: +48 608-849-189 WOODEN HOMES Companies wanted who can built wooden houses in Western Europe. pas@fruitier.nl MEDICAL SERVICES Medical Service for Foreigners +48 609-201-372. Since 1990. GUITAR CATERING Are you looking for classical guitar music for your restaurant or gathering. Spanish, Argentinian and Italian classical music. guitarcatering@gmail.com EDITING SERVICES Need help editing your English-language texts? Write: media.editing@gmail.com PRIVATE LESSONS Lessons in English with native speakers – journalists. Improve your conversation skills and grammar through reading, analyzing and discussing interesting articles. Decent rates. jerrybarrows@yahoo.com Looking for a Polish-language teacher for private lessons. Lessons for advertisement in classifieds section of this newspaper. Email: jamisonmarshall@gmail.com NETWORKING A Dutch businessman is looking to meet fellow countrymen based in Krakow and the region for networking, chatting and generally being cheap together. Write: namhctud.gniylf.eht@gmail.com Looking for Russian speakers to hang out, talk, have a good time. Please write me at: jamisonmarshall@gmail.com Searching for lonely depressed people who are questioning the meaning of life. yourfavoriteunclebob@gmail.com Get your message across today! Advertise in The Krakow Post! Contact: Andrzej Kowalski, Marketing Manager BOOKS Looking for books of Betrand Russell in English. anaksymander@wp.pl I want to find any and all books printed by Soviet and pre-Soviet Russian publishing houses, or even old samizdat. I am also looking for Soviet newspapers and magazines of sorts and genres. Please send me an email with a list of what you have to my box: krichlvivpublications@yahoo.com VACANCIES Looking for an in-house web site developer. Fluent English, PhP 4 and 5, Mysql, CMS. Experienced in web design, joomla experience preferred. Send your CV to us at: jargonmedia@gmail.com INVESTORS Looking for individuals interested in investing in a growing and successful business in Poland. Please write: alec_news@mail.ru CATERING Interested in trying homemade Russian pelmeni or Armenian pierogi? Top Russian chef offers great quality for low prices. Write: russianchef@gmail.com PERSONALS An 82-year-old English businessman is looking to meet a nice Polish lady aged 18-25 for a long-term relationship. Must look good in a string. Please email: foreignerkrakow@yahoo.com Looking desperately for you. We met Sat. the 15th at Sioux restaurant. Funny Dutch guy. You had black hair, red coat. Please react to: love.at.firstsight@live.nl Overweight Englishman gives lessons in love for the frigid. $50 per lesson, excluding tips. snuffleupagut@gmail.com Lieber Jacek, please contact me, nur fuer dich. missabine96@gmail.com PIANO LESSONS Piano lessons for kids and adults. All styles. Beginning to upper-intermediate levels, taught by a professional. Good rates 50 zloty per hour. Home studio 8 min from Main Sq. art_mus@yahoo.com or (0) 605-727-912 Looking for individuals interested in investing in a growing and successful media business in Poland. Hostels Momotown Hostel ul. Miodowa 28 Tel.: (0) 12 429-6929 info@momotownhostel.com www.momotownhostel.com Hostel Hocus Pocus Krakow ul. Florianska 28 Tel.: (0) 12 421-0844 rezerwacje@hostelhocuspocus.pl www.hostelhocuspocus.pl Introductions “Polonia” Matrimonial Agency Have a lovely Polish wife. Over 500 offers in our photo gallery. Tel.: (0) 12 633-6152 ul. Krowoderska 61a/9 biuro@bm-polonia.pl www.bm-polonia.pl Heirate eine Polin. Über 500 schöne Damen auf Partnersuche. Taxis Barbakan ul. Ks. St. Truszkowskiego 52 (0) 12 683-3599 eMail: biuro@barbakan.krakow.pl www.taxi.barbakan.krakow.pl Tele-Taxi ul. Dzielskiego 2 Toll Free! (0) 800 500-500 Tel.: (0) 12 413-9696 (0) 501-449-626 9626@tele-taxi.krakow.pl Bookstores +48 (0) 798-683-160 krakowpost.com 37 Mogilska St. Tel.: (0) 12 411-7441 Cell: (0) 506-698-745 Please write: alec_news@mail.ru Night Club 37 Krakow’s top night club offers the most beautiful escorts in town. In-house and outcall. Professionalism and safety guaranteed. Open: Mon-Sat: 11:00-06:00 Sun: 20:00-06:00 Discounts on drinks with this ad. Credit cards accepted. Nicolaas Hoff, Publisher Marshall Comins, Publisher Wojciech Zaluski, Editor-In-Chief In cooperation with: Hal Foster, Editor Don Summerside, Editor Jim Patten, Editor Randy Renegar, Editor Aaron Wise, Editor Nicole R. Miller, Editor Soren A. Gauger, Journalist Danuta Filipowicz, Journalist Grazyna Zawada, Journalist Anna Biernat, Journalist Adelina Krupski, Journalist Alicja Natkaniec, Journalist Justyna Krzywicka, Journalist Krzysztof Skonieczny, Journalist Michal Wojtas, Journalist Inter Book The Oldest Bookstore in Krakow ul. Karmelicka 27 Tel.: (0) 12 632-1008 biuro@interbook.com.pl www.interbook.com.pl T O O U R R E A D E R S CALL TO ADVERTISE: Andrzej Kowalski, Marketing Manager +48 (0) 798-683-160 The Krakow Post welcomes letters to the editor. Letters for publication should be signed and bear the signatory’s address and telephone number. Letters should be sent by eMail to: editor@krakowpost.com, or by post. The Krakow Post reserves the right to edit letters. Jargon Media Spolka z Ograniczoną Odpowiedzialnoscią, KRS 0000 267205, ul. Retoryka 17 Lokal 31, 31-108 Krakow (Adres redakcji) Telefon: Mechnice 077-464- 0492, Krakow 012-429-3090, Telefax: Mechnice 077-464-0492, eMail: jargonmedia@ gmail.com, Redaktor naczelny Wojciech Zaluski, Krakow 01.11.2007 Drukarnia: Grupa wydawnicza Polska Presse, Czasopismo dostępne w cyklu tygodniowym/bezplatne, Wydawnictwo nie ponosi odpowiedzialnosci za materialy prasowe nie zamowione oraz tresć reklam i ogloszen umieszczonych odplatnie. www.krakowpost.com
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November of memory: Poland remembers those who ... - Krakow Post

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