Yearbook of the Independent Performing Arts Scene in Serbia - TkH

now!” activity, and nearly anonymous cultural practices of rallies, parades,amateur or folk dances etc. 10Now I would abstain from categorization and evaluation of these bodilymovement forms in terms of artistic, aesthetic, and even political values, toconclude with something that seems to me more central. Looking throughthis lens I would opine that dance as a cultural-artistic practice (and thisimplies contemporary dance as well), is not bodily practice of emancipationdisengaged from ideology, but a tool for shaping the individual body asthe social body. I propose this as a base for social conception of dance, aplatform from which we could and should start addressing qualitative differencesand particular purposes of this tool, as well as certain instancesand trials of resistance to the dominant ideology. This initial standpoint canalso help explain the emergence of contemporary dance in the new postcommunistand socialist European countries, transforming their ideologiesalong with the shifting of their respective economic and political structurestoward capitalism and multi-party regimes.But, what’s it like in the ‘real life’? There is fierce criticism of the contemporarydance influences that come (or, rather, are being ‘imported’) fromthe West. How many times in recent years have I heard complaints bydance practitioners from Tallinn to Skopje that the only dance practiced inthe East, supported both locally and internationally, is choreography markedlyshaped by influences of the Western contemporary dance, conceptualdance in particular. On the other hand, Eastern choreographers who workalong the current lines of contemporary European dance are used to beinglabeled by Western programmers and critics as lacking anything specificallyEastern and, accordingly, with bad publicity of being constantly late(as opposed to their Western counterparts). 11 For instance, I heard suchcomplaints at the Moving Cake festival held in Ljubljana in 2005 and BITEFShowcase: Tel Quel in Belgrade in 2006. The unbearable ambiguity of thisposition is even rendered as the main concern of Saša Asentić’s piece IndigoDance (2007).10 Metaphorically speaking, “a-professional-Western-contemporary-dancer”is an ideal image of an independent, well-educated and accomplished manager ofa private enterprise, while “an-Eastern-mass-of-(semi-)-amateur-performers” isa projection of a Workers’ Council wherein each voice claims equal importanceand value in a workforce structure that belongs to all of them (in fact, to thewhole society).11 Statement by Bojana Kunst; see her text “Performing the Other/EasternBody”, TkH, No 4, Belgrade, 2002. (Lecture, International Conference of TheBulgarian Theatre Association: Cultural Bridges, 4-5 June 2002, Varna, and FestivalTanztendenzen, June 12, 2002, Greifswald).