Half-Sick of Shadows

The Parlour Trick: "Half Sick of Shadows" (Starring Rachel Brice) from Theremina on Vimeo.

Sorry, I have been ill, but woke up to this and had to share. :)

Another Trip Down the Rabbit Hole

To combine the physical flexibility with the mental flexibility, to experience an intimate magic, go to the Cirque du Soleil. There is nothing like it for mystery and inspiration. They create their shows from the ground up, the story, the music, the dance, the costumes, the acrobatics and trapeze, the clowns, all are put together just for the show. They have phenomenal singers and musicians. Everything is shown to you under a tent, no huge arena where you end up watching the whole thing on video anyway.
It is a complete experience, and these videos are just a small taste, nothing like being surrounded by the sound and the costumes, nothing like the trapeze artists soaring above you and the flame's dance of brightness and shadow across the crowd and in your eyes.
Still, they are amazing videos.

Here is the hula hoop act, by the amazingly flexible Elena Lev:




and her father's high bar act:


Both are from the show Alegria.


Then there is the show Quidam,a show about:
"The nameless passerby,the person living lost amidst the crowd in an all-too-anonymous society. It could be anyone, anybody. Someone coming, going, living in our anonymous society. A member of the crowd, one of the silent majority. The one who cries out, sings and dreams within us all. This is the "quidam" that Cirque du Soleil is celebrating.

A young girl fumes; she has already seen everything there is to see, and her world has lost all meaning. Her anger shatters her little world, and she finds herself in the universe of Quidam. She is joined by a joyful companion as well as another character, more mysterious, who will attempt to seduce her with the marvelous, the unsettling, and the terrifying."

Here is the opening of the show "Quidam," plus the German Wheel Act:



From their show "Corteo":




and Varekai:

In Defiance of Gravity

(artist: Jacek Yerka)



(artist: Jacek Yerka)



In response to the news of the day...
Here is a video of defying gravity, which we should all do, in every sense of the phrase, if we are to escape the laws and limits of the “board”...... i don't know how Erika Janunger did this, but she did, and that means something.


Introducing it, I'd like to quote Tom Robbins, a master of defying gravity, from an essay called “In Defiance of Gravity,” from which I borrow the title of this entry. He begins the essay contemplating a leap off a bridge and wondering how he has come to that point, and he realizes that it's from having taken too big a share of some painfully depressing fiction. He then goes on to wonder what the point of such a style of fiction is. He is not, and nor am I, suggesting that we should eschew topics that matter, difficult topics, out of a desire to always feel warm and fuzzy, he is merely addressing the way in which we decide to go about exploring those topics, and the goal we have in mind when we do so. Are we hoping to convince others that, as hip-hop stars like to “spit” nobody knows the trouble I've seen... (hm. I may have mis-stated my source, there)? Are we hoping to spread the misery around a bit? To ensure that no bright corner, no last bastion of innocence remains? Or are we trying to solve a problem?


It's my opinion that if we're trying to solve a problem, we should suggest solutions. Possibilities. Possibilities, preferably, that adhere to Einstein's statement that if at first the thing doesn't seem absolutely impossible (absurd, even), then it's not even worth considering. That is the realm of art: painting doorways onto walls. Finding secret passageways:



(Orange Grove, by Jacek Yerka)


Refusing the trap of darkness and despair:

(Illegal Production of Light, by Jacek Yerka)


In that essay, Tom Robbins calls upon an ancient ideal, that of the Joker or the Fool (see blog “Liminal Spaces”), what the Tibetans call “crazy wisdom:”


"Crazy wisdom is, of course, the opposite of conventional wisdom. It is... wisdom that flouts taboos in order to undermine their power; wisdom that evolves when one, while refusing to avert one's gaze from the sorrows and injustices of the world, insists on joy in spite of everything; wisdom that embraces risk and eschews security; wisdom that turns the tables on neurosis by lampooning it; the wisdom of those who neither seek authority nor willingly submit to it."


Lightness of heart creates light, I think. Buoyancy, I mean.



So, that video:








For more photos of Jacek Yerka's artwork, I recommend: