As Daghdha Dance Company settles into its new home in a converted Limerick church, Michael Seaver finds promise in its 'Framemakers' project.
It was a coincidence that a present of The Art of Possibility dropped through my letterbox the morning I went to Limerick for Daghdha Dance Company's Framemakers symposium. Normally not one for self-help books, I nonetheless flicked through chapters on the train, and arrived armed with one-liners picked out from the believe-it-or-not anecdotes. I needn't have bothered. What greeted me in a converted church in John's Square is enough to bolster anyone's life with promise.
Daghdha's artistic director Michael Klien practises the art of possibility every day. Together with his board, he has seamlessly relocated Daghdha into the Church of St John of the Cross and the former Limerick City Museum, which are now dance studios and office space for the company. Long cosseted in the University of Limerick, dance is now living in an urban community and he has thrown open the doors of the new home, not just so people can come in and have a nose around, but to allow them actively challenge, engage with and contribute to the company's work.
"It looks different now, doesn't it?" he asks as we begin the guided tour, recalling the official opening some months ago, when we sniffled in the dust and cold, agreeing on the potential. Now under May blue skies the gorgeous wall-to-wall wooden floor is lit by slanted sunbeams and there is a hum of energy. A group is in deep conversation with dramaturge Steve Valk on the couch, dancers are rehearsing in the middle of the floor, a few stragglers are wandering around picking up books or watching videos and two stubborn pigeons flap around determined not to be evicted.
"First and foremost it's a social space," says Valk, who is a constant presence in the building. "We want people to think about what connects us, in our personal, social and political lives. There are all sorts of challenges facing us right now. I read the other day that we have run through half of our oil and fossil fuel reserves. How are our lives going to be changed by that, and how will we adjust to those changes? Framemakers is asking: Can we change the frames in which we lead our lives?"
What are these frames? "Well, habits are frames. The ordinary ruts we fall into and continue along unchallenged." Valk thinks of Framemakers as an interface with rather than an oasis from the outside world. It's not a refuge from problems and challenges but a place where these can be discussed and re-imagined. There's even a problem-solving table where dance artist Davide Terlingo uses choreography as a tool to bring people together to solve others' problems. It was just my luck that an exam was keeping him away from his table that day, but Klien explains how it works.
"It's like a task force. You propose a problem, which Davide summarises, and others can read and suggest solutions, either to the entire problem or just one small aspect of it. The dynamics are important and we hope to create more lasting strategies to help find solutions."
This all seems far from the normal business of a dance company. Instead Klien sees choreography not as an act of putting steps together but "the creative act of setting the conditions for things to happen". This happens not only in the dance studio, but in the street.
Iris is a project of Cork 2005 where 8,500 stainless steel rings are being distributed through various social and cultural groups. A wearer, on meeting another, may "cross their path, steal a gaze, send a telepathic message, swap rings or create their own response". This social choreography "makes you aware of how you communicate with people and encourages you to break the daily frameworks of your life so there is the possibility for change." Already there is a steady stream of people into the social space.
"Some people who used to work in the church have come by, just to see how it looks now, and have stayed to talk and read," says Klien. Contributing groups are diverse, from the local Garvey Centre for special needs who have made banners that hang on pillars to the Dublin-based Basta! Youth Collective who left drawings on blackboards.
Picking through the orange-covered books - a primitive anti-theft device - Gregory Bateson's name regularly appears. An anthropologist and social scientist, his concepts of cybernetics were embraced by the 1960s counter culture. Communication is central to his philosophy and whereas previous sciences dealt with matter and energy, the new science of cybernetics focuses on form and pattern. This finds resonance in Klien's choreographic credo where steps and sweat are substituted with systems that allow movements to evolve. "I mean, just making steps . . . who'd want to do that?" asks Valk.
With the imminent ecological crisis and collapse in social values, certainties in our lives are changing. Writer Jeffery Gormly is re-imagining the 10 commandments and, in a corner of the church, asks whether we can still follow the rules Moses passed on from God. "I'm asking simple questions. What are the new social rules? Are the 10 commandments still relevant? Should there be 10, or should there be more? With globalisation and increased knowledge of other cultures, is it possible to have common values?"
The term "choreography" has entered the political lexicon, particularly in Northern Ireland. On the video interview table, three monitors play interviews of talkers, thinkers and politicians. Donning earphones, I listen to Simon Coveney MEP talking to Klien about his impressions of choreography and systems. For him, choreography is planning a pattern of events that persuade the public. When asked whether people can choreograph politicians, he is uncomfortable and turns to the safety of describing EU structures.
I'm put on the spot later in the day, when Gormly interviews me in the recording booth, like a small confessional box. At this stage I have watched dance videos, played the baby grand piano, and climbed to the "nest". Here you can lie on beanbags and watch documentaries on Bateson, Joseph Beuys, architect Friedrich Kiesler and composer John Cage projected on to a screen suspended from the rafters. Things will get busier during an intensive week, beginning tomorrow, when organised activities will feature keynote lectures by thinkers and artists.
During this time daytime access is ticketed and these talks - along with the video interviews, problems, new commandments and other contributions - will be included in the Framework Book of Recommendations.
On the train home The Art of Possibility (by Rosamund Stone Zander and Benjamin Zander) opens at a chapter entitled Creating Frameworks for Possibility, which says: "We have the capacity to override the hidden assumptions of peril that give us the world we see. We can open a window on a world where all is sound, our creative powers are formidable, and unseen threads connect us all."
A converted church in Limerick is already giving people a head start.
