Site-Specific Choreography

05/03/23 • 48 min

You’re probably reading the title of this episode and thinking “site-specific choreography? Aren’t most screendances site-specific?” You are certainly right, listener! You must be a screendance fan!

As you know, site-specific episodes have been a recurring topic on the show. As we’ve segmented the dropped pins over the years, we’ve built an understanding of what the director may be conveying through movement within the landscape. The camera allows dance audiences to go on a journey that they may not be able explore on a live proscenium stage. The beauty of these films is that they push the boundaries of what these spaces can do. Art is experimentation and experimentation allows curiosity to run wild, and yet make all sense with it in the end.

In this episode, we’ll be picking apart the art of creating a site-specific dance film including many questions going from the very start of location scouting– Why do you want to create a film in/on/around this location? What is the significance of this space? What can you create in this space and what are your limitations? How do you want viewers to see and understand this environment? Along with all of that, we drop some useful advice that may help future makers well prepared for their next big film shoot. Press play and find out!

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Check out Studiobinder for all your planning needs!

Crash course on location scouting from the folks at Aputure!

5 week online course from 2014: Site specific dance / choreography Stephan Koplowitz / CalArts

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Got a question? Send us an email!

Please reach out anytime at [email protected]

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Check out Studiobinder for all your planning needs!

Crash course on location scouting from the folks at Aputure!

5 week online course from 2014: Site specific dance / choreography Stephan Koplowitz / CalArts

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Got a question? Send us an email!

Please reach out anytime at [email protected]

Previous Episode

A Conversation with Rogue Dancer

In this episode, we are highlighting the wonderful Jennifer Scully-Thurston, also known as Rogue Dancer. Frameform listeners may already know this friend of the podcast and fellow panelist at last year’s Screendance Symposium. Enjoy this conversation with Scully and Jen Ray including experiences producing festivals online and in person, creative approaches to curation and the pursuit of solutions instead of obstacles.

Jennifer Scully-Thurston (Scully) is a choreographer, dance filmmaker, curator, journalist, and video installation artist. She is founder and director of FilmFest by Rogue Dancer, a monthly thematic on-line event devoted to dance. She has curated and adjudicated for EnCore: Dance on Film, James River Film Festival, and Screen Dance International.
Her dance films have been featured in Core Dance presents... REEL ART (commission), ADF Movies by Movers, Golden Earth Film Award (Best Female Director 2021), Direct Monthly Online Film Festival (Best Female Director 2019), DepicT! (Special Mention), and numerous other prestigious international festivals. She has been an administrator with Grasshorse (character animation studio), HOU & ATL Core Dance (performance company), and NC Arts in Action (in-school public dance program) and is currently Manager of Studio Programs and Community Engagement at the American Dance Festival.
More about Rogue Dancer: We believe dance exists outside the walls of a proscenium stage. It can exist in the wild with mischievous playfulness. A person or organization can create work anywhere that wanders and behaves in unusual ways. The creation and presentation of Dance Film is a great representation of these ideas. We are dancers who have gone off grid to create work in our own way, with our own rules.
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Thank you to Scully for being our first ever Frameform Fan and all of the wonderful support and engagement over the years. We are thrilled to share about your dynamic body of work and we’re looking forward to having Frameform be part of ADF’s Movies by Movers this season!

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Listen to Season 3 Screendance Symposium Panel Episode

Watch and Submit to FilmFest By Rogue Dancer

Become a Rogue Dancer Patreon Supporter

American Dance Festival’s Movies By Movers

Follow on IG @roguedance @amerdancefest

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Got a question? Email us at [email protected]

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@frameformpod

Next Episode

Location Scout: Forests

If you thought we were done with location scout episodes, boy you are incorrect. We still have a few in our back pocket! We’re going into the deep deep forest to ground our roots in what nature has to offer in this episode.

Let’s be real. Dance films taking place in the woods is a hard production. Most we’ve personally seen or made are not the strongest works. To be honest, forest films have a lot of limitations. To feel totally immersed, you have to take your gear and crew far away from battery supply. Available light and weather is questionable. The dangers of poisonous plants, sharp objects, wildlife, and land preservation are a few other curveballs you may face if you plan to make a film in this environment.

But what is it about the woods that makes it so desirable to shoot in? Is it the feeling of being wild and free? Is it the mystical wonder that creates curiosity? Or is the land a symbol of something way bigger that only history can tell.

We’ll be looking at 3 very different films that highlight the forest with 3 contrasting personalities. They exhibit the forest floor beyond a backdrop, but a character in the space. You definitely need to watch as you listen, or you may miss the feeling mist and fresh air against your face.

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FILMS

Grief (2022) - France

Dir. Max Gozy, Florence Peyrard, Bastien Fiche

Choreographers : Florence Peyrard

Outside In (2011) - Sweden

Dir. Tove Skeidsvoll & Petrus Sjövik

Choreography and Dancing by Tove Skeidsvoll

The Earth Will Come (2017) - Germany

Direction, Camera and Edit by Katelyn Stiles (US Indigenous artist “tribal citizen of the Sitka Tribe of Alaska and the Central Council of Tlingit and Haida Indian Tribes of Alaska.”)

Dance by Kira Kirsch

Music composed and performed by Barnaby Tree

Music produced by Pebble Music

OTHER MENTIONS

Walking to Birth

In Capsule (Upstate New York, USA)

COLD CHAIN (FINLAND)

Bonheur

Dancinema 2020: Røtter

Dancinema 2021: OUT OF RUIN (RI, USA)

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Got a question? Send us an email!