Where Butoh Lives

-- By Tom Phillips

Melissa Lohman -- "Vessel and Void" 

Butoh is an art form that rose from the ruins of the atomic bombing of Japan -- an event that recalled the Big Bang at the beginning of time, and presaged the Resurrection of the Dead.   Both the beginning and the end were evoked last night at the second annual New York Butoh Institute Festival. 

This year’s festival features 14 performers – all female – from all over the world.  While Butoh is a Japanese art form, it lacks the strict formal traditions of Kabuki or Noh theatre. Instead it has a spirit, available to any culture that has survived destruction.  New York, which constantly destroys and rebuilds itself, is an ideal venue.

Melissa Lohman’s opening solo “Vessel and Void” was a New Yorker’s take on the Beginning – when a light shone in the darkness, and became flesh.  In an empty black space with a spotlight above, she lay white and prone on a what looked like a thick black duffel bag, over which she humped and crawled until she was seated on the floor and it was standing on its end like a thick black phallus.  Rising to her feet, showing mostly her back and sides, she made much of the body’s bilateral symmetry. The two columns of her back rose and fell independently like climbers on Jacob’s Ladder, to the sound of a single column of air, something like a Japanese bamboo flute. Her minimal script repeated the polarity of something and nothing – asking “what is this?” Toward the end her movements became more expansive and playful, and the score switched to what sounded like wind chimes – again columns of air but with a greater incidence of chance and play.  This was a creation story without a fall, a dance of mischief and joy. Bowing at the end, she patted her duffel like a fellow performer. Thanks, bro.

Eri Chian, "Mogari"

Eri Chian from Japan offered a classic Butoh resurrection.  In a black kimono with her face painted ghostly white and a sprig of nature in her hair, she began on her knees, head bowed to the ground. To the sound of Buddhist ceremonial chanting, slowly and haltingly she rose to her toes and came to life. When she was fully upright, facing front, her arms regained their power, pumping slowly at the sky like pistons.

Minimal and radical as it is, Butoh risks slipping into self-parody – as it did last night in an homage to the medieval multi-genius nun, Hildegard of Bingen.  In German performer Sindy Butz’s tribute, Hildegard rises from her tomb in a yellow shroud and purple polka-dot underwear to become a feminist rock star. Twitching like a zombie, she jerks to her feet as an angry anthem demands “peace and compassion.” Somehow it reminded me of the American tribal love-rock musical “Hair,” which Hildegard might not have enjoyed. But who knows. 

The New York Butoh Institute Festival 2019 runs through next weekend in the East Village.  It is curated by Institute founder Vangeline, a French dancer who will perform her own take on this far-out form of art and protest.  

Butoh lives; in New York.

-- Copyright 2019 by Tom Phillips 

Photo of Melissa Lohman by Flavio Arcangeli

Photo of Eri Chian by Wei Chi