About Butoh 4: Other Butoh Artists

[@zazenshin1]

Dear Bob thank you for these valuable, honest videos. I started studying Butoh in the 90s in London with Ray Baskerville. Since then it was obvious. to me that Butoh is something very delicate and subtle. It could be easily lost to the side of the controlled technique or to the side of free improvisation. I remember Ray Baskerville, my first teacher, asking us not to indulge to the music or to the image and allow something to unfold. In our times where everything is objectified could Butoh escape this fate?

[@BobDeNatale0]

Glad you are enjoying the videos. Butoh is such a radical way of looking at the world, that I don't think it is in danger of being objectified. My bigger concern, which I don't address in these videos, is whether butoh will be able to develop and grow as an art form, whole remaining true to its core.

[@jxgxjxgx]

Hello, Bob. Do you know of any butoh teachers in the Los Angeles area? I love your butoh videos, by the way. They are extremely useful and well spoken.

[@shadowbody]

Grotowski's beehive has always been an inspiring concept in terms of improvisation and long durational happening in a retreat space. I've in my own workshops enacted long jams (up to 12 hours straight). After that stage of his research (paratheatrical), he is said to have regretted it because he felt it was too amateurish. I don't understand because from the description of those beehives, it seems to have put the participant in a very heightened liminal state, something Grotowski was into as well (with the theatre of sources). It seems like not coming to terms that absurdity, amateurish, broken, can also lead to heightened states and can be very meaningful.

[@BobDeNatale0]

Funny how artists can n be blind to what is good in their work because they are looking for something else. I'm thinking of doing a series about Grotowski down the line a bit. His work is fascinating.

[@shadowbody]

@@BobDeNatale0 That would be gratefully appreciated if you can do Grotowski, yes.