EDITORIAL

A Note From the Editor

Dance is to me, after poetry, the most fascinating art form. The translation of choreographic ideas into artistic and athletic movement of the human body can be exhilarating and mysterious. The chance to watch a new dance – a contemporary ballet – in development provides a unique opportunity to understand something of this mystery.

The rigour, dedication, and abilities of dancers are unprecedented in comparison with any other physical endeavour, with the possible exception of the training and skills of elite athletes. But BOULDERPAVEMENT is concerned more with expression than competition. Dancers can seem to defy gravity, to float, to leap effortlessly through space, to explode with movement, or to be static as statues, and all in positions that for most of us are unattainable or even unimagined until we see them on the dance stage.

Many poets, fiction and non-fiction writers, visual and audio artists, even outdoor adventurers, take on or include matters of the body in their work. Here in BP we have settled for nine contemplations and presentations of artists exploring the body.

The central piece of this new issue of BOULDERPAVEMENT is presented in four parts, and focuses on the development of a contemporary ballet – Face to Face – by choreographer Kevin O’Day and dancers from Ballet British Columbia and the National Ballet of Canada, and a musical score by John King.

The remaining content in the magazine stretches out from there, and concerns itself, too, with movement and the body, but in other media.

The human body is our temple, our asset, our liability, our canvas, our allure, our disease-bed, our achievement or our downfall; it is the vessel for our remarkable and brief journey on a stunning planet. An enormous anthology, drawing on all of humanity’s centuries, exploring the expression of the human body’s movement and condition could be assembled. Reflections on the human physical body, the social body, the animal body, present endless possibilities.

The content herein addresses in diverse and creative ways the appearance of the body, its sensations, its sensuality and absurdity, its dilemmas and denials, its longings and fears. You are invited to explore controlled artistic movement in moments elegant and visceral and abstract.

The human body – this remarkably evolved complex of tissue, bone, water, and chemistry – is what each one of us has, at the same time in common and in astonishing difference. And it is, in the end, all we have here on earth.

We hope you enjoy this celebration and exploration of the body and its movement, through our selection of words, sounds, and images contributed by a cluster of superb creators in a wide variety of artistic forms.

Steven Ross Smith, January 2011