Pantsula + The Photographs of Chris Saunders

Pantsula is a fusion of traditional and modern dance, hip-hop, jazz, everyday's gestures, acrobatics, lifestyle, fashion, and storytelling. Its name is a Zulu word meaning waddling like a duck, a reference to thw way fashionistas used to walk and pose in the 1970s. The roots of Pantsula can be traced back to Johannesburg, the suburb of Sophiatown, of the 1940s (via and via).

::: Watch Alexander Tiernan's "Yellow Jumpsuits" on YouTube: WATCH

"Pantsula is a fundamental part of Johannesburg culture, Johannesburg is the city I grew up in. It’s a very divided city stemming from the history of Apartheid, a city where many important cultures and mechanisms of recording and telling history were formed, one of them being Pantsula. 

I felt that by documenting Pantsula I was documenting a form of storytelling that was the closest to the true history of the city, a culture that developed in the townships around Johannesburg where many black people were forced to live.

(...) Pantsula is an older culture with a strong heritage dating back to Jazz and Swing, it lived through Apartheid and came out as a very developed rich culture.

(...) I think as a white South African it was important for me to learn and document South African culture, growing up in separated areas as children we often didn’t have exposure to Johannesburg’s vibrant African culture, but when Apartheid ended and I grew up I began documenting what I felt were Johannesburg’s most prominent and somewhat relatively undocumented modern cultures and subcultures."

Chris Saunders

"Coming from a white background in South Africa during the transition, we weren't massively exposed to a lot of black culture. I had been exposed to Kwaito music, however, which had Pantsula dance in some of its videos. You'd see bits of pantsula, and be like, “Cool. That's interesting. But what is this culture?” There were songs that were coming out that were linked, but that was it. 

I guess it was like growing up in Nebraska and watching hip-hop videos from the ‘80s. That's how vast the separation was because of apartheid. It took years of people having conversations and being interested in assimilating into general culture to be exposed to each other’s cultures. But now people who don't know about pantsula, which is massive popular culture, don’t really have an excuse. There are thousands of people who are a part of it. That's why I never wanted to call it a subculture, because it was important to be seen as modern city culture. Almost everyone who grew up in a Johannesburg township, which is the large majority, knows what pantsula is. You can't really call it a little subculture. It's popular culture.

(...) There was also this idea of the townships, with all these people forced into environments by apartheid. You see all those things crashing together and this incredible culture coming out of it. For me, this is the closest you can get firsthand to the story, because they were telling these stories in the townships during apartheid about what was happening. It wasn't a writer going in and interviewing a guy, and reinterpreting the story. They were involved and this was their lives.

(...) It's a very masculine culture. There were always women involved, but on a specific side of the culture. They would do their own dance, and men would do their own dance. Now it's joined, starting less than ten years ago. I've seen the number of women in some crews rise since I met them. Part of it may be because of the growing popularity of the culture. There were a lot of guys who had a very traditional mindset that women could never dance like a man. There are a lot of girls that are as powerful as the male dancers."

Chris Saunders

photogrpahs by Chris Saunders via and via and via and via and via

Sleep Sound... Deaf Dancers Moving to the Silence

“I was on a train listening to music, getting deep into it, and this girl started staring at me, After a while I took my headphones off and she came up to me, started signing and then wrote me a note to say that she was deaf but could almost feel the music by my movement.

The relationship between silence and music is a big part of what I am trying to express with my work. The first kid in the video, Archie, was bliss - all of them were amazing. I hope this is a project I can develop further.”

Sofia Mattioli

::: Sleep Sound on YouTube: WATCH

Inspired by this "chance encounter, Mattioli was asked to create a video for the member of The xx and Grammy-winning producer of Alicia Keys, Gil Scott-Heron and Drake. During the course of one day, she danced with 13 members of the Manchester Deaf Centre with ages ranging from five to 27 years old, who responded to the movement of the artist and the vibrations in the air given off by the song." (Nowness)

- - - - - - 

image via

Interprète. Jennifer Jackson. Inappropriate Behaviour.

"8 mature dancers from UK and Australia respond to a set of movements choreographed by myself as a student at Laban in 1987. These dancers are part of the primary research for the PhD thesis: Ageism and the Mature Dancer. They also form part of the creative practice for the PhD: 'Inappropriate Behaviour' - 8 short films of their responses to a set of movements where the dancers can choose to interpret, ignore, embellish, fragment - the choice is totally individual." Vimeo

Interprète - Jennifer Jackson - Inappropriate Behaviour from sonia york-pryce on Vimeo.

Ageing Dancers and the Shift from the Outer to the Inner Body

Youth being an essential condition for a dance career is a notion that is still widely unchallenged in cultures obsessed with youth. Once in their late thirties, dancers are expected to retire. Only recently did "mature" dancers become more visible on stages "emphasising the boundless waste of artistic talent and embodied knowledge".

Choreographers responded by developing works for mature dancers. The Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch, for instance, reinterpreted "Kontakthof" - originally created in 1978 - in 2010 using dancers in their sixties. The aim was to confront the audience "to face up to its ageist society". Several works were developed by different choreographers in the 1990s celebrating the dancers' maturity, showing effort, emotion, and vulnerability instead of dazzling technique. Involving them was seen as an artistic need and the question arose whether "the older dancer has a stronger message to voice as opposed to the youthful one". Seeing professional dancers still working in their fifties was - and still is - rare.

Years of knowledge and wisdom stored within these older bodies go to waste and audiences lose transformative experiences as we, as a society, revel in the virtuosity of youth and fail to see physical feats as merely one aspect of an artistic investigation. Jillian Harris

Dancers notice a shift from the emphasis on physicality to the thought process of and about the movement, a shift from the outer to the inner body. The dancers' passion, however, remains unchanged. 

The transformation moves from quantity to quality of movement with perceptions of agility over ability and maturity over youth. There is an inner subjecivity and honouring of experience that can only be perceived or embodied by a mature dancer. (York-Pryce, 2014)

- - - - - -
- York-Pryce, S. (2014). Ageism and the Mature Dancer. Conference: time space & the body 3 inter-disciplinary /probing-the-boundaries/making-sense-of/time-space-and-the-bodyAt: Mansfield College Oxford University UK, link
- photographs of Pina Bausch via and via

Define Gender: Unboxing

“Gender isn't as black and white as I grew up believing. While some people are fluid and others decisive in their identification, both are of equal value. The social labels of the male and the female feel irrelevant and restrictive today. I wanted to express this through dance ...

... because, energetically, it can call upon the masculine and feminine but also exist outside those stereotypes. With the box structure of the set—and the dancer's liberation from it—I wanted to show that we do not have to exist within the binary limitations society inflicts on us. This film presents a space where gender can be more fluid than fixed definitions allow.”
Kate Cox

image via

Do Butterflies Remember Being Caterpillars?

Luca “Lazylegz” Patuelli is the breakdancing star at the heart of this film. Born with a neuromuscular disorder, he has spent decades finding new and innovative ways to participate in dance. Usually incorporating scrutches into his routines, Patuelli invents adapts breakdancing moves that harness his upper body strength.

Caraz is a rising director based in Montreal. With a background in photography, he explores striking, powerful characters set in diverse worlds. Her ability to create highly crafted aesthetics with an emotional approach gives her films not only a sense of style but also personality.

Born in Italy, Alessandro Giaquinto is this movie’s choreographer and a dancer for The Stuttgart Ballet. (literally via).

- - - - - 
image via

Artificial Things

"Filmed on location in a derelict suburban shopping mall and featuring an ensemble of disabled and non-disabled dancers, the film explores human interdependence, strength, and vulnerability. The film is a re-imagining of the stage work of the same name and dancers Amy Butler, Laura Jones, Chris Pavia, David Willdridge and Dave Toole, who devised the original piece, all appear in the film. (...)



ARTIFICIAL THINGS was the winner of the prestigious dancescreenaward in the category of SCREEN CHOREOGRAPHY OVER 15 MINUTES. In selecting the film as the winner, the jury said ‘This film’s cinematic vision speaks to the depth of human experience through the metaphor of a supermarket. The jury responded to the strength of the ensemble and a non-hierarchical vision of corporeal expression.’" (via)

::: Artificial Things, the film: WATCH



photograph via

World Aids Day, Tilda Swinton, Love, and Dance

"I wanted it to be something that is very pure; very human. We’re talking about people who have to take medicines everyday and have to live with this everyday, and I think for me the film was very poetic, communicating the support that ICCARRE provides. The song is about love. I think what ICCARRE is doing is about love too. The song gives the film another emotional dimension with the narration that I’m doing with the dance.”
Blanca Li, choreographer



In 2003, the ICCARRE (Intermittents en Cycles Courts les Anti Rétriviraus Restent Efficaces) programme was founded to replace the presently recommended seven anti-viral pills a week by two to three aiming to improve patients' quality of life (via).

ICCARRE - 4min30 SANS ST from St Louis on Vimeo.

"It’s something that we can all be truly grateful for that a diagnosis of HIV is no longer the same terrifying threat it once felt for so many of us in the Eighties and Nineties. It’s something that younger generations may not be aware of, the extent of that threat and its realities. For the sake of perspective, let’s just say that I, myself, remember in 1994 attending, with many others, the funerals of 43 friends. My grandmother who was born in 1900 and lost her brothers in France in 1915 and drove an ambulance in the Blitz was sincerely empathetic. She called it my generation’s war. Happily, things have progressed. Many of us now live full and fulfilled lives having been diagnosed with the virus for decades. This fact is wonderful to remind ourselves of: so many friends have left us too early, others have lived for too long with the debilitating effects of treatment that has impaired their ability to fully engage with their lives. What ICCARRE offers is a chance to work with HIV in harmonious collaboration, naturally and with an attitude self possession and self determination."
Tilda Swinton

- - - - - -
photograph of Tilda Swinton via

"That was when I realized that through dance I could communicate, and that saved my life."

One day, my mother took me to see Oakland Ballet’s “Nutcracker.” Being Deaf, when I would watch TV or go to the movies, I couldn’t connect with what I was seeing because it was not accessible for me — usually lacking captions or ASL interpreters. I would miss all the jokes. When I watched the Oakland Ballet, it was wonderful. No one was talking on stage; instead, everyone was dancing as a way to communicate. It showed me that I can use art and dance to communicate with the world.



That was the day I knew I wanted to be a ballet dancer. My mom couldn’t afford to take me to dance lessons, so I had to wait until high school to dance. It was a long wait. I was a person that no one understood; therefore, I became a person who felt I had no place in the world. It was a depressing feeling of being an outcast and left out of everything.

My high school dance teacher Dawn James taught modern and jazz, and she believes the spirit of dance lives in everyone … including me. Whenever she danced, it was powerful — a Black woman was giving me permission to find power in myself. She didn’t treat me differently, even though I was the only Deaf student in her class.

One day, she gave us a class assignment to collaborate in groups and come up with a dance performance to Whitney Houston’s song “I Will Always Love You.” Students were supposed to work together, but no one wanted to work with me. So, Ms. James told me to make up my own dance and perform a solo. I couldn’t really hear the words, but I read the lyrics on the back of cassette tape then clicked play and initially rocked side to side expressing the cold and loneliness I felt. During the powerful instrumental break, however, I was suddenly all over the room, my body channeled the lightning, fire, wind and ocean I sensed in the music. When the music ended, I faded off my dance. My classmates were blown away. They told me, “I really felt you were cold and alone.” That was when I realized that through dance I could communicate, and that saved my life.

I could remember that feeling I had when I watched the Oakland Ballet. Dance has the power to communicate, and I felt I could channel that power to communicate with others around me and they would understand me. I no longer wanted to die. (...)



As a dancer, people will say to me, “Oh, you can feel the vibration, that’s it, you’ll be fine.” No. If I jump, I can’t feel the vibration. If I’m running around really fast, I can’t feel the vibration. I have to slow down and stay in one place for a while to feel the vibration. So what does that mean? I’m listening. I’m using every intelligence of my being to do what I have to do to make it work.

For me, this often means creatively finding visual cues to stay on beat. So sometimes, I’d try to see what was happening with the light. Maybe the light would feel the vibration, and I could see what the rhythm is. Or I look at the musicians, and they’re bopping their heads or tapping their feet. I say, “Oh OK, that’s what the rhythm is.”

My body started to develop Deaf instincts, it’s like mother instinct or animal instinct — or like a Spiderman sense. Some people say, “How do you know when the music starts? Or the music changes?” Well, it’s my Spiderman sense. We love feeling the vibration. We don’t just like to feel loud shaky beats, but also clarity in the music through the vibrations. (...)

My work, deeply rooted in social change, will uplift marginalized communities, expose hidden truths through arts while breaking down barriers of judgments from those with white and/or hearing privileges. Marginalized Deaf communities include those who are Deaf youth, Black Deaf, POC Deaf, DeafBlind, DeafDisabled, LGBTQIA, and other intersecting identities.

Antoine Hunter

- - - - - -
photographs via and via

The First Day

"I am Elizabeth Eckford. I am part of the group that became known as the Little Rock Nine. Prior to the [de]segregation of Central, there had been one high school for whites, Central High School; one high school for blacks, Dunbar. I expected that there may be something more available to me at Central that was not available at Dunbar; that there might be more courses I could pursue; that there were more options available. I was not prepared for what actually happened."

"The First Day, which was performed by Kendie Jones, is a dance interpretation of Eckford’s walk that day. Its monochrome aesthetic is an evocative nod towards the black-and-white images of Eckford's public ordeal, which was captured by press photographers and republished in papers internationally." (via)

THE FIRST DAY from barnaby roper on Vimeo.

"I was more concerned about what I would wear, whether we could finish my dress in time...what I was wearing was that okay, would it look good. The night before when the governor went on television and announced that he had called out the Arkansas National Guard, I thought that he had done this to insure the protection of all the students. We did not have a telephone, so inadvertently we were not contacted to let us know that Daisy Bates of NAACP had arranged for some ministers to accompany the students in a group. And so, it was I that arrived alone.

On the morning of September 4th, my mother was doing what she usually did. My mother was making sure everybody’s hair looked right and everybody had their lunch money and their notebooks and things. But she did finally get quiet and we had family prayer. I remember my father walking back and forth. My father worked at night and normally he would have been asleep at that time, but he was awake and he was walking back and forth chomping on cigar that wasn’t lit.

I expected that I would go to school as before on a city bus. So, I walked a few blocks to the bus stop, got on the bus, and rode to within two blocks of the school. I got off the bus and I noticed along the street that there were many more cars than usual. And I remember hearing the murmur of a crowd. But, when I got to the corner where the school was, I was reassured seeing these soldiers circling the school grounds. And I saw students going to school. I saw the guards break ranks as students approached the sidewalks so that they could pass through to get to school. And I approached the guard at the corner as I had seen some other students do and they closed ranks. So, I thought; 'Maybe I am not supposed to enter at this point.' So, I walked further down the line of guards to where there was another sidewalk and I attempted to pass through there. But when I stepped up, they crossed rifles. And again I said to myself; 'So maybe I’m supposed to go down to where the main entrance is.' So, I walked toward the center of the street and when I got to about the middle and I approached the guard he directed me across the street into the crowd. It was only then that I realized that they were barring me, that I wouldn’t go to school.

As I stepped out into the street, the people who had been across the street started surging forward behind me. So, I headed in the opposite direction to where there was another bus stop. Safety to me meant getting to that bus stop. It seemed like I sat there for a long time before the bus came. In the meantime, people were screaming behind me what I would have described as a crowd before, to my ears sounded like a mob."

Elizabeth Eckford, 1997

- - - -

Related postings

::: Narrative images: World Press Photo of the Year 1957: LINK
::: Narrative images: The Lost Year: LINK
::: Narrative images: Charles Thompson goes to school: LINK
::: Ruby & The New Orleans School Crisis: LINK

- - - -

gif via

Captain of Dance

In January 2019, Andrew Self - a "Captain of Dance" - competed on BBC's show "The Greatest Dancer", a competition "open to children from 7 years and above, with no upper age limit" (via). Andrew fell in love with dance when he was 11 (via) and taught himself to dance (via). Having Down Syndrome does not stop him from doing anything.



::: The "No, I don't cry, you cry"-audition: WATCH

- - - - - -
photograph of Andrew Self via

Dance! Skin Tone and the Balanchine Body

Black dancers are often labelled and typecast "in pieces that require extreme athleticism as opposed to classical lines". As they are viewed as muscular and athletic, they do not fit in to the Balanchine model that was used for ballet dancers: small head, long legs, very slender body (Keenan, 2017). George Balanchine (1904-1983) liked to see bones and ribs. His obsession with slender bodies, in fact, is blamed for eating disorders of dancers today (via).


/>

"Dictating such rigid roles for centuries has made it difficult for audiences, choreographers, and dancers to accept change." A homogeneous corps of ballet is still preferred which again promotes Eurocentric beauty ideals. The American Ballet Theatre, for instance, had its first black female principal after 77 years (Keenan, 2017).

George Balanchine's presence was so dominant in NYCB that the dancers, the scenic presentation, the musical investiture, all seem to operate with the same value system, even in ballets not choreographed by Balanchine.
Siegel (1983)

- Keenan, S. M. (2017). A Choreographic Exploration of Race and Gender Representation in Film and Dance. Scripps Senior Theses, online
- Siegel, M. B. (1983). George Balanchine 1904-1983. The Hudson Review, 36(3), 519+521-526.
- images (Sweet Charity, 1969, based on Federico Fellini's screenplay) via and via and via

Harlem Hopscotch

"She loved everything, from pop to country and, of course, hip-hop. With her dedication to social activism and how she illuminated the struggles and injustices of the urban experience through prose, there's a direct correlation to hip-hop today." "She was really excited about her street-wise commentary being presented in this way." 
Colin Johnson, Maya Angelou's grandson



One foot down, then hop! It's hot.
Good things for the ones that's got.
Another jump, now to the left.
Everybody for hisself.

In the air, now both feet down.
Since you black, don't stick around.
Food is gone, rent is due,
Curse and cry and then jump two.

All the peoples out of work,
Hold for three, now twist and jerk.
Cross the line, they count you out.
That's what hopping's all about.

Both feet flat, the game is done.
They think I lost, I think I won.



In 1969, the storyteller, poet, dancer, singer, autobiographer and civil rights activist with more than 50 honorary doctorate degrees Maya Angelou (1928-2014) published her poem "Harlem Hopscotch" (via). Hopscotch is driven by rhythm; the "twists and jerks" are a metaphor about the difficulties faced by black US-Americans (via). Before she passed away in May 2014, she worked on a project that blended her poetry with hip-hop music. Maya Angelou recited her poems, producers Shawn Rivera and RoccStarr focused on beats and instrumentals, Tabitha and Napoleon Dumo on choreography. The music video shows dancers in N.Y. and L.A. (via).

::: Maya Angelou's Harlem Hopscotch: watch





"When you read the poems on the page, they can be interpreted rhythmically by the reader." "But when Dr. Angelou reads them, there's no doubt that she was coming from the place of rhythm. ... You can tell the rhythms were implied already. She already was the first lady of hip-hop."
Shawn Rivera



photograph of girl playing hopscotch in Harlem, 105th street by Walter Rosenblum (1919-2006) taken in 1952 via, photograph of children playing chalk games in Brooklyn, taken by Arthur Leipzig (1918-2014) in 1950 via, of children in Ladbroke Grove via, of children playing hopscotch taken by Ralph Morse via, of girls playing via, photograph by Raymond Depardon via, of patrolman J. S. Davidson playing hopscotch, watched by patrolman T. D. McKnight, taken by Jim Shearin via, of Doris Day via

Vienna International Dance Festival

In the 1960s, dance language shifted from the need for the "classical dancerly body" to an expansion of boundaries. The idea that anyone could be a dancer made dance open to a more diverse population. Mixed-abilities dance companies were founded which included people with disabilities (Herman, 2009).



On 17 July, ImPulsTanz, the Vienna International Dance Festival will start, an annual contemporary dance festival that has been taking place in Vienna since 1984. The festival hosts the DanceAbility-Day and offers a month-long DanceAbility Teacher Certification Workshop. DanceAbility was co-founded by Alito Alessi, a "pioneering teacher and choreographer in the fields of contact improvisation, and dance and disability" (via).



"Contact improvisation offers a form of improvisation to everyone, their abilities tailored to their dancing duet by the choices they make. With danceability, Alito Alessi put this idea to work with people with disabilities – any disabilities – and discovered that it works, and it erases the assumed distinction between able/disabled. Looking around, I see that this distinction is used almost everywhere: in language, in education, in government. It is the common assumption, and so becomes the common attitude, the common thing for children to learn, to grow up holding, and eventually, to design and legislate with, as they mature. It is like a toxic cloud hovering around the fact of disability. Toxic? How would assignment into a separate and somehow inferior social status affect you? Cloud? Always in the shadow, in society’s estimation. Danceability has the power to lift this cloud. Using the art of dance, the art of the body, it begins with the facts of the body – the facts of anybody/mind – and slowly, gently, shows the partners in a dance how to find common ground. An event occurs which can only occur with the participation of these two people, an invention which assumes the opposite of what is normally assumed, and which is a path to healing the divisions we find everywhere installed – the normal ‚default’ setting – in our environments, in our minds, in our hearts. Danceability is a kind of healing, not to ’heal’ the disabled, but to heal the able and disabled at once, in one forum. For a time, the separation is dissolved. For our minds, the separation can no longer have unquestioned power over our thinking. For our hearts, a connection is forged between creative partners. Try it. You will be moved." Steve Paxton



- Herman, C.-P. (2009). Danceability's Contribution to Mixed-Abilities Dance, a Survey Analysis. Oregon: MA, via
- photos via and via and via

International Dance Day

World Dance Day, every year on 29 April, established in 1982 and promoted by CID, aims at attracting attention to the art of dance. It is celebrated by millions of dancers around the globe. On that day, dance companies, dance schools, organizations and individuals, professionals as well as amateurs, organize an activity addressing an audience different from their usual one (literally via). CID is the Conseil International de la Danse (International Dance Council), recognised by UNESCO and founded in 1973.



Belonging to a particular dance group can form a sense of belonging as an older person. "Culture of dance" can empower older persons, create a community feeling, offer an opportunity to dress up which again is an important aspect of experiencing lived embodiment. Learning to dance when one's age is rather advanced can be a positive health behaviour choice (Paulson, 2009).
Age & Dancing: Paddy and Nico's performance in Britain's Got Talent led to standing ovations and went viral soon afterwards: watch

Dancing People Link Pack:

- Daft Punk "Lose Yourself To Dance" watch
- Moby "Bodyrock" watch (fire version) and watch (official video)
- Kate Bush "Wuthering Heights" watch
- Men Without Hats "Safety Dance" watch
- Jamiroquai "Stillness in Time" watch
- Dancing Twiggy watch

- - - - - - - - - - - - -
Paulson, S. M. (2009) An Exploration of How Various "Cultures of Dance" Construct Experiences of Health and Growing Older. London: Dissertation (via)