Where the daimon dwells

A chorography of the space between

In his final extant letter, written on 24th February 1948, Antonin Artaud resolved to devote himself to:

a theatre of blood
a theatre which with each performance will have done something
bodily to the one who performs as well as the one who comes to see others perform
but actually
the actors are not performing
they are doing.
The theatre is in reality the genesis of creation.

Performance potentially generates a space for creation, materialisation, for transformation. Movement itself engenders this transfigured space, and makes it visible to the eye and tangible to the senses. In this presentation I trace the relation of this interstitial space with the dancing body, grounded in an aesthetics and kinetics of the interval. I discuss the techniques of trance and transformation as a method of presencing the other, in space and in the body; and consider chor(e)ography as an art of crossing the threshold, where the daimon dwells.

This presentation was given at Trans- States: The Art of Crossing Over, University of Northampton.