DANCE/Insight
Choreographer Donna Uchizono, on "Butterflies from my Hand"

The striking opening image of "Butterflies from my Hand" served as a springboard to explore questions about the power that can be gained through the act of letting go and the possibilities that loss and vulnerability have to offer.

The work explores movement that uses personal experiences surrounding resistance, loss, power and uncertainty as a motivating force to uncover a physical language that gives the piece a sense of an emotional journey that is viscerally powerful.

As a choreographer, I am dedicated to the experimentation within the movement medium. With each new work, I create a new movement vocabulary specific to that particular piece, thus setting up a dialogue with the dance itself and fostering a symbiotic relationship between form and content. "Butterflies from my" Hand utilizes the opening image as a metaphor for guiding its kinetic direction.

The title "Butterflies from my Hand" came about while I was talking with a visual artist about the new piece. I discussed the fact that I was exploring the power of letting go and was holding my hands tight in a fist and asked: "What would happen if I just let go?"

He responded, "Maybe butterflies would fly from your hand."

The dance opens with a dancer suspending herself off the ground by holding on to a red curtain that is attached to the ceiling. Slowly she pulls out a pair of scissors and starts to slowly cut the curtain that is supporting her body...

The dance is imbued with layered fragility, striking visual images, bold gestures and emotional sublime inviting the audience through a multi-emotional experience.

Each viewer comes to the theater with their own intelligence, information and experiences and through their own particular lens will come away with their own emotional journey.

I am personally discovering that there is power in letting go.

Each piece I make is very different from each other. "State of Heads" (1999) with it’s odd, but endearing characters in all-white, to "Low" (2002), which is sensual, yet cool, heightening the investigation of weight and the constant dynamic interplay of exchange between partners through the constriction of space, to "Butterflies from my Hand," a play between tension and release.

I approach each piece as a unique entity that warrants a new vocabulary to define itself. I think the audience will be delighted with the opening image, the dance and the end.

I think we are all hungry for “live” interaction, and true physical contact. Dance is a “live” art form. It is ephemeral, temporal and alive, as is life.

Bio: Donna Uchizono is the founder/artistic director of modern dance company La Donna Dance, (Donna Uchizono Company).

Read more artist profiles in the April 2004 issue of "Arte Six".