Work-in-progress clip from 1938 section of This Dancerie

This segment is based on the story of Herschel Grynspan and Ernst von Rath.

Performers: Oisin Stack as Herschel Grynspan; Nils Nusens as Ernst von Rath

Videographer: Sebastiano d'Ayala Valva

Editor: Joe Lumbroso

Score: Andrew Alden

TD - 1983 - Rev 2.1a from Tony Whitfield on Vimeo.

Digital Performance Architecture Intensive

This intensive workshop has been established in collaboration with the Center for Transformative Media at Parsons The New School for Design as a context for the development of an innovative, interactive digital structure for This Dancerie's culminating evening long performance.

Digital Performance Architecture Intensive: Navigating This Dancerie

PGHT 5030, CRN 7925.

Instructors: Tony Whitfield and Edward Keller

How does one live a forbidden life in public? This Dancerie is a large scale multimedia project that is being developed to ask this question as it pertains to the history of gay men in Paris since 1900’s. Working with film/video makers, choreographers, composers visual and digital artists, Tony Whitfield, in the role of Artistic Director and Producer, will develop eight to ten short movement based videoworks for motion-activated projections into public spaces in Paris that, at various points over the last century, had been important to the social relations of gay men. These works will be proposed for inclusion in La Nuit Blanche 2017, the annual dusk to dawn citywide festival of the arts hosted by the City of Paris. After these presentations, the group of short films will then be brought together in an evening long multimedia event including live performances in a theatrical context.

For more information about This Dancerie, visit http://thisdancerie.blogspot.com.

Students are being sought to take part in an intensive workshop under the auspices of the Parsons’ Center for Transformative Media  (CTM,) during which the digital architecture for that performance as well as apps that augment the project will be developed. Several sessions exploring the history behind, as well as the research and development of, the project will be conducted by Whitfield; and lectures on the context of this project in relationship to the history of film and cities will be conducted by Ed Keller, Director of CTM.  These introductory sessions will be followed by an intensive workshop with Whitfield, Keller, composer Andrew Alden, videographer Joe Lumbroso, Paris-based digital artist Klaus Fruchtnis and choreographer Thierry Micouin [as well additional New School faculty TBA] in a four day intensive workshop to create the structure of This Dancerie’s culminating performance.

All students will be required to take part in 3-hour sessions held on Saturdays March 14, April 11 and May 2 and six hour sessions on April 25, 26, 27 and 28.

This is a 3 credit 5000 level course

Food For Thought; More Partner Dances

https://www.facebook.com/video.php?v=10152974765523140&set=vb.145805293139&type=2&theater

Food for Thought: Dancing in Heels

Food for Thought: Men Dancing Tangos

MEN DANCING TANGO WITH MEN

The impetus for this article arose from stumbling across one of the most beautiful tango videos I have ever come across - containing two men (brothers no less). The fact that it is tango milonga is already a big plus, as that genre is my favorite... but I digress. Before this topic is discussed, I attach the said video for your viewing pleasure.

Enrique and Guillermo De Fazio dancing to the Reliquia Portenas

The Myth

The myth of how men started dancing tango with men has two variations; both around the theme of bordellos - aka 'prostibulos' - most likely because this theme sounds so damn good. The first variation relies on the boredom factor, a la whilst men were waiting to be 'serviced' they had nothing else to do other than to refine their dancing skills. The second variation (only slightly less fanciful) has bordellos providing the waiting men with tango bands for their casual dancing amusement, while they waited.

The sad truth is that whilst both variations undoubtedly did happen, it does not account for the large numbers of men who danced together, nor for the wide-scale acceptance of same-sex dancing, which is quite rare in other dancing cultures.

The Origin of Him-and-Him

So indeed, what is the principle origin of men dancing tango with each other? 

In fact there are three completely separate reasons - which interestingly worked together.

Reason 1: No Access To Women

The first reason derives from where tango was initially danced. It must be remembered that tango, foremost, was the dance of the poor, the underprivileged - the 'lower class'. This group of people had less access to venues where tango was danced, and furthermore had less cultural 'finesses' or boundaries. As a result of these influences there evolved a culture in which it was acceptable for tango to be danced in the streets. Hence even before tango was danced between men, we must imagine in our minds a culture where it was quite common for couples to dance out in the open. In fact a specific style, Tango Orillero, was even evolved out of outdoor suburban tango dancing.

But in the early 1900s, tango was changed forever by the advent of European immigration. One of the outcomes of this cultural shift was that it became unacceptable for women to dance on the streets. The proximity of men and women in public was considered to be a scandal - even touching slightly, let alone embracing. Many women, especially the young, were not allowed to go to practicas or milongas, except if accompanied with their parents. However men being men, they still wanted do what they men wanted to do - dance! A certain percentage of the men went to venues where it was acceptable to dance, but many others - due to limited means or access - had no option other than to continue dancing in the streets. At that point, if a man wanted to dance in the street, there was not much choice; his only option was to dance with other men, which is precisely what occurred.

Reason 2: Courting

The second reason for sam-sex dancing is the fact that dancing was seen as a means to a woman's heart. This was further exacerbated by the fact that men outnumbered women in Buenos Aires in the early 1900s, so competition was fierce, and every edge counted. From this perspective, the fact that men could dance with men away from women was actually anadvantage: young men could tune their skills for a long time by going to men-only prácticas, until they were ready and confident to enter the floor of couples - where inevitably only very good dancers were accepted. This further reinforced the need for male-only dancing. It should be noted that the process for a man to learn tango would first start with the man going to a practica, and watching. Eventually one of the older men would teach him how to follow. Then when he was proficient, he would be promoted to leading another young man. Normally it would take about a year until a man was promoted to start leading. Then, when the man was ready - and this took often 3 years! - he would finally be escorted with another more experienced man to a milonga for an arranged dance with a woman.

Reason 3: Suppression of Tango

The third reason for men dancing tango with men is that tango was considered immoral by the upper class and the authorities. So much so that there was a formal initiative to close all cafes and ban tango music from being played on the streets. For example, in 1916 a law was passed in Buenos Aires that banned dancing between men in dance establishments. An attempt was made to slowly eradicate it from Argentina, and we find an account in 1919 by Joaquin Belda, who in his visit to Buenos Aires for 6 months wrote that most of the cafes were either closed or empty.

This of course resulted in even further reduced access to couples dancing tango, so to dance tango, men had to to dance with each other.

Videos

El Internado


Rudolpho Valentino and Vaslav Nijinsky


Vladimir Vereshchagin and Vladamir Mahalov


Lalo and Luis at Tokyo

Food For Thought:: for segments on the 50's, 60's and 70's

Les Invisibles – review

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• • Philip French
  • The Observer, Saturday 13 July 2013
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1. The Invisibles (Les Invisibles)
2. Production year: 2012
3. Country: France
4. Runtime: 115 mins
5. Directors: Sebastien Lifshitz
6. More on this film

Back in 1977, a team of six directors madeWord Is Out, a classic 134-minute documentaryin which 26 American gays and lesbians, aged from 18 to 77 and mostly from California, talked with frankness and good humour about their experience of coming out, breaking away and finding new lives in an often oppressive world. Sébastien Lifshitz performs a similar job for present-day France, with 11 talking heads, all of them middle-aged or over and mostly from the rural south and around Marseille. They're skilfully edited, placed in their contexts and accompanied by newsreel clips, home movies and old photographs.

Anyone who thought that the land of Proust, Cocteau, Gide, Rimbaud, Verlaine and the haven of Wilde was a place of tolerance and understanding will be surprised by the revelations of prejudice everywhere and the cruel intolerance of a newspaper and the Catholic church. They'll also be heartened by the courage, articulacy and openness of these men and women. There are stories of love and rejection; of a brave woman running a clandestine abortion clinic; of a shy, middle-aged man outed by a photo report on the gay world in Paris Match; of a pick-up place beside a river in a remote beauty spot frequented by an elderly, bisexual goat farmer; of a 71-year-old man finding a devoted new partner through a newspaper ad. A revealing, deeply moving piece of work.

Food for Thought: for the 1950's Segment

Food for thought for the 1950's segment.

Food for Thought: for the 1900 segment: traditional French and Breton dance

French Dance Stroud

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French Dance Stroud has been formed to share our enthusiasm for traditional European dances, especially French and Breton. Dances include such favourites as bourree, scottishe, mazurka, waltz and a variety of Breton dances. We hold regular, monthly dances at Horsley Village Hall, inviting some of the best bands, both local and from across the country, to play for us.

The music is therefore always live, fresh, stimulating, with a variety of styles and instruments, including hurdy-gurdy, accordion, bagpipes, violin, guitar, flute, bombarde and more.

Next Event Details		Musician's Group
Future Event Dates		Instrument Makers
Location		Links
		Contact

Food for Thought: for the 1900 segment: Traditional European Partner Dances

Food for Thought: for 1900 segment: Hurdy Gurdy compositions by Cliff Stapleton, Matthias Loibner and others

Food for Thought: for the 1900 segment: Marcus Scott and Jake Evans Step dancing

Post by Mike Smith.

Food for thought: for the 1900 segment: Mazurka Francese

Food for thought: the mazurka, dance and music to consider for the 1900 segment

Cruising from Quai des Tuileries to The Tuileries to the Garden of the Palais Royal, 1900

The arc of This Dancerie travels from the opening of the 20th century when the concept of "homosexuality" is largely in formation to this period when issues of sexuality are being reshaped by expanding expressions and practices and consciousness of a spectrum of gender identities. The first narrative of This Dancerie will explore public manifestation of homosexual interaction in the first years of the last century.  This narrative will focus on the acts of recognition, and invitations to social and sexual interaction, or cruising in open public spaces. Much of this interaction is made up of signs and signals, patterns and ways of moving through space, a dance. This section of This Dancerie will explore the language of cruising and magnify the notion of partnering by juxtaposing the popular dances that might have been seen between men and women in 1900. In This Dancerie they will be performed by male couples. The dances they will perform will also reflect the range of movement that might have been "imported' into this urban environment from the province or other cultures. The segment of the project will also link relatively nearby spaces, the Quai des Tuileries, the gardens of the Tuileries and the Garden of the Palais Royal.

Here are images of some of the spaces that might be used in this section of This Dancerie.

Prostitutes and clients conversing at the Palais Royal Paris, 1800. Ink and watercolour. Bibliothèque nationale de France

Magic City, 1900-1937?

In August, Alex Bado, Thierry Micouin and Tony Whitfield surveyed the vicinity where Magic City amusement park and ballroom was situated on the Quai D'Orsay.  Of particular interest was the ongoing occurrence of Drag Balls in the Ballroom and the possibility of creating a contemporary drag ball on the current site that was geared to attract a multi cultural queer community, manifesting a range of current drag traditions. The concept that has evolved is a film of the ball shot from above during the summer before the presentation of This Dancerie.  That film would be projected onto the paved surface of the current site on the Quai D'Orsay at night.

A bit of background on the site.

The reference site on the planet Tango  Tango Encyclopedia

Magic City

1900-1934. Paris. Theme park and huge ballroom. The park is located between numbers 67 and 91 on the Quai d'Orsay, opposite the Pont de l'Alma. The ballroom on the first floor of 188 University Street.      All is founded in 1900 by Ernest Cognac, the owner of the department store La Samaritaine.      place is closed by the decision of the authorities on February 6 1934 Up in 1942, the hall continues to be used for gatherings.

Ballroom 1910

Mr. Basile Pachkof, which conducts research on the history of the Mi-Carême, brought an interesting piece of information. Indeed, it cites the newspaper Le Matin , 20 February 1937, page 2, 5th column, and notes that the Magic City Hall was still working in 1937, after the administrative decision to close in 1934.     One might think that the closure of the ballroom has been linked to major disturbances generated by the Mi-Carême balls, collecting gay transvestites, and unleashed a whole population that was loudly partying in the streets avoisinnantes.    Yet in 1910, the police headquarters in Paris had issued an order prohibiting dancing between men. And in 1934, the Prefect of Police Jean Chiappe implemented this order and has closed all concerned, including the ballroom of Magic City.   prom This prohibition would therefore not affected other types of gatherings including the one mentioned by Mr. Pachkoff.   Moreover, the address given by the article does not exactly match that known. Error journalist or other input to the ballroom?

Source: Email from Mr. Basile Pachkoff 28 April 2013.

In 1942 the park was destroyed. And the ballroom was bought by the government attributes it to Paris-TV. The German Kurt Hinzman installed a television studio, directly connected to the emitter of the Eiffel Tower. The studio was opened September 30, 1943 and issue until 12 August 1944 emissions are primarily for German soldiers hospitalized or convalescing.

The ballroom was famous for its fancy dress balls and gay Lent.

The ballroom had a permanent orchestra, called Dance Orchestra Magic City . He recorded under the direction of conductor M.Brun a disc with two titles tango composer Saint-Servan.     22cm. Sapphire. Label Opera No. 7021 Two tangos " Enamorada ", 0141. matrix" La Chiquita Linda "0142 matrix.     Accurate label: " Starting at the edge , "which allows us to suppose that the disk is prior to 1914.

The potential site for This Dancerie Drag Ball

Magic City

Prospectus Magic City

Ballroom

Entry in 1943

The hall in 1943 before restoration.

The hall in 1943, after its transformation into TV studio

Others viewed photos on

- http://paris1900.lartnouveau.com/paris07/lieux/magic_city.htm . A slide show presents some amusement park.

Magic City - Paris 7th Buildings destroyed   Theme Park Magic City was built by Ernest Cognac, owner of the Samaritan woman , in 1900 between numbers 67 and 91du Quai d'Orsay and University Street opposite the Pont de l'Alma . Magic City was the first amusement park of Paris, before Luna Park at Porte Maillot (1909), it included fairground attractions, sights, shows, performances of "natives" and a large dance floor with orchestra. Closed in 1934, then commandeered by the Germans during the occupation, the ballroom is transformed into a television studio that will become the Fernsehsender Paris after the war studios Cognac-Jay. Entrance   Scenic railway   creation see a larger picture Bridge madness waterfall   the great hall Magic bench Waterfall dance headhunters