I first came across Butoh in 1996, while working at the the now defunct Tower Books. Issue 21 of Visionaire, which took the form of a box of oversized playing cards, featured as it’s hearts suit a group of arresting photographs of a man, covered in white make-up, twisting about and making crazy faces. I photocopied them and put them in my “archives” for later use. It was Ushio Amagatsu a second-wave Butoh dancer, and founder of the legendary troupe Sankai Juku, though I didn’t realize it at the time. In fact I didn’t make the connection until years later when I saw a performance by Kazuo Ohno on television. It was the first time I’d ever even heard the word Butoh or seen it in motion. I am not particularly a fan of dance, nor do I tend to gravitate toward performance art, and yet with this form I was totally fascinated.

It’s a hard art to explain really. In my mind the best of it is dark and almost frightening in its viscerally primal strangeness. It can remind you of an epileptic seizure, or some ugly lunacy made flesh. Simultaneously, however, you’ll recognize in it tiny gestures and glances and movements which seem somehow sublimely beautiful. Perhaps it is the appalling humanity of it, so easily understood in the murky emotional realm of our private minds, but so strange to see manifest before your eyes. Since becoming aware of it I’ve noticed its stamp on everything from E. Elias Merhige’s masterpiece Begotten to Matthew Barney’s Cremaster Cycle.

Recently I received the 1987 book Butoh, Dance of the Dark Soul as a gift and wanted to take the opportunity to share some of it, as well as some other Butoh related material, with you.

“Butoh is an explosive, convention-shattering performance art that has redefined the limits of dance and theatre. The form was created by a handful of avant-garde postwar Japanese artists who drew upon their native agrarian myths, the iconoclastic theatre of Antonin Artaud, and the influences of Western modern dance.

But Butoh is more. It is perhaps the most daring attempt yet made to translate the mysterious, often tormented life of the unconscious into the communal medium of theatre.

The first true Butoh performance, an adaptation of Yukio Mishima’s novel Forbidden Colors, scandalized Japanese audiences when it premiered in 1959. Its creator, Tatsumi Hijikata, was banned by the Modern Dance Association and branded an outlaw dancer.”

-From the dust jacket of Butoh. Dance of the Dark Soul, 1987.

“Some people say that the essence of butoh lies in the mechanism through which the dancers stops being himself and becomes someone or something else. This is a different conception of dance then the conventional where the body of the dancer expresses an emotion or abstract idea.

For example, take the studying of a rooster. “The idea was to push out all of the human inside and let the bird take its place. You may start by imitating, but imitation is not your final goal; when you believe you are thinking completely like a chicken you have succeeded.

The important thing with this is not the transformation into a chicken, but the transformation itself, the fact that you change. Only in this way you can bring the body back to its original state. It is not depiction or symbolization which is the foundation of butoh. It is the metamorphosis.”

-Harmen Sikkenga, from Butoh - Dance of Darkness 1994.

“Butoh has a primordial quality. It is dark. It is generated somewhere in the lower strata of the subconscious, in the murky areas of personal prehistory. Memory is its source. Its etymology refers specifically to dance through the character bu. Buyoh is the neutral word for dance, but it has a sense of jumping or leaping, whereas toh implies a stomping. Buyoh is in the ascendant, like the vertical ascent of Vaslav Nijinsky or Isadora Duncan’s leap toward the source of light. Butoh is a descent. Hijikata would often say, “I would never jump or leave the ground; it is on the ground that I dance.”

The element of stomping, the intimacy with the ground, the soil. has its roots in agricultural society. Similar patterns are found in the dances of southern India, Spain, and in the Japanese classical Noh theater. The seasons and the agricultural cycle form the foundations of Japanese mythology, at the center of which is the Sun Goddess, Amaterasu, from whom the Emperor is descended. Amaterasu is said to have retreated into a cave and plunged the world into darkness after her unruly brother Susano, the Storm God, allowed his piebald horses to rampage through her rice fields. In the cold and darkness of her absence, the other spirits, or kami, gathered outside the cave and performed wild and bawdy dances. They also placed a mirror in the branches of a tree overlooking the cave. Amaterasu, curious at the sound of the revelry, peered outside and caught her reflection in the mirror. Dazzled by her own countenance, she returned to the world, and the warmth and light were restored with the onset of spring. The stomping of Butoh has its mythical parallels in the revelry of the spirits in a darkened world.”

-Mark Holborn, from Butoh. Dance of the Dark Soul, 1987.

“Hijikata used the term Butoh to describe his dance. Although modern dance is something that is liberated from Western classical dance, Butoh is not comparable. If modern dance is like a thoroughbred racehorse, then Butoh is like a camel. The difference is like the difference between diamonds and cork, though both have the same elemental base.                                     

Butoh is just a Japanese name. There are many parallel dances elsewhere. When I first saw the Omizutori, the fire festival on the hillside at Nara, an ancient religious ceremony from the eleventh century, the ceremony seemed like an imitation of my dance, just as 1 may have drawn from an eleventh century ritual. I was very impressed by the age of the ritual. Butoh is something new, but there are many comparable forms throughout history. Butoh is a form that almost precedes dance, just as a child moves and plays before he dances.

Imagine a snake emerging and appearing before a Japanese farmer, then sliding away. The step with which the farmer may have crushed the snake, may have been the beginning of a Butoh step.”

-Akaji Maro, from Butoh. Dance of the Dark Soul, 1987.

“Where are the points of difference between butoh and other forms of dance? First in the singularity of the body in butoh. As is particularly striking in ankoku butoh, the body of the butoh-ka is far removed from the balanced, ideal beauty of the ballet dancer, and has no reason to take pride in its powerful musculature or physical strength. Compared with the symmetrical beauty of conventional dancers, the butoh-ka with his stooped body, so small and lean, his bent legs, and his outsized caricature of a face is the picture of deformity. Butoh performers even seem to emphasize the rounded back, bull-neck, and bandy legs so typical of the Japanese physique. In addition to these peculiarities of the eastern body, some work like that of Kazuo Ohno brines together the complementary aspects of the same entity a delicate sensibility and the grotesque ugliness of old age. It was this kind of oddity which first drew attention to the more fundamental strangeness of butoh.

Oddity also makes the publication of collections of butoh photos an easy business, once the pathetic expressions of the strange figures which appear on the butoh stage are visually stimulating to the imagination. In this grotesque ugliness and corruption, however, there accomplishedcan be found an irreducible beauty and sweetness which are without equivalent elsewhere: Clearly, butoh has accomplished a reversal in the aesthetic consciousness.”

-Kazuko Kuniyoshi, from Butoh in the late 1980s, translated from the Japanese by Richard Hart.

When I was, perhaps… 15 I had an experience that seemed so odd it impressed itself deeply on my memory. I was alone, sitting in a very secluded little spot of a neighborhood park where I’d often go to read; on a raised concrete slab surrounded on all sides by trees. It was mid-summer and the entire area was crawling with insects and loud with their buzzings and chirpings. As I sat there I began to focus on the insects, their sounds, their motions across the ground and the concrete slab.  Eventually, and without forethought or reason, I began to mimic them. I made crazy sounds, writhed around a bit, and struck odd poses there on the slab in the sun. It lasted for about two minutes. Even then, having only just experienced it, I could see how bizarre the whole episode was.

I can only categorize it as some kind of primal outpouring, either creative or spastic, which seemed to come upon me from parts unknown. Being brought up Catholic, and being a child, I wondered whether it were some kind of possession, whether I’d in fact been talking in tongues or some other horrible thing. It was actually embarrassing somehow and consequently I told very few people about it. I recognize that same strangeness in the photos of Kazuo Ohno, however, and it seems to me now, all these years later, that it was a sort of naive Butoh, springing from the same subconscious well, seeking to cast off the composure and formality of being a “good kid.” It was play, albeit of a kind I only recognized when I got older.

In truth Butoh is most certainly something which must be seen for oneself in order to form any kind of opinion or reach any kind of understanding. It can’t be neatly summed up or even properly approached with a few quotes and a handful of images, no matter how enigmatic or beautiful. To spite that fact I hope you enjoyed this little taste anyhow.

For more on Butoh try:

Butoh.net
Butoh - Dance of Darkness
Butoh: The Darkness Amongst the Joy
About Butoh
What Does Butoh mean?
Butoh in the Late 1980s (pdf)
An Art Form In Transition
Butoh at Wikipedia
Sankai Juku: Butoh Dance from Japan
A Conversation with Ushio Amagatsu
Cokaseki.com
Bodytaster.com
Butoh-ultraego.com photogallery.

You Tube returns many result when doing a search for Butoh, most of which are pretty weak. Here are a few which might be of interest however:

1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7,  8, 9, 10.

*Note that all photos in the main body of this post (with the exception of “Gold Boy” and “Kagemi”) are by Ethan Hoffman from Butoh, Dance of the Dark Soul, which, if you are interested in Butoh, I recommend highly. It’s the best book on the subject I’ve yet found.

Well, as it happens I have an old friend (wishing fervently to remain anonymous) who is working closely with the production team of Mr. Men: The Movie. At my behest he’s risked livelihood and limb (Thanks pal!) and smuggled me out some exclusive images which I thought you might be interested in checking out. The image at the beginning of this post was one.

Stylistically it seems they’ve decided to go after a mixed CGI / cell-animated look, with the characters remaining flat and graphic, exactly as they appeared in the books, and the environments being dimensional, with blurs and light effects, etc. Nice looking, and well done, but pretty standard fare for an animated feature.

Thematically though? ...let’s just say its a bit of a departure. The film seems to eschew the usual Mr. Men formula of having those characters in the oeuvre which embody negative traits (i.e. Mr. Grumpy, Mr. Grumble, Mr. Greedy, etc.) learn a moral lesson through their interactions with those characters which embody positive ones. In this film, at least judging by the images I’ve seen, the negative characters seem to… well… have their day in the sun so to speak.

See for yourself-

As you most likely surmised in less than 5 seconds it’s all lies. A put-on. I admit it. There is no movie, no anonymous friend, and the screen grabs were of course cobbled together by me, Monsieur Non, or Mr. Snide if you prefer– popper of hot-air balloons, crumpler of kites, and trampler of picnic blankets! Mwuah-ha-ha. 

Why perpetrate such a flimsy fraud you ask?

Well, looking at the Mr. Men page on wikipedia it dawned on me what sad creatures these negative trait characters were. I mean think of it– they were created specifically and purposefully to be grumpy, clumsy, greedy, dissatisfied, mischievous, or what have you, and then they are obliged to spend the rest of their existence being chided and “taught lessons.” What a cruel fucking trick!

“I am your creator and I dub thee Mr. Loud because you are loud and can’t help but be loud by your nature. Loudness is the natural state the taught vocal cords I fashioned for you tend toward. Your faulty ears require loudness. Every fiber of your being yearns for loudness. That is how I have made you… Now go forth and be quiet.”

Sick.

Put yourself in their shoes. Imagine being surrounded on all sides by the likes of Mr. Happy, Mr. Cheerful, Little Miss Splendid, Mr. Perfect, Mr. Good, Little Miss Fun, Mr. Right… Christ! I would be Grumpy and Grumbly too. They’d have to call me Mr. Punch-You-In-The-Fucking-Mouth.

Anyhow I thought that if even just for a few moments, and even if only here in my little ramshackle trailer on the outskirts of the internet, these poor bastards could fight back against those freakishly unflawed creations who browbeat and proselytize at them daily (and by extension lift a metaphysical middle finger to the sadistic God of their universe) well… I figured it would be time well spent.

Hope you enjoyed.

Now I don’t think at this late juncture even a half-blind Javanese pre-teen, wearing a Shaq jersey and sipping a can of R.C. Cola through a Spongebob shaped twisty straw, would sit through his newest bootleg DVD and afterward feel compelled to praise Hollywood for its imagination. We locals know this, we see more of the reheated narrative slop than anyone. But this “writing on walls” thing? Sheesh.

Do rational minds have such a very hard time conceiving of ways to portray irrationality? Is this obsessive convoluted scrawl the only visual metaphor we can come up with for the interior of a troubled mind? Is the act of defacing that most comforting of spaces, the one within 4 shelter-giving walls, the most poignant non-lethal transgression we can conceive?

Tell me- Is it that unstable personalities are inordinately difficult to portray or is it simply that tame minds are ill-equipped to visualize the fruits of wild ones? When such a staggering percentage of the populace, though not exactly lunatic, differs substantially enough from the imaginary mental “norm” to require therapy and counseling and annually quadrupling dosages of anti-depressants, I find it hard to believe “the other” is quite so inconceivable.

From a creative standpoint, someone involved in the perpetuation of this goofy trope has to realize that the use of an instantly recognizable visual shorthand in the portrayal of abnormality is something of a contradiction. Also, from a functional standpoint, this fictional maniac is generally a killer or stalker or rapist, or some such horrible thing, and the desired reaction to the revelation of his/her insanity ought to be: “Holy shit! That persons insane! Yikes. Creeeepy.” Seeing something as familiar and comfortable to your psyche as the ass-groove of your own couch cushions, something like say a tired old cliche, does not inspire this reaction. Does it? I have to chalk it up to a simple lack of imagination. Which is ironic, ‘cause you know who seem to be extremely imaginative? Crazy people.

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I hereby decree that if this cliche must be used then one of more of the following 3 items must be adhered to-

1. The individual who created the room covered in scrawl must be either a 13 year old (and at least 65% of the scrawl must take the form of band logos and song lyrics,) a graffiti artist (in which case the writing must be applied with something other than plain black ink / white chalk / blood,) or a set designer (who curses under his breath at the director continuously for making him create such a lame set.)

In emergencies when scripts must be turned in within 24 hours the individual may also be a disgruntled typographer, novelist, graphic designer, illuminated manuscript restorer, stenographer, or naughty grade school pupil.

The exception here is an individual who lives in a Lower East Side dive bar bathroom.

2. The handwriting must be neat and finely executed rather than angular chicken-scratch. Someone who spends hours every day writing screeds all over every surface of their room, no matter how batshit crazy, has had plenty of practice and ought to be able to lay down some readable handwriting. (A few storiated initials at the beginning of paragraphs, or some handsomely proportioned looping script would be nice.)

The exception here is if the individual doing the writing is limbless and holds his sharpie in his mouth or between stumps. The individual may also be blind, but in such a case the writing should be in neatly composed braille.

3. Police officers must canvas neighborhoods, going to apartment landlords, motel managers, and concerned parents, carrying not a suspect sketch but the image which began this post. “Have you come across any rooms that look anything like this?” they must ask. “Because if you have… that’s our man.” Clerks at the local art supply store should also be questioned.

If these guidelines are ignored filmmakers must be charged, post haste, with “aggravating assault on a deceased equine” and have their equipment impounded while they await trial… and atomic-wedgies.

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Lastly, since I fully realize my edicts over the film industry do not carry as much weight as they should, I’d like to take this opportunity to announce my new venture:

Are you too busy scouring the earth for creepy porcelain doll heads, rusty farm tools, 18th century family photos, broken mirrors, and over excitable kittens to really get your wall-scrawling crazy on? Well breathe easy set designer, because we’ve got you, and you’re murderous lunatic’s walls, covered!

Introducing Scrawlpaper®©™ the finest collection of dingy scrawl-covered wallpapers available on the market today.

Have You got a loony whose interior struggle needs to made painfully obviously clear to your brain-dead audience? Kidnapper? Religious nut? Obsessive masturbator? Repressed sister-lusting rapist? Multiple personalitied self-flagellator? Satan worshiper? Rouge Priest? Brilliant but morally bereft doctor? Cannibalistic asylum escapee? Hey, we’ve got the pre-crazied wallpaper just for you!

Scrawlpaper®©™

(Coming soon.)

!!!

Enjoyment was intended.

(All images portioned from the magnificent bounty of here. All machine elucidations, fully actual! Happy courtesy of the babelling fish.)

Xensen: Suppose you love someone romantically—a woman, let’s say. Do you parcel out your love, setting it in scales and weighing it out against little blocks, one that says “improved character,” another that says “better self-understanding”? Or do you simply love her, without inhibition? Now suppose her name is The Humanities.

Conrad H. Roth: I do love someone romantically, and it is even a woman. However, if I spent my whole life—or even a large part of my life—stroking her lovely face, I might have reason to worry I was not spending my time as well as I should be.

Myself: Now suppose multitudes of people all over the globe love her, passionately, covetously, and these multitudes spend their whole lives stroking her face as well. This stroking, however reverent and gentle, has, through the constant attentive friction of countless fingertips, an unintended effect; A quantitative effect oblivious to the romantic clink of wine glasses and undiminished by concupiscent cooing.

The affectionate caress, when administered by a mob, feels decidedly more ardent. 

Capillaries are broken, bruises formed, skin stripped, layer by layer, from her cheeks and forehead and chin. The Zygomaticus and Orbicularis oculi and Oribicularis oris are tenderized, breaking peptide bonds between amino acids and dissolving sinewy connections. Her lovely face breaks down. The fervent hands of the multitudes, with fingertips pressing into a slurry of scrap and cartilage, caress their way straight through the processes of autolysis, putrefaction, decay, and diagenesis until they are left, finally, pawing at a beautifully polished bone.

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Notes:

The image is adapted from a shot of Clown Skull by Vik Muniz, 1989.

Any resemblance to loved ones, living or institutional, is purely coincidental.

Further description: The gold false cuvette opening to reveal the erotic scene of an African woman wearing pearls and a man with a dog at his heels. The polychrome enamel figures engaged in an amorous encounter spring to life when the repeat mechanism is activated. Anonymous Swiss. Circa 1900.

Oh to be a human of any epoch! Brilliant I tells ya. Brilliant.

(Found on Antique-watch.com. Also: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10)

This image cracks me up. More so in context (because it’s not a piece of Nihilist propaganda or some allegorical face smack from a Jack Chick tract.) You might notice that little scribbly “song” written up in the corner…  this is in fact a cover illustration for a piece of sheet music published in 1909. I can’t help but think of it as the equivalent of a “megadeth cover” for its time, except you just know the music inside is all jaunty and “23 skidoo” and “tennis, anyone?”

(all images adapted from the scientific paper The Chemical History of a Candle by Michael Faraday.)