Exploring Gray Space
An Interview with Corey Scott-Gilbert | vAL
BY EMMALY WIEDERHOLT
Corey Scott-Gilbert is a dance artist currently based in Germany who has performed throughout the US and Europe. He makes work under the adopted identity vAL, whose agenda is to understand the mental state from which creation springs. Corey describes STAGED, a new dance film by vAL, performed by Roderick George and Corey. He shares how STAGED explores gray space and articulates senses of loss, emptiness, and vacancy.
All images are stills from STAGED and are courtesy vAL.
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Can you share a little about your dance history? What shaped you as an artist?
I’m a military child born in Baltimore, Maryland. I attended Baltimore School for the Arts where I had my first serious introduction to dance. My mentors Stephanie Powell and Tony Wilson encouraged me to focus on quality of movement above all no matter which genre of dance I was dipping a toe into. I took this encouragement to The Juilliard School. After graduation I got a job with Lyon Opera Ballet. I was there for two seasons before I got homesick to return to the US. I joined Alonzo King and his mission with LINES Ballet in San Francisco. I collaborated there for three and a half years before getting a bad ankle injury that forced me to ask new questions about my approach to my craft. I joined Cirque du Soleil because I needed daily physical therapy and time to realign my body and my thoughts around this new questioning. I was clearly hungry for something different than anything I had experienced. This curious appetite brought me back to Europe. I have now been working as a freelance artist based in Berlin, Germany for 11 years. During this time, I have been in collaboration with Sasha Waltz, Richard Siegal, Eszter Salamone, Diego Tortelli, Sergiu Matis, and Ligia Lewis. In the past few years this questioning has motivated me to interrogate thoughts through the making of my own work.
You create work under the name vAL. What is vAL?
Dancers are often put into a category that can feel quite limiting. I often felt like I was in a bit of a bubble that didn’t take my interest seriously if they veered too far from my physical intelligence. I wanted to create a slate for myself where this bubble of limitations was null and void. I also wanted to get rid of my own ego to stay true to the task of process and with that decided to adopt a creative identity.
Valerie is my mom’s name, and everyone called her Val. In my head, her nickname represents her very playful spirit. I am Val’s son, so I take her name to be a constant reminder that the work I’m creating is bigger than me and my own proclivities, to allow space to observe myself in the process of doing something different from what I know.
What was the impetus behind your recent dance film STAGED?
I started free writing after an ankle surgery forced me to sit still. I quickly noticed my writings kept steering towards topics of escapism and finding a better place. I fell in deep dialogue about this text with my friend Gus Solomons Jr., and we agreed to do something together with this “elsewhere” text if we got the opportunity, so when I received a digital commission from Baryshnikov Arts, it felt like the perfect opportunity for Gus and me to come together and work. Being 84 years old, Gus had an approach to work that was very different than most. It was important to me that his needs dominate this project, which meant finding a slow pace on film that still challenged the body and the viewer.
This became the basis for STAGED.
Unfortunately the week before our first residency period, Gus had a fall and ended up passing away two months later. That put a big question mark over the entire project. I was not sure how or even if it made sense to continue. I was always clear that I was not interested in making another solo video project, but replacing Gus felt impossible.
Roderick George is one of my dearest friends and our connection is an undeniable one that is reminiscent of my relationship with Gus. Our friendship is timeless. In order to continue, I needed this rare intimacy in the studio, so I shifted the concept and invited Rod to join STAGED. Rod is a very physical performer but I didn’t want to lose some of the ideas that were already at play from approaching the studio with Gus.
The piece spun into an articulation of loss and emptiness that seemed to define an unspoken gray area. We found a beautifully vacant fiction that challenged the image of the American Gothic, the iconic painting by Grant Wood. We imagined what this painting would look like if it had to be reconsidered today. What does an “American Gothic” folk feel like now? Some haunting rhythms and unanswered alarms entered the space with us and the hovering question became, “What happens when a body is only waiting… and waiting?”
Going back a little bit, how did you know Gus Solomons?
I was working with Richard Siegal in Essen, Germany, at this festival called Ruhrtriennale. Richard was invited to make a three-year trilogy work. I played Dante for his version of The Divine Comedy. In Richard’s third year he was looking for a God- like figure for Paradiso. He landed on Gus for this role which brought us altogether in 2017. That was also the summer of his 80th birthday. We immediately went from mentor to bestie. The bond was immediately familiar and close.
What was the process of creating STAGED?
First off, we embraced detachment. Because Rod and I were dealing with such physically and emotionally weighted material, we needed to find ways to physically and emotionally protect ourselves. We needed to find ways to shield ourselves so we could dive into vulnerabilities without being scathed. We understood that we wanted to construct and reflect provocative images, but we did not need to embody all the horror that those constructions came with.
We began every day with a lot of shaking. We would shake our bodies until utterances and anxieties oozed out into the space. We would root down into the floor and shake until our limbs dangled and a sense of vacancy would swell over our entire bodies. I plucked this shaking practice from qigong, and now start every day this way.
From this emptiness, we would choose how to fill our vessels. We made ourselves containers to be filled. We held and released any image in our body without thought to accurately reflect a dismal and unpleasant reality. It’s not an easy time for an artist to reflect because we’re constantly inviting uneasy topics into the space with us. Taking care of ourselves is vital to keep creating.
There are consequences to inviting questions like “What happens to a body in waiting? What happens to a mind that’s endlessly pending?” into the space with you. With our vacant bodies, we would follow those consequences. Falling became a repetitive gesture. We studied the sound of falling and how lonely it is to hear a fall but not see it. In order to give ourselves relief from the weight of the lingering questions in our space, Rod and I found ourselves in these puppet-like bodies that found grace in bouncing back.
Mutually understanding that in our playing field no one is safe, we allowed ourselves the luxury to construct and deconstruct the staging of our own horrors.
This practice very quickly disrupted power dynamics which unveiled a very pleasurable drama and amusement to a rather dense situation. It is also quite seducing to watch.
How did the project change for you with Gus Solomons passing?
It was a massive change but what is crazy is that at no point did I question the shift too much. What was most important to me was who I was sharing the space with.
The initial plan was that Gus would narrate but also do most of the movement with the shadow of my hands projected as his silent partner.
The version we have made now features two very physical bodies. But after I realized Rod had a willingness to dive deep into intimate and sensitive materials with me, I simply trusted the relationship and allowed what needed to unfold to do so.
Why did you choose to create STAGED as a film and not a live performance? Was there something about the film medium?
I had filmed myself on the beach the summer before my ankle surgery with the plan to work on editing images during my recovery. I got inspired to pair my “elsewhere” writings with the footage from the beach. This work became a three-part transposable film called Drift. This process of choreographing an image on a screen changed my eye. My understanding of choreography shifted altogether. For example, the idea of hearing the body but not seeing the body immediately became a beautiful and haunting possibility with film. A soundscape of active bodies with an empty screen became a beautiful canvas to catapult into.
The initial proposal was to the Princess Grace Foundation. I won the award in 2009 and wrote to them for a special grant to create this duet with Gus. They were very excited, but I didn’t receive the grant. Baryshnikov Arts heard about it through Princess Grace and offered me the funding to make this work.
What do you hope viewers take away?
It’s important to present STAGED as a sort of spark in the dark rather than just dark. I want to reflect our dark days without getting too bleak.
There are two ways you can see this film. It’s dependent on what you’re busy with when you sit down to watch. You can take away deep sadness and loss, or you can take away the wonder of this gray area we reside in. Some things are black and white, but many things are gray, meaning so much feels uncertain. With a relentless frolic, STAGED leans into societal gray areas. This film is in pursuit of the spirit of life in a seemingly vacant place.
Also, there is a hopeless aspect that is pulled out of false starts, empty images, and unanswered alarms. But that hopelessness for me is the most honest reflection of where we are. Now a real conversation can start about where we are headed.
What’s next for you? Do you have an upcoming project of focus you want to share more about after STAGED?
It’s important to be an honest reflection of what’s going on, but there’s no need to add to the despair. I feel like I’m starting to now understand that the work I’m doing is not necessarily mine alone.
I don’t know what it is next, but I know what is not. There are some things in the social climate I’m not interested in dealing with anymore. When I’m asked the question, “What is there to do,” it feels like a lot of digging into further processes that align with what I’ve already been busy with. The questions of escape were so present with STAGED. Now, an escape is a dream. I am working on a solo called INTERMISSION that premieres in Berlin this fall. With this live solo, I will question my newfound inability to dream.
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STAGED is a digital world premiere commissioned by Baryshnikov Arts. STAGED will be available for free beginning November 1st at www.baryshnikovarts.org.
To learn more about vAL and Corey, visit valwashere.com or on Instagram @valwashere and @coreyscottgilbert.
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