// TAKAHIRO YAMAMOTO //
TAKAHIRO YAMAMOTO
Property of Opaqueness
OCT 6 / 7:30PM
Velocity 1621 12th Ave.
Tickets * $12 General ($15 Door) / $10 Low Income (Incl. Student/Senior) / $7 Henry and Friends of Velocity members
In partnership with the Henry Art Gallery, Velocity will be presenting a performance by Portland-based artist Takahiro Yamamoto‘s Property of Opaqueness. This event will coincide with Takahiro’s work with the Henry, related to Carrie Yamaoka‘s recto/verso exhibition, on view at the Henry through November 3rd.
The collaborative dance performance Property of Opaqueness is the first iteration of choreographer Takahiro Yamamoto’s project under the umbrella title Opacity of Performance, which will debut at the Portland Art Museum in Fall 2020. This multi-year project investigates visibility and the physical and emotional effects that performers and viewers undergo when acts of looking, moving, and paying attention vary over an extended duration. When does visibility/invisibility validate the performer and when does it negate them? What are the social consequences of looking at a performing body today?
Opacity of Performance applies Edouard Glissant’s idea of opacity to a discipline that relies on the audience’s clear desire to see the performers. For him, opacity is “that which cannot be reduced” to the familiar. It is the part of ourselves that others cannot grasp, “the thing that would bring us together forever and make us permanently distinctive.” By varying levels of visibility/opacity in the work, Yamamoto proposes that both viewers and performers use perception and imagination to reflect on the relational nature of validation and understanding. In this work, Yamamoto centers the unknowable as a vulnerable yet necessary state of being.
This iteration of Property of Opaqueness will feature Portland filmmaker Roland Dahwen Wu and Seattle artist and arts administrator Rana San, performing alongside Yamamoto.
In bringing Property of Opaqueness to Seattle, Yamamoto will further his research for Opacity of Performance by collaborating with local artists and thinkers, both in this performance on October 6, and during a public discussion at the Henry on Saturday, October 5.
*While ticketing sales provide valuable support, we do not want to turn anyone away for lack of funds. A number of free tickets are available with pre-registration. Please email Shirley Wong, Operations Manager, operations@velocitydancecenter.org to request.
ABOUT THE ARTIST
TAKAHIRO YAMAMOTO is an artist and choreographer originally from Shizuoka Japan, Takahiro, currently based in Portland, Oregon. His approach to choreography is interpersonal and observational. He starts conceptual investigations with a question–currently about the ontology of performance, mutability of identity, and social implication of the gaze–as he invites collaborators to bring their own perspectives into the creation. Yamamoto has received support from National Performance Network, Japan Foundation, Regional Arts & Culture Council, and danceWEB Scholarship Program, among others. Both his performance productions and visual art works have been presented at PICA (Portland), Diverseworks (Houston), Contemporary Arts Center (Cincinnati), GoDown Arts Centre (Nairobi), Center on Contemporary Arts (Seattle), and others. Yamamoto holds an MFA in Visual Studies from Pacific Northwest College of Art. He co-directs the performance company madhause with Ben Evans, and is part of the Portland-based support group Physical Education with Allie Hankins, keyon gaskin, and Lu Yim.
LINKS
