TodAncestor III
Berlin based Butoh dancer Yuko Kaseki's solo performance piece TodAncestor is an intermedia installation performance ritual for vier (four) and its homonym relatives fear, poetry (詩) and death (死). A meditative ritual that deals with one’s own death, that inevitably will come as part of the natural cycle of life.
“Tradition becomes our security, and when the mind is secure it is in decay.” - Jiddu Krishnamurti
The final piece premiered at DOC11 (Berlin, 26 - 29 August 2021) was the result of four creations with four different collaborators, vol.I with Yuko Chigira (dramatologist, JP), vol.II with Ingrid Müller-Farny (spiritual coach, DE), vol.III with Tot Onyx and vol.IV with Lisa Stertz (performer, DE). In our collaboration, we explored the theme from the perspective of sound, both audible and inaudible, invisible. Sounds that once vibrated the air in the past that still remain in the same space, like strong energies. Searching and channeling, as our bodies and ki start to follow the rhythm and improvise with radio noise, metal objects, analog synthesiser, voice and cassette tape players as the tapes inside the cassette shells begin to come out and extend in every direction throughout the room, ending up occupying the space with visible sounds of the past.
Direction/ Sound/ Installation/ Costume/ Performance: Yuko Kaseki, Tot Onyx
Photo: Echo Ho, Sigel Leicht
TodAncestor - revisited -
The piece was given an opportunity of a further research during the residency program at Berlin's Uferstudios in September and October 2022. Through a deeper study of life and death, it became clear to us that sound, energy (body) and light, all had one thing in common: frequency. This realisation lead us to explore with surround system of 6 speakers, new device developed together with Francesco Della Tofolla
Direction, Costume, Performance: Yuko Kaseki, Tot Onyx, Teo Vlad
Sound: Tot Onyx
Creative contribution: Ingrid Müller-Farny, Francesco Della Toffola
Photo by Andreas Kühn