2022, Vol.86, No.2

The Korean Journal of Dance Studies 2023 KCI Impact Factor : 0.93

pISSN : 1226-900X / eISSN : 2713-9468
https://journal.kci.go.kr/krsds

This study started with the observation that many discussions on art production in the field of post-dance, that is, “dance after dance,” overlooked discussions on the audience. Through literature research on the audiences of experimental choreographies and performances, the audience characteristics of contemporary arts was understood, and the importance of audience participation was confirmed. The general audience’s response to the experimental choreography was collected through non-professional review cases and lecturer interviews. In the context of contemporary choreography, which has emphasized the social and political roles of arts, this study insists that the art practices of post-dance should go beyond discussions only by limited producers and experts.

This study examines choreographer Jérôme Bel’s performance dramaturgy which has led the discussion on the ontology of dance in Europe since 1990s. As a method of study, this paper reads Roland Barthes’ works focusing on Writing Degree Zero, and Bel’s works, the name given by the author and Jérôme Bel. Bel’s dramaturgy has largely based on Roland Barthes’ theory known as writing degree zero or neutralization which erases authors’ style. Accepting Barthes’ theory, Bel created unprecedented types of work which are now called ‘choreography’ far different from a traditional concept. The results suggest that his works provide rich meanings and discourses from the texts. Besides his formal experiments, Bel puts emphasis to create discourses surrounding dance mainly focusing author, dancer, and audience to criticize the mystified ontology of dancers, the body image that the capitalism renders. Due to the dense signifiance of his texts, death, absence, ephemerality, emptiness, and nothingness are always revealed beyond the surface.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the aesthetic significance of non-danse and to suggest the possibility of expanding the scope of dance. We analyze Jérôme Bel’s Nom Donné par L’Auteur based on Alain Badiou’s theory of inesthetics. In the process of analysis, this study intends to reconsider the perception of ‘what dance is’. As a result of interpreting Jérôme Bel’s work into ‘the six principles of dance’ suggested by Badiou in his essay “Dance as a Metaphor of Thought”, it is found that non-danse, a form of experimental art, provided artistic significance suitable for the new era. As such, when the ontological significance and characteristics of dance are discussed in various ways from the perspective of a new aesthetic transformation, the extension of dance art will be expanded and diversified, and its value will be rediscovered.