Vangeline Theater/New York Butoh Institute
In Collaboration with Howl Arts
presents

QUEER BUTOH

FLOWERS

Featuring
XUE
In collaboration with MIKA OROTEA & JOHN BARRINGTON

June 8, 2021 8 p.m.

Performances of new dances in the series will air on June 15 & 22, 2021 8 p.m.

Livestream
www.howlarts.org

Available through June 30, 2021
www.vimeo.com/vangeline

XUE is a surrogate for butoh artist Sher Chew. In FLOWERS, she uses chrysanthemums to powerfully evoke humanity’s addiction to attachment and the emotional and physical traps we set for ourselves.

Filmed in black and white under a small spotlight, the naked XUE bit by bit brings the flowers into the light. Crouching, she calmly pulls the petals from their stems, laying the blossoms to create a large circle on the stage. Now enclosed in her self-created prison, she wordlessly exudes strength, doubt, thoughts, and decisions, even in her pauses. Such is butoh.

A change erupts. XUE crushes the petals, whips herself mercilessly with the headless stalks. The viewer must feel the performance, become immersed in the silent power. Is she destroying her patterns, her entrapments? Punishing herself for falling into social restrictions? Inflicting pain to awaken her Self to a new reality? Or is she so numbed by her banal existence that even pain cannot reach her soul? Her physical vocabulary emerges as conventions surrender.

XUE presents a moving, touching, elegant performance. She perfectly embodies the magnificent essence of butoh.

-Karen D’Onofrio-