Session House Annual Report 2018: Moe Sugawa
Crossing the Sea—Back Then, I Was a Child—
From November 7 to 11, 2018, Mademoiselle Cinema participated in “Power of the Forest X—Toward the Forest of the Future,” organized by the Wakayama Arts and Culture Support Association (WACSS). In Kumano’s rich forests, which have nurtured history and culture, they conducted dance workshops and created a video work while interacting with all eighteen students across the grades at Izumo Elementary School in Kushimoto, Wakayama Prefecture, and with local residents. This project came to fruition through the efforts of WACSS chair Setsuko Inoue. Through filming and editing, I watched the dancers led by director Naoko Ito, the children, and the power of the forest.
The theme: create a story with the body. The subject: Little Red Riding Hood and the wolf. There is no title yet.
Naoko Ito: “Think of this class as physical education, art, Japanese language, and recess too.”
* “My name is Soei……”
Naoko Ito: “What characters do you write it with?”
* “……… (Apparently unsure what to say.)”
The older students nearby point to the kanji written on his indoor shoe. Looking closely, I see that his other foot wears a slipper.
Soei Kawaguchi (川口蒼瑛): “(Smiling and pointing to the foot in the slipper) I sprained it.”
Everyone: “(Laughter) Take care!”
The mothers, fathers, and grandmothers who gave them their names. The sight of the eighteen students shyly saying their names seemed like a moment when a little light was lit within their own existence.
Ready! Action!
The children divided into Little Red Riding Hoods and wolves, made costumes from newspaper, and went out into the forest. Little Red Riding Hood is justice, and the wolf is the villain. The children enact this fable in the forest. Using two paths through the forest, we film a scene of confrontation. Girls—the Little Red Riding Hoods—peek out from behind the trees; boys become beasts in the densely leafy forest. Acting and playing blend together. The children seemed like guardian deities of the forest.
OK! Cut!
The familiar school hall where they introduced themselves becomes the final stage. About twenty minutes straight through. When Naoko says, “Imagine a thousand people are watching,” the children begin to concentrate quietly.
The few minutes between “Ready! Action!” as filming begins and the call of “OK!”, and a nonstop stage performance of about twenty minutes. How did the children feel the weight of these two spans of time? I drifted between cinema and documentary, my eyes fixed on the children’s expressions appearing within the camera frame.
Pure hearts tremble slightly, and bodies continue to move expansively. The mischievous boys’ expressions move and move, full of curiosity! The grown-up-seeming girls turn delicate gazes held within themselves. The first- and second-graders are somehow the most self-assured. Even the laid-back children smile as their bodies remain relaxed. While inside the world of the story, the children danced with a free way of feeling, directed by no one. Why dance? Humans are born into nature and return to the soil while resisting negative entropy. Mademoiselle Cinema has danced in the forest, on rocks, and in the sea. Encountering the boat artwork created in the forest by artist Rika Oya (大矢利香), I felt that we had been given permission to dance in nature.
Women who crossed the sea a hundred years ago to become brides in an unfamiliar country. The time spent sending our thoughts toward them across the years was something simpler than merely dancing by the sea spreading before our eyes.
Mademoiselle Cinema’s traveling dance met Wakayama’s forests, sea, and children, and the women of a hundred years ago, and the bodies became unguarded. The video work reached the children of Wakayama.
Everyone apparently seemed happy to see themselves onscreen. I would like to keep editing the video with that same openness.
Once again, I thank WACSS chair Setsuko Inoue, Kazuhiko Yamaji (山路和彦), principal of Kushimoto Municipal Izumo Elementary School, all the teachers, all the students, everyone at the youth center, and Mademoiselle Cinema for creating this opportunity.
Moe Sugawa, Mademoiselle Cinema
Excerpt from Session House Annual Report 2018
Photographs: “Power of the Forest X—Toward the Forest of the Future,” workshop at Kushimoto Municipal Izumo Elementary School
