1.61 Golden Section

1.61 GOLDEN SECTION

1 VIDEO. 61 ARTISTS

A collaborative improvisation project for music and dance. Taking place online via Youtube, Instagram and Facebook throughout January & February 2021. 

1.61 GOlden sectiON is an innovative improvisation project, running digitally until Thursday 18^th February 2021. Created by the London artistic management agency Only Stage, and exploring theme of the famous ‘golden ratio’ that has existed in science, art and music since ancient times, the project is in collaboration with Teatro degli Arcimboldi in Milan and Edizioni Curci Music Publishing, with the support of the Arts Council Cultural Recovery Fund.

For this unique digital collaborative initiative, composer and pianist Delilah Gutman has created 61 musical shorts based on improvisation. Throughout the run, theses 61 tracks will be sent to 61 Italian and International dancers who, following some simple unifying guidelines, will dance on the theme of 1.61, or the golden section, embodying perfection and imbuing the concept of the perfect ratio into their compositions.

The short tracks will be edited and evaluated by the artistic committee put together by Davide Garattini Raimondiand Barbara Palumbo, in order to structure an effective sequence. The final video, which will feature all 61 single videos, will not be in chronological order, but instead will be structured around a hypothetical fil rouge emerges from every single improvisation and unifies the concept as a whole. The videos will subsequently be published and disseminated through the social media platforms (YouTube, Vimeo, Facebook and Instagram) with daily frequency.

The periodic number 1.61 refers to the golden section, a number which has been studied for centuries and indicates the ratio between two unequal lengths of which the greater is an average proportional between the smaller and the sum of the two.

The golden section was also found as a constant within medical parameters relating to human movement, of which dance is arguably its highest expression. A number easily identifiable, 1.61 is a clear, legible reference and index of perfection, and here it is shown to represent the movement of the body against the static state the pandemic has forced upon us: of opening versus closing, and of dance as a response to physical and mental immobility. Terpsichore‘s art, here understood as the maximum expression of freedom, is the same freedom that we cannot give up on.

This unique project uses technology not as a simple mean of disseminating an art designed to be experienced live, but as a fundamental part of the artistic project itself. Here, it is able to provide the viewer three-dimensionality of the movement through the two-dimensionality of the screen.

"The spread of the Sars-Cov-2 virus has forced us to use new communication systems, even in Art. With this project we want to claim a new perspective on video dance: the pandemic thus becomes the pretext for the creation of a new art form and no longer the context within which art adapts to be simply spread through the technological means at our disposal.

Despite beinga British art management company based in London, we at Only Stage found ourselves in these difficult times being able to support our artists in a manner similar to an ancient impresario thanks to the grant we received from the Arts Council Recovery Fund. Davide Garattini, an extraordinary stage director and our artist, presented us with this project, conceived with Barbara Palumbo and Delilah Gutman, and we could not help supporting it. Maintaining our focus on international co-production. We were delighted to involve the Teatro degli Arcimboldi and the Curci Musical Editions, two of the most prestigious Italian organizations based in Milan.

– Susanna Stefani Caetani, Only Stage

All videos will be online on the Youtube, Facebook and Instagram channels of Only Stage, Teatro degli Arcimboldi and Edizioni Curci Music & Books, every evening at 09.00pm.

@onlystage.co.uk