The Absentia: A choreographic exploration of absence through presence

Abstract

This research seeks to explore the question of how absence can be performed through presence within a contemporary choreography. It exists in a written thesis and a choreographic performance named The Absentia along with video footage of the performance. I explore in this research ways to invite absence to reside in the present and make meanings of absence from positioning it with presence. The research considers how hauntology theory can be applied to discover the relationship between absence and presence. Additionally, this research explores how concepts of absence, presence and hauntology theory can be used as stimuli in studio practice to create the performance of The Absentia. Living, thinking and behaving in the present is influenced by what has happened in the past: the absence. Therefore, this research considers how dance can function as an approach to retrieving the absence. Additionally, the research recognises that a study of absence is also an investigation of presence. Through exploring absence, one can live in the present and possibly predict a coming future. Engaging with practice-led research, I aim to reflect on the hauntological belief of a returning past (Derrida, 1994; Geary, 2002; Lorek-Jezińska, 2013; O'Riley, 2008; Young, 1997). The practice-led research paradigm reveals how kinaesthetically a performance of absence is created through studio practice (Barrett & Bolt, 2007; Mäkelä, 2007; Sullivan, 2009). It also helps to understand and discover meanings of absence through kinaesthetic exploration (Candy, 2006). The research realises that absence is never absent as it is connected with the present (Goodheart,1984). The presence implies the absence, and this implication shows the presence which is formed under the influence of the absence (Goodheart, 1984).