Cuerpo Paradójico por José Gil

We know that the dancer evolves in a particular space, different from objective space. The dancer does not move in space, rather, the dancer secretes, creates space with his movement. This is not too different from what happens in theatre, or on other stages and in other scenes. The actor also transforms the scenic space; the gymnast prolongs the space that  surrounds his skin—he weaves with bars, mats, or simply with the ground he steps on  relations of complicity as intimate as the ones he has with his own body. In a similar way,  the zen archer and his target are one and the same. In all of these cases a new space emerges. We will call it the space of the body.

It is a paradoxical space on many levels; while different from objective space, it is not  separated from it. On the contrary, it is imbricated in objective space totally, to the point of being impossible to distinguish one from the other. The transfigured scene where the actor performs—is it not already objective space? Nonetheless, it is a scene invested with affects and new forces—the objects that occupy it gain different emotional values according to the actors’ bodies; and although invisible, the space, the air, acquire a diversity of textures—they become dense or rarified, invigorating or suffocating. It is as if they were enveloping things with a surface similar to the skin. The space of the body is the skin extending itself into space;  it is skin becoming space—thus, the extreme proximity between things and the body. 

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Publicado en: TDR: The Drama Review 50:4 (T192) Winter 2006. ©2006  New York University and the Massachusetts Institute of Technology.