LANGUID BODIES
A Butoh and Video Performance
"Those languid bodies
once were
tense of life"
When does our body languish if it is not when we lose it?
Death itself, in that tension that torments us so much, must go through the total languor that so much romanticizes us.
From our early childhood we feel how our members come into different tensions, be it by surprise, fear, anxiety, excitement, passion, and we discover that languor - as a total exhaustion - comes when that tension ends, when we cannot endure it more, when something stronger than us has been completely satiated.
Sexual rape of girls and boys within the family is more than common in our species, it is a continuous practice, almost traditional, and in the same way it is a practice of concealment of the act that societies and religions reject but do everything possible to avoid its exit to the light; the abuse by one becomes the abuse by all. The presence of that abuse continues in the life of the violated person and it is a reminder that traditions do not break easily.
In the absence of a greater fight against physical and mental violence languor becomes the only means of survival, allowing everything that attacks us to penetrate even more easily, without resistance, until the end of life itself.
Neither adolescence dreams, nor the desire of having a family or even a personal professional success will leave our -forever- languid body... The tension of that omnipresent trauma is also a kind of languor.
Omar Ramírez Casas in his seven sections in video and Gustavo Thomas in his improvised choreographies of Butoh navigate through the hidden images of that trance of the languid body due to the violence exerted by sexual abuse in childhood.
The images of his creation follow each other without apparent chronological logic, let's say they are a substitute for impressions of a concrete fact, as is the visual poetry of Omar and the internal impulse of Gustavo's performative body.
The non-conclusion of this creative act is a metaphor of death itself: the total languor of the body and its images is the accumulation of beauty before its final dissolution.

若非至死,我们的身体何时凋零?
死亡本身必须经历那些使我们浪漫的萎靡;虽然它带来的紧张感使我们饱受折磨。
我们自幼便能感受到大家如何陷入不同的紧张感中。不论它们是惊喜、恐惧、焦虑、兴奋还是激情,当这种紧张感消失、当我们忍无可忍、当某些比我们更强大的东西完全满足的时候,萎靡——一种精疲力竭的状态——便来到我们身边。
对家中男孩和女孩实施的性侵犯,在人间屡见不鲜。这是一种持续的、几近传统的行为,同时也是一种隐蔽的行为;社会和宗教在拒绝它的同时却竭尽所能地避免将其曝于光天化日之下。于是乎,一人施虐变成众人施虐。这种虐待在受虐者的一生里蔓延滋长;它提醒着人们,传统是难以挣脱的枷锁。
无法与身体和精神暴力抗衡时,萎靡成了唯一的生存之道。它放弃抵抗,让攻击我们的一切长驱直入,直到生命的尽头。
青春的梦想、拥有家庭或事业成功的愿景都不会彻底离开我们萎靡不振的身躯……创伤无所不在;它的紧绷感也是一种萎靡。
奥马尔·拉米雷斯·卡萨斯的七段视频与古斯塔沃·托马斯的即兴舞踏穿梭在那些恍惚隐秘的图像之间;它们是因童年性侵而萎靡的躯体。
这些创作的图像之间没有明显的时间逻辑顺序;它们正如奥马尔的视觉诗歌和古斯塔沃舞动身体中的内在冲劲,替代了具体的事物印象,
创意表演戛然而止,就正如死亡本身:身体完全的萎靡和影像凝聚为美,最终消融殆尽。
慵懒的身体
慵懒的身体
曾几何时
紧张地生活
童年
女孩
皮肤如此美丽
无尽地仰望着
屋顶
她稚嫩的身体
眺望着苍穹
暴力
天真的兄弟
你利用
熟悉的吻
你攻击
缓慢而暴力
没有紧张感
我的胸口滑入
身边的地狱
沉默
我不为自己哭的时候
紧张过后
慵懒是道
我放弃
我上升
我沉重地接受
让我迷失的它
梦
肿胀的我飘浮
在自己的河流中
脏了的纱巾
我的肢
不叫喊
不呻吟
全身湿透
梦中却如释重负
欺骗
纯净的面具
却抹不净
那双嘴唇
婚礼
是粉色的惩罚
嗜血的惩罚
放弃
落空的希望
四散的孩子们
虐待
寂寞飞翔
无可救药
永恒
那个夜晚
昏暗慵懒
无用的
天真
永远消失
美丽仇恨着
无可救药的悲伤
(Translation by Eva Chen & Tadeo Berjon)
LANGUID BODIES
Languid bodies
once they were
tense in life
CHILDHOOD
Girl
of beautiful skin
looks constantly
to the roof
Her tender body
looks to the sky
VIOLENCE
Ingenuous brother
you take advantage
of familiar kisses
You lunge
slow and violent
Without tension
my chest slips
near hell
SILENCE
Time I do not weep for me
After tension
to languish is the means
I let up
I rise above
I receive without relief
that in which I lose myself
DREAMS
Floating swollen
in my own waters
The veils dirty
my limbs
they do not scream
nor moan
wet
they dream about themselves in relief
DECEIT
Masks of purity
they do not clean
the lips
The wedding
it is a rose-pink punishment
a bloody one
ABANDONMENT
Vain hope
The children detach
abusing
Loneliness flies
without remedy
PERMANENCE
Night
opaque and languid
Useless
innocence
forever lost
Beauty hates
Irreparable sadness