Motif
A motif is a sequence of movements that is repeated throughout the dance. The motif will appear a various number of times, it will be recognisable to the people watching which makes the dance more engaging as it feels familiar.
A motif can be any type of movement whether it's travelling, jumping, turns, gestures or falls.
Now here's something crazy and exciting that some choreographers like to do called Motif development, this is where the motif will be expanded on. The development could be an additional move on the sequence, the size of the movement may get bigger or smaller, different body parts may be used, it could change direction, reverse the order or alter the focus of a movement.
A good example of what a motif looks like is in a piece called Ohad Naharin by Minus 16.
Click play on the video below to watch.
A motif can be any type of movement whether it's travelling, jumping, turns, gestures or falls.
Now here's something crazy and exciting that some choreographers like to do called Motif development, this is where the motif will be expanded on. The development could be an additional move on the sequence, the size of the movement may get bigger or smaller, different body parts may be used, it could change direction, reverse the order or alter the focus of a movement.
A good example of what a motif looks like is in a piece called Ohad Naharin by Minus 16.
Click play on the video below to watch.
The whole of this dance is one big motif! As you've seen from the video, the dance piece starts off with the dances leaning backwards over their chair with their hands in the air then sitting back down, the person on the end falls to the floor each time, the group stand up and shouts while the person on the floor gets back up, that sequence is the motif in this dance as it is constantly repeated. This dance also shows the motif developments each time, the motif is performed an extra action is added on to the beginning of the sequence.
For this piece the choreographer never said what it was about, this gives everybody the ability to make their own interpretations of the dance. The two main ideas of what the dance is about are War and Feminist acts.
This piece is a good example of a motif because it is shown very clearly in the dance, it is very apparent what the motif is and how it is developed.
Although the motif in this is good a problem with it is the repetitiveness becomes almost over whelming and as you're focusing on the development it's difficult to remember how the motif was first shown or developed.
If you still don't get it why not try to imagine that you're choreographing a dance about the time you fell out of your bed. So maybe you'd want to make the motif a fall to the floor to show this. Maybe you'd start off with the fall to floor before doing some dance movements about your one direction pillow case then you'd show the fall again and so on. Get it now? Good!
For this piece the choreographer never said what it was about, this gives everybody the ability to make their own interpretations of the dance. The two main ideas of what the dance is about are War and Feminist acts.
This piece is a good example of a motif because it is shown very clearly in the dance, it is very apparent what the motif is and how it is developed.
Although the motif in this is good a problem with it is the repetitiveness becomes almost over whelming and as you're focusing on the development it's difficult to remember how the motif was first shown or developed.
If you still don't get it why not try to imagine that you're choreographing a dance about the time you fell out of your bed. So maybe you'd want to make the motif a fall to the floor to show this. Maybe you'd start off with the fall to floor before doing some dance movements about your one direction pillow case then you'd show the fall again and so on. Get it now? Good!