1. Marking the Holocaust Memorial Day with ‘Ankoku Butoh’

2. What is Ankoku Butoh? Translates as “Dance of Darkness”
Japanese Physical Theatre
Created as a response to Hiroshima (1945)
by Tatsumi Hijikata in 1959.

3. What is movement like? Twisted distorted movements.
That symbolise the body decaying.
Gestures showing physical pain.
They perform everyday movement like standing still over an exaggerated period of time.

6. Was used to:
Demonstrate the long term effects of the Radioactive Bomb on the community.
Make a Political point, by reminding us of the years of slow painful suffering.

7. What is the Holocaust Memorial Day?
A day that helps us to remember a variety of communities that have suffered from persecution, genocide and war.

8. Task 1 Mind map some events from the Nazi Concentration Camps.
Mind map some of the images that may have occurred from that event.

9. Nazi Concentration Camps
Events
Images

10. Task 2
Create some of the images physically using the style of ‘Ankoku Butoh’.

11. Teacher activity
Time
Pupil Activity
Introduce Ankoku Butoh
Explanation of the tradition and style of dance. (Contextualising Butoh on power point)
Run Through : Learning objectives 5/
10mn
Sitting around the PowerPoint.
Dvd Extract of Butoh demonstrating movement qualities and aesthetics.
Task:
Experiencing movement and body empathy.
Ask pupils to fall to the floor as slowly as they can.
(Maintaining the same speed)
Recap the Holocaust connection and similarities with suffering.
Pain
Waiting
Patience
Emotions
Mind map
Images and events of the Holocaust.
(Put one Idea up on the interactive white board with post its)
Select an image from the holocaust and show it in the style of Butoh.
Model eg of standard movement to symbolise image then in the style of Butoh.
Perform as a class to music
Discussing and breaking down what we’re seeing.
Pupils talked through the process; the psychological empathy and kinetic.
Discuss emotions and thoughts and feelings.
Thinking of Ideas surrounding the holocaust.
Choosing their image or one of their peers
Performing following the teachers instructions whilst performing.
Target Question:
Direct Questioning Targeted at evaluating pupils understanding of the session.
Recap over key issues. What is butoh? What was it formed as?
How did it make you feel? Link it to Theatre Practitioners.
10min
max
Answering and summarising the lesson prompted by the teacher. Demonstrating their learning for self, peer and teacher feedback.