I’ve realized how stressful the spring was and now that I’m easing into the summer and a bit of a holiday, I start to feel all the workload in my body. I even haven’t had the time to sit down in peace to write my blog and there are numerous things that I haven’t managed to complete the way I would have liked or needed to. I have some issues with my lower back and neck which need a bit of focus, time and energy.
My performances during the Kuopio Dance Festival as part of Paikallisliike 09 event went well but left me with a lot of questions. I was very happy that some collegues, people from the Finnish Dance Information Centre and at least one international writer were present at the performances but I don’t understand why the Kuopio Dance Festival cannot collaborate with the regional dance centre more thoroughly. Many dance professionals say that the Paikallisliike programme is much more exciting than the actual Kuopio Dance Festival programme but still there are a lot of writers that were in Kuopio who did not bother to see the full Paikallisliike programme because they don’t consider the program seriously. Jussi Tossavainen from Helsingin Sanomat and Eeva Kauppinen from the Finnish theatre magazine and Kaleva newspaper -among others- were here but did not attend the full Paikallisliike programme (they also didn’t bother to attend the launch of the ANTI Festival 2009 programme). I saw Eeva in one of the performances, which consisted of two worst works I’ve seen for a while. I don’t know, but I think she was there because one of the works was a premiere by Rimpparemmi, a folk dance group from the same region where she lives. Jussi Tossavainen I only saw in the Veljmies supermarket gambling and didn’t feel like saying hello to him. I don’t know – I just don’t understand why writers across Finland and Europe come all this way but instead of seeing as much as they can, they gamble, take salsa classes or otherwise just relax as supposed so showing interest to contemporary dance artists’ works? This really depresses me. Well, an exception was Ann-Marie Wrange from the Swedish Dans Tidningen who came to see several nights of the Paikallisliike event and who also attended both of my works. That was really lovely and I enjoyed her presence in BODY/HAIR a lot.

There’s a lot I would like to blog about but I will have to continue tomorrow. Today I went to functional training and cycled back and forth and feel pretty exhausted now. I’ve promised to my trainer that I will run a half marathon in September so I’m in the middle of my running programme. I’ll write more about that soon.

Johanna