(not) Understanding Improvisational Dance through the Lens of the Kantian Sublime

Abstract

Collective dance improvisation, as an experimental form of dance-making, presents a challenge and dissatisfaction to the audience member who attempts to interpret it by asking what it is about, or what it is supposed to represent. These pieces are characterized by their collaborative, spontaneous nature, and by their blurring of the lines between quotidien and virtuosic, expected and unexpected, natural and unnatural. In this paper, I argue that questions about representation stand in the way of having an aesthetic appreciation of improvised dance pieces. On the other hand, I find Kant’s aesthetic theory in The Critique of Judgment promising to be used in this case, for its dissociation of representation from aesthetic judgments. I ultimately argue that Kant’s notion of “the sublime,” as opposed to “the beautiful,” is applicable to improvisational dance, as it accounts for the negative pleasure we feel in experiencing something we cannot fully comprehend. This ends up challenging Kant’s own framework, as he never acknowledges such connections between the two and only uses “the sublime” in the context of nature.