Host is a one-woman-entertainment-service-machine. In the hostess clubs of Tokyo, Filipino female and transgender hostesses engage in ‘affective labour’ by performing a version of femininity that caters to Japanese salary men. These hostesses employ mimetic strategies and hybrid identities to survive and succeed. It is in this role that we first discover Jocson: she is our host, receiving and entertaining the audience as guests. The body then begins its transformation into a database of female body representations. And the performance physically explores mimesis and hybridity by colonizing Jocson’s body with a diversity of female dance languages of entertainment. Host invites us to experience and reflect on feminine image formation by displaying forms of entertainment strategies associated with femininity and by exhibiting labor and body politics.

www.eisajocson.wordpress.com

CONCEPT, CHOREOGRAPHY, DANCE Eisa Jocson DRAMATURG Arco Renz COACH Rasa Alksnyte SOUND DESIGN, COMPOSITION Marc Appart NIHON BUYO COACH Nanako Nakajima NIHON BUYO TEACHER Oohisui Hanayagi SHIN BUYO TEACHER Bea Tamura Pascua LIGHT DESIGN Ansgar Kluge, Eisa Jocson PRODUCER Tang Fu Kuen

Residency and co-production: Workspacebrussels, Tanzhaus-nrw

Research and Residency grant: Saison Foundation

Co-production: Zürcher Theater Spektakel, Beursschouwburg

Residency and work in progress showing: TPAM 2015 (Tokyo Performing Arts Meeting), Pianofabriek

photo © Andreas Endermann