'Gestures' of Gardzienice

Wlodzimierz Lengauer

     A language of gestures is not ranked among the most comprehensible ways of communication any more; at utmost bodily expression has been strongly individualized. It truly seems that contemporary European culture, only now rediscovering a body language, has forced much of natural, once conventionalized body behavior into the sphere of indecency. Natural behavior of crying has been almost hidden, at least in relation to male population. Physical touching of another person is considered highly inappropriate; under certain circumstances this approach also refers to excessive face mimicry or lively gesticulation. We have learned to restrain our emotions to a smaller or greater extent anyway. If we demonstrate them we use modest means of expression. It does not only relate to our emotions featured in our everyday social life (both in private family life and public space), but also in art, particularly in theatre where tension is built in a detached and balanced way. We forget about Shakespearean sound and fury. The consequence of the well-known fact that Greek culture, also in its classical period (5th – 4th c. B. C.), was mostly oral – was a great role of spoken word which could not do without movement and gesture. In Homer’s Odyssey the performance of the epic poet Demodokos in Scheria, who recited or rather sang playing phormincs, was accompanied by a dance of young Phaeacians. A theatre performance in the 5th c Athens was mostly a colorful and noisy show.
A theatre performance in Athens was a show of loudly shouting and lively gesticulating performers, accompanied by music. It is obvious that the movement of the choir and gesticulation of actors belonged to the artistic means characteristic for a theatre performance, but at the same time it was clearly understood behavior, featured in rituals, speeches in court tribunals or simply everyday life, the audience was familiar with. Even the most superfluous reading of Homer conveys the picture of conventionalized gestures (most frequently invocations) and animated, quick-tempered reactions demonstrated by protagonists.
Nowadays we are inclined to forget that the people of antiquity (not only Homer’s protagonists) behaved loudly and violently, were guided by emotions expressing them through lively, dynamic mimicry and gesticulation, sometimes vulgar, abusive, often blindly ending up in bloodshed.
For Greek writers cheironomy or, in the Latin version chironomy, (Greek noun cheir – „hand”, verb cheironomeo – „to gesticulate”) was first of all an element of choreography, lively gesticulation of a dancing choir presenting their physical condition and dancing skills, at the same time allowing to express, just like Greek sculpture, a state of man and his feelings. Staniewski’s Electra returns to Greek cheironomy, or it rather refers to this way of performing and communicating not only emotions and moods, but also entire situations. Staniewski called his performance a theatrical essay, its program enumerating thirty-one separately entitled scenes.