TLO - The Language of Objects
The TLO workshop is based on a structured checklist of questions and impulses designed to sensitise humans to the presences, agencies and affordances of objects. Initially a personal creation method, it encompasses many aspects of Benjamin's choreographic and performance philosophy. Rooted in Graham Harman's Object-Oriented-Ontology, J.J. Gibsons Theory of Affordances, and Benjamin's researches into the Bauhaus and post-modernism, TLO enables others to not only develop their own object-oriented sensitivity, but to understand more about their own creative processes.
As well as using the method in his own creations, Benjamin has taught TLO to BA, MA and PHD students at the Stockholm University of the Arts (SKH), at the Ècole Supérieur des Arts du Cirque (ESAC), as well as at other performing arts universities and institutions and in independent workshops all over Europe. The method can be taught in a studio or remotely via video conference.
TLO has left a strong trace in the circus world, with it now being commonplace for artists to regard their objects as more equal partners and to give space to their inherent values, meanings and presences. Benjamin sees this to be a valuable development towards a more sustainable relationship with objects and materials in the performing arts and the world in general.
Benjamin’s creative advice and knowledgeable opinion on the history of contemporary juggling had a tremendous impact on my work and my understanding of my circus practice. I found in his teachings substantial questions to confront the many assumptions that were laying behind my performative intentions, and concrete tools to use as compositional strategies. His long experience in dance as much as in circus, lead me through a journey of fast discovery as I was walking on a similar path. It is under Benjamin’s careful and unreplaceable supervision, that I succeeded in my circusnext selection. His methods not only changed my work, but also the perspective in which I position myself in relation to my work, and my discourse around it.
- Andrea Salustri