This is an old review but I just found it in a folder and I think its chur as so its going up! Written by Alexa Wilson

‘Terces Ym’ – Performance Improvisation

Graduation MCPA Performance by Sarah Gavina Campus

Danced by Sarah and Val Smith

November 5 & 6, 2008

TAPAC Auckland

A calm opening in the darkness. Two women are present. At ease, open and powerful within darkness and light as if they are one. A depth created in space and body which makes performers and audience alike seem as if they are together in the deep ocean in its depth and calm- both emotionally and spiritually. The way the light cuts through deep ocean/space creating an ephemerality and a clarity, the two performers engage with their presence, each other and the environment. I am mesmerised. There is both stillness and expanse as the two move with such poise, awareness and synchronicity one would or could think this dance is 'choreographed'. Of course, we know, it is. In the same way that life unfolds and tells us its many stories in one long, manifold constant.

The beauty of liminal improvisational performance is that it not only opens and heightens spaces and transitions and transforms strong imagery also evoked in the viewer as a liminal exchange, but it fuses or morphs imagery and experience together between them in one constant exchange and endless transformation. This was my primary experience of the performance.

As the space/body work opened, I began a 'reading'- perhaps defined by these black, androgynous military costumes clothing that had such inherent female power, beauty and intelligence floating in deep space and time. I saw a connection to World War II and the trails of this left in our generations blood/DNA make up, coupled with Italian (traditional/folk) song and knowing Sarah's genealogy of Italian/Sardegnan family history. I was aware that this was my own projection and I was seeing or 'making of' the improvisation what I wanted, but this very European experience of survival during war and horrific disconnection from celebration of humanity which brought such suffering (perhaps a reason for immigration to nz?) was at once sitting inside the grief of this past and healing it at the same time. I saw also the reclamation of a long line of female magicians, healers, shamans, and witches healing this history together. This was in the beginning of the performance and an example of the imagery, which arose and was evoked in me.

There was such a depth of presence and sensitivity within both performers Sarah and Val, - such a deep knowing and trust available to them that each movement, gesture, moment of contact or solo moment was embued with extreme awareness and care. While there was the power of pain transformed in small and large stories through transitioning moments in both audience and performer, the liminal space created an extremely focused, vulnerable and powerful sense of love and safety. Things were looked after and cared for in this world created by the performers.

Retreat into darkness was as profound, loving and artful as a reach of the hand into a small square of light. There was no judgement here, only being, being in self, with other, powerful and generous. The skilfulness of this form of improvisation is so captivating because while both the performers in this work were extremely internally aware and intuitive they were also as externally aware and giving of themselves and the audience. This is SUCH a rare quality in ordinary dance. While it is fleeting in other 'choreographic' or 'improvisational' work it was continuous throughout this performance which for me was a testament to the mastery of their improvisational craft and bond together as performers and people. They created a space for new voices and experiences to be felt, heard and seen. This was done through total clarity and presence within the ether.

This was my overall experience of this absorbing, powerful and moving performance.

Prodigious Pilot

Yours Truly Productions present Prodigious Pilot
Transmission Room

By Georgie Goater

In the heart of high-rise Auckland city, an emerging group in an underground venue take on popular culture through contemporary dance. Indie/pop music (Lady GAGA, Lady Hawk, Lilly Allen, Gwen Stefani… and more) runs until we are casually ushered to the cabaret-seated dungeon facing the stage. Banana lollies in trendy vintage teacups and bowels of fruit are on offer throughout the space. In front of the stage to the right, stand racks of hanging clothes, to the left a mock band of instruments – a drum kit (tagged “The Peelers”), keyboard and 2 guitars made out of cardboard and tinfoil; evoking a memory of the knitted aesthetic in Stereogram’s video “Walkie Talkie Man”.

Out of the darkness lurks the first performer who takes their place on stage (perhaps the lead band member of “The Peelers”) - a 2-imensional life-size Banana head man, who proceeds to execute a lateral two step dance to the beat of the music, building to a climactic boogie. A gimmick false start to the show along with a voice-over announcement introducing Prodigious Pilot, sets a tone of the ironic mockery of pop hype.

Six young women explode into the space with a sassy synchronised dance routine, of which the integrity is carried through a collective interpretation of the popstars personas, and each performer’s own expression of their ‘bedroom mirror’ alter-egos. This chorus of Cool Bananas complete with uniform yellow printed t-shirts and yellow sneakers is the recurring theme and structure that frames the series of dance vignettes in the show, through theatrical scenarios and leg air-guitar dancing. Overtly characterised and throw-away in performance, yet effortlessly united and succinct to the musical beats, these individuals dance well together.

A stylised Egyptian duet between a male and female is slick, fast and tight, displaying pleasurable moments of unison and partnering movement supported by the dynamic base-heavy track by Santigold.

With the choreographer herself as the bride in between murdering bride’s maids, a soap opera inspired scenario of dance unfolds. Detailed, fast and intricate movement expresses the build up of internal angst, beautifully executed by this technical trio. A deconstructed sound score of dramatic organ sound bites, is the only break in the show from popular music – in all a sophisticated highlight in the show.

An improvised dance to Joy Division has a solitude woman staunchly enter the space and bounce on and off beat across the concrete floor like an awkward lone rocker at a concert. An honest performance, as the dancer naturally progresses through the build up in the movement and melts into a grin; this is a delight to watch.

Melancholic Moby and Iron & Wine play musical access in a private friendship heart to heart duet. Helping each other into long dresses, the weighted dancers come off the floor into a soft dance of freedom.

A final solo dance to Billy Idol’s hit track “Dancing with Myself” triggers the return of the Cool Bananas, in a chorus frenzy of high legs, quick turns, swooping arms and the repeated gesture and sound of eating (bananas). The dancers charge around the space through the audience and up on to chairs chanting “go bananas” infusing the audience a with sensory banana overload.

Yours Truly Productions has bravely taken on pop music as their access to self-expressive choreography, despite the challenging nature of predisposed associations other popular art forms can present when making dance. The punchy, catchy dancing always matches the level of hype and interest of the pops songs and is never outweighed – a challenge I believe these girls achieved with their innovative dance moves. The banana as the symbol of pop eventually exhausts the show without development from its original introduction – a journey is missing with this idea. I am left wanting more, but with less banana.

Sacred Blend Satisfies

Sacred Dance Tempo 09
Collection of works
4,5 & 6 October
TAPAC, Auckland

Review by Sarah Gavina Campus

So what’s sacred about our dance here in Aotearoa? I went along to immerse myself in a programme designed to initiate a shift in consciousness.

This year’s Sacred Dance programme offered an eclectic mix of physical and metaphysical dance that traversed through emotional and environmental landscapes in search of expansion and expression.

First up was Dee Landon’s work ‘Persephone’, performed by Sassy Niven. Niven dances in homage to the Greek fertility myth of Demeter and Persephone’s journey to the Underworld. Resplendent in pink and white, Niven exemplified the Isadora Duncan style of dance – free flow, bare foot, expressly feminine.

Sassy did a great job in emotionally exposing the tale, particularly and clearly through her facial expression. Gestural movements and a flattering draped pink and white costume spoke of delicate flowers, earthly abundance and added an archetypal female signature to the piece. Invocation in arms and footwork deftly wove wave like patterns emphasising circles and arcs, continuity and female cycles of birth, growth, renewal and change. Niven dances with assurity and definition, reflecting the tradition of Isadora with a clear sense of timing and rhythmic and lyrical flow.

Jumps were precise and a welcome counterpoint to her floorwork. My sense was that Landon attempted to portray both characters of Demeter and Perspehone, speaking through the dancer’s body their relationship to the underworld and eachother. Two performers may have been a more fitting choice in order to clarify the theatrical dynamics of this ancient myth. Sassy performed both roles with commitment and an awareness of the shifts in state needed to profile each character.

Next up was Jennifer De Leon, in a brave and self-reflexive piece of work entitled ‘The Light Came Through The Window’ (2008), exploring her total dedication to dance following major hip surgery. Revival, resurgence and regeneration emerged as primary feeling tones, as did portrayal of plummeting sorrow, grieving and loss that physical injury can have on a dancer’s career and passion.

Jenny danced with conviction and fortitude, opening her vulnerable self to the audience. She combines her history in modern and balletic dance with contemporary sensitivity to the space around her, softening her body at times to yield to forces of gravity and momentum.

The exposure of Jenny’s open chest to the sky added another heart felt depth and sense of intimacy to the work. Falling and spinning into the backspace combined with strong limb extension provided dynamic balance and showed Jenny’s willingness to embrace current contemporary movement genres. A repeated series of rond de jambes appeared to reference the location of her injury; evocative of the ordeal her body has experienced.

Music by Leonard Cohen was the perfect sonic accompaniment to support themes of sombre loss, purposelessness turning to purposeful, the rekindling and picking up pieces of broken anatomy, and an uncompromising ferocity to stand tall in the face of adversity.

A free standing split leg balance displayed De Leon’s physical skill and ability to control her form. Her prowess as performer and technician emerged strongly, and I encourage her to continue to find stability in her work, both physically and in live performance. Jenny appeared to be breaking some of her own habits in dance by committing her body to move in a ruthless and tender pursuit of her own journey.

Monisha Kumar presented ‘Natraj Dance’, a potent mix of polarity in response to the deity Lord Shiva. Kumar cuts a stunning figure of Indian graciousness, speed, charm and precision. She energises a direct line to her audience, which captivates our hearts. Monisha communicates to each audience member, allowing us to witness her passion and commitment to her sacred dance.

This dance revered Lord Shiva through a series of continuously morphing and fluid images that explored ‘feminine’ and ‘masculine’ aspects. Movements alternated between articulate traditional finger, head, arm and foot patterns more evocative of a feminine essence in classical Indian dance, to explosive and dynamic whole body expressions that propelled her directly and speedily through space and with ‘masculine’ energy and force in limbs, eyes and torso. This provided a real winning combination for the viewer. An extended sequence of ‘on the spot’ turns displayed Monisha’s ability and expertise in this dance form.

Musicality comes naturally to Monisha, evident in the marrying of her superb footwork with the beats of both traditional contemporary rhythms and contemporary music which accompanied the change of states from ‘feminine’ to ‘masculine’.

I delight in watching Monisha dazzle with costume and a face that so expressively lights up the space around her. She appears effortless in her ability to hold contradictory rhythms in her body with animated power and one pointed focus and attention to detail, whilst dancing with such joy!

Benny Ord’s solo presence on stage is unmistakable. Mixing fluid precision with a length in his limbs that seem to wrap themselves around the entire stage, Benny also exudes calm and serene stage energy. Ord epitomises the ‘cross-over artist’ – equally masterful in both camps of contemporary and classical form.

‘Peter’ (2003), choreographed by Mary-Jane O’Reilly, was originally commissioned for St Paul’s cathedral in collaboration with the Auckland Choral Society. Ord eloquently embraces the moodiness and turmoil demanded by this piece. He appears instinctively in command of both melancholic qualities and technical virtuosity - who can forget those leg extensions! Benny is rapidly coming into his own as a mature male dancer, able to portray the inner world of the solo dance character. He captures in movement the poetry and sensitivity needed to dance this journey in a modern ballet style.

Ord’s lines sear through the space. He appears like a sea bird in the wind – highly articulate, delicate and powerful in a masculine style. Although classically trained, Ord’s body owns a contemporary sense of weight and momentum that strikes the space in a lightning like manner. He sets and conveys the story with honed focus and commitment to each moment to ooze a simple looking body whilst dancing complex choreography.

Benny’s next challenge is to bring his quirky and unique dancing signature to his face and allow his mask to generate aliveness and expression so natural to his body. This will enrich and add whole new layers to his charismatic presence.

The stand out highlight of the evening for me was ‘Siva Aitu’, the new 30 minute work by emerging company Ura Tabu, choreographed by Charlene Tedrow. This strong band of women is a potent force to be reckoned with – a posse of young bodies grounded in earth, in sensual stage presence and in their relationship to eachother. The mix creates a performance synergy that ignites the space with reverence to cultural and spiritual homelands.

‘Siva Aitu’ was broken into 5 parts or rites of passage, each beginning with film footage dedicated to various components of Pacific living. Geography, environmental disasters, history, colonisation, cultural artefacts, artifice and community spirit is touched upon and explored in a rich soundscore composed of natural sounds of bush, birds and animals.

The dancers of Ura Tabu are totally committed to this work. Hands appear so softly to touch the earth in respect for themselves and for the environment of Pacific peoples. Fingers trace simultaneously delicate air patterns in the sky whilst pumping bare soles lay claim to the earth inside their blood.

Choreography presents a mix of traditional, contemporary and hybrid forms, each appearing as an exploration of primarily ensemble formations. The women are so tuned to eachother that this format works very well for them. A dynamic sensitivity between each performer creates a palpable tension and longing for reunion and symmetry when one dancer departs to solo or duet.

Costumes cloak and/or reveal the body in simple lines and combinations, fleshing sensuality and honouring traditional and current fashion. The ‘mix and match’ approach further conceptually developed could create a fresh mark on the dance scene in this country. These women offer a point of difference. They are not afraid to show us their wildness and abandon, their sexual integrity, their love of their people united through time and geographic distance, and their sacred relationship to nature and cultural practice.

With a narrative hung loosely around departure from a shared point, navigating outwards to locate new knowledge from Pacific lands, and re-emerging with new forms, Ura Tabu presented a dance fitting to the recent turmoil in Samoa. Touching upon environmental themes allowed audience members to realise the preciousness of the Pacific and the fragile environment in which it sits.

Film images of faces and people in action coupled with live drumming and singing reinforced the communal elements vital to the conservation and preservation of Pacific ecology and rituals. Images were skilfully woven to impact the overall choreographic texture. With further artistic development these could become a powerful symbol to inspire and clarify a cohesive choreographic voice.

Each dancer embodied the entire movement range required by the dance - from wild head and hip movements to earth pounding plies and foot rhythms, and fantastically focussed eyes channelling the lineage and spirit of Pacific peoples. My own mind and body is steeped in kinaesthetic and visual memories of dextrous fingers dripping through pockets of air created by rippling, curvaceous, sensual arms.

In all the works of the Sacred Dance programme, my spirit was moved – someplace, to a new place, to a place I had never been. Only by the performers embodying their own sense of the sacred could I be opened to my own experience. Well done everyone. Let’s hope you continue to define and redefine the sacred in your dance and to share in skill and celebration.

.

Footnote Forte Solo Series

Footnote Forte Solo Series
6 pm, 12 October 2009, City Art Rooms, Lorne St, Auckland

By Alys Longley

Footnote Dance Company’s latest offering Footnote Forte gives a new twist to their repertoire, with a series of solo works, each one made by a different choreographer, performed in unusual locations. Here in Auckland it’s the City Art Rooms and the bar Cassette Number Nine. I very much enjoyed the intimacy of the works and the intensity of the dancers- the intimacy of performer and audience is matched by that of the two dance artists collaborating in making a new work – as the evening unfolded I thought a lot about the provocative nature of the solo dance work.

Michael Parmenter’s piece Somebody’s Darling folds out from itself in enticing layers of formal play, narrative complexity and creative heritage; the work is choreographed to Douglas Lilburn’s somber, moving piece Elegy, which dancer Francis Christeller’s grandfather sung for its original recording. Christeller’s intense performance quality reminded me of Parmenter’s performance of his Long Undressing, especially as this piece is actually structured as an undressing, from the formal confidence of the performing opera singer to the near naked figure of a figure stricken by loss. I enjoyed the space that Parmenter gave his movement phrases, the formal cycle of movement echoing the shifting tones of Lilburn’s arrangement of poems by Alastair Te Ariki Campbell.

Kristian Larsen’s Adze was a work of sparking, diving, hurtling playfulness, with
dancer Claire Lissaman flowing through unpredictable momentum paths into abrupt shifts of rhythm and form. Larsen made Adze as a tribute to local composer Phil Dadson, but I really can’t figure out why Dadson’s music didn’t feature in the work – his creativity sure did though, Lissaman radiated the experimental pathways of Dadson’s sonic / aesthetic experimentation with confidence and strength.

Dancer Anita Hunziker was positively ablaze with the confidence of a who-gives-a-shit electro-pop loving teenager in Sarah Foster’s Firecracker. Her brooding demeanour shot through excessive pathways of what the programme describes as a “cathartic onslaught of movement”. This movement was edgy, provocative, and very rock ‘n’ roll.

The final work of the evening (two of the program’s works– Ross McCormack’s Stealth and Malia Johnstone’s Lens 1 are off the evening bill) was set in bar Cassette Number Nine – a perfectly chosen venue for Maria Dabrowska’s Stark, which fantastically brought dancer Sarah Knox’s tremendous skill and spark to the stage. This was a very tight, enjoyable piece, although I must say that it was almost too tight, with a bit too much ‘tah-dah-ness’ for my taste. I would have loved to see the darker, more challenging elements of Stark’s legacy brought to the fore – and I would think that Dabrowska would be the one to do it, as she’s proven she’s highly capable of innovative and edgy work.

It was a pleasure to enter the field of such fiery, electric collaborations between choreographers, dancers and composers.

And We Need You!!!!

A review of Prime Cuts
Alys Longley
6 October 2009

No seriously, my feeling is that right now our dance community is desperately in need of the kind of work performed in the Prime Cuts show of this years’ Tempo Festival. Big ups to the curatorial team of M.J O Reilly, Marianne Shultz and Marama Lloyd who selected a body of daring, inspiring and challenging dance works, all of which deserve longer runs and extended development.

The evening began delicately with Sefa Enari’s work Fanua. This choreography was danced with sophisticated articulation by Filio Vaila’au, with composer Poulima Salima’s soundtrack echoing the fusion of the modern and the traditional in contemporary Samoan dance.

Melanie Turner’s work Texture evoked landscape and birdlife. Abstract movement was punctuated with environmental motifs, with digital projections folding the dancers in rich texture of light, colour and pattern, reminding me of the way light creates and recreates the movement of the forest with shadow and sun.

My heart skipped more than one beat for Anna Bate’s new work Score, performed by Bate and Mariana Rinaldi. This dance felt rough, ready, confrontational and playful. From the outset this piece signalled that its audience was going to be more like a room of active witnesses (and perhaps testifiers or judges) than a safe and passive audience, to the extent that our presence as audience was cleverly choreographed into the torsion of the work. This piece had me on the edge of my seat, and really made me want to DANCE in salutation of the anti-social, the imperfect, the radiant strangeness of negotiating interactions with others.

Gabrielle Tomas’s piece Hapu was another courageous work dealing with a negotiation of shifting identity – the term “heavily pregnant” couldn’t apply to Thomas, who shared the incredible form of her pregnant body with lightness, almost ease. The want of utter easiness occurred in Tomas’s engagement with what she describes as the ‘celestial grotesque’, which she describes in the programme notes as a form of physical endurance. Tomas’s work begins with a film work; she is submerged in water, her pregnant body rich with movement – this state soon becomes uncomfortable – is she trapped in the water, will she surface? She eventually does, but the sense of a disconcerting lack of control, of weight carried and of the magnificence of this weight makes this a gripping work.

Geordan Wilcox and Kristian Larsen’s work re:set closed the evening. Wilcox and Larsen are wonderful performers,– as highly experienced dancers they might be considered an unlikely pair – Wilcox’s forte being ballet and Larsen’s being performance improvisation, but it is in the disjunction between movement vocabularies that this work sparks. The tension between Wilcox’s controlled sharp lines (heightened by his wearing a pristine suit) and Larsen’s idiosyncratic, organic informality (wearing a singlet) were perfectly matched. As the piece finished I must admit I was left with a desire for the partnering in the work to develop further, and this is a work that I think should be developed, which felt like it had further depths to mine.

In fact, all of works in this years Prime Cuts are well worth further development. I especially hope that Melanie Turner’s Texture has a further run as I felt this was a piece that was just finding its feet, which the dancers could release themselves into still further, relax into, to really find the edges of the phrasing that Turner skilfully and rhythmically choreographs into her work.

All in all, I would say that Prime Cuts is a must-see. It’s rare to see such a diverse body of choreographic ideas brought together in such a way that the works accent each other, with the singularity of each work still being supported. And a random tinsel bird person as well!! Perfect!!

"Displacement"- a performance by Alice Masprone and Marco Pezzotta as part of Chiba&LaPupazza at Okidoki Gallery, Neukölln Berlin, 0ct 3rd 09

So I just posted this on my facebook status because I was moved by a small piece of performance art in a gallery that my new Italian friend Sara had taken me to in my local suburb of Neukölln in Berlin, which was a group exhibition organised by Italian artists. I said 'Alexa Wilson saw a performance in an exhib last night where a woman lay naked on the floor and encouraged people to sit around her touching her as she joined people's hands gently across her body. . nice and unexpected for berlin. something quiet, something ...gentle.. something honouring of vulnerability. cool to see small children also observing with curiosity. no irony, no rock n roll, no ego. simple. .'

Then Cat, the editor of this review site, wrote to me 'yellingmouth!' and I thought I don't know who the artist was though, but then I realised that not only does this performance sum up alot of things I think European progressive performance really has to offer right now in 2009 going on 2010, but we ARE in the digital age and I can easily find out who she was. And this is the strength of this age.. so here we are creating and sharing webs of community, experiences and ideas.. across the world, across the net- with my Italian friend opening me up to a world of Italian artists in an underground Berlin gallery, Cat encouraging this website for caring community performance and so it goes on. And really, I need to say and share this stuff actually because it is part of a wider trend right now, helps me feel there is hope for the world, is very much a direction which interests me in performance and makes me just feel more normal to write about it. So here it is...

The exhibition is called 'Chiba&LaPupazza' (Italian for 'Feed' and 'The puppet') presented in Okidoki Gallery and is a mixture of photography, painting, installation, object art, illustration, music and performance. And there's also a great feed.. which goes with the title of the show. Free (often vegetarian) food in a community based- artistic context is not unusual in Berlin, which tends to have a former east, communist-anarchist-community arts vibe about it, with lots of food collectives around putting on free food nights everywhere. Not only Italian artists present work at this exhibition, there is also a heavy presence of Japanese artists with live electro music, video and object art. Being Berlin right now there is alot of nudity in the photography and I am not surprised to then see a naked performance. Infact I have seen nudity in public in non-creative contexts. It doesn't seem to be a big deal to bust out nudity in Berlin in public.

So all this understood, a female performer (Alice Masprone) enters the front room of the packed and pretty small gallery, covered in white paint and nude, to lie in the middle of the floor like a starfish, facing up. As I am standing outside, I have to crane my neck to see over people's heads or between their legs to see that she has joined up the the black lines/markings on her body with those of a circular type grid marked out on the floor- which I had earlier noted and thought was some kind of basketball court or sport-like demarcation of space. So I read it as making her body somewhat like a known territory for games or sport, aggressive, competitively fought over etc.

She lay there for some time. The audience had that combination of anticipation caused by waiting and bordem as they sat and stood patiently expecting something to 'happen'. People left the room as the silence became more uncomforatable, so I was more able to see as- and I'm not entirely sure what initiated this process, perhaps the performer beckoning- about 5 or 6 people, both men and women, slowly came and sat around her body, touching her with theirs in an alarmingly gentle and respectful way. It was not what I was expecting.

It was actually disconcerting to see people in Berlin responding in such a kind way toward vulnerability. They even had beer in their hands, as most people tend to here. I didn't know what to make of it. Then Alice, the performer, began to touch people's hands and faces gently, with fingers which created some kind of gesture towards measuring their bodies. Then she started to join their hands together, in pairs or groups, across her naked body. Some of them touched her body gently with their own hands. She undid some hands and joined them with others. I noticed a girl around 10 or 12 sitting in a chair looking directly down the event with totally patient curiousity. Oftentimes here I have seen the small children of Berlin witnessing some really amazing event or world-class international artist do their thing and thought 'lucky little bastards' and 'they're so cute' and how they will grow up so so cool. And so they should, its the new skool way.

So finally the group left her, and again I've no idea what initiated this as I couldn't see very well. She then got up, the lights went dark, then (maybe accidentally) on again as she then ripped a video camera off the official looking videographer of the evening to leave the room. I wasn't sure if this was staged or not. Ambiguous. People clapped. She returned to thank everyone, including the Italian community who had supported the event. She sounded American when she spoke english but was fluent in Italian also.

Upon discussing it with my Italian friend after- we decided the circular grid was actually Leonardo da Vinci's famous drawing of a male body splayed with anatomical circular measurements around it. Was Masprone therefore addressing issues around the female body, which does not fit the male archetype or (art) world, having and doing its own measurements of others from a position of powerful vulnerability? I really couldn't say. All I was really left with was a feeling. A feeling that something special had happened. Something rare. Something I have not seen yet in performance. In a typically 'rock n roll' internationally urban cool gallery environment in a city which is renowned for 'anything goes'- that a naked woman lay in her ultimate vulnerability (visible from the street) on a concrete floor under harsh lights inviting people to sit around her and hold hands. It drew me in, it took away a sense of separateness that I may have as an urban dweller, it softened me, it certainly softened those who participated, and it gently asked all involved (including viewers) to question the power of vulnerability to transform social relations in a healing, loving and community way. There was no judgement, no irony, no pushing away or harshness. It was fresh, both for Berlin and the world (of performance too) because it was not trying to be anything other than people relating- genuinely, real-ly, in the moment, in a respectful way to female bodily vulnerability. I thought it was very powerful in a quiet way.

Within context I know that Europe has a lot of somatic and healing performance processes and ways to offer. I have done alot of workshops to this description since being here. I know it has been happening for sometime but it seems to be gaining momentum at a pivotal time in world history- with the threat of planetary destruction upon us. Gone is the need to harshly strip bare, or push to the extreme, or deconstruct, or ironically and sardonically entertain to make a point or say something via performance.

We are looking at a new era of what is real and truthful here in this world- through the existential lens/platform/vehicle/artform that is performance- using the live body presence to do so. If there's anything I've learnt from being here it is that if performance/choreography is putting itself on a pedestal of spectacular virtuosity or even deconstruction in the privileged western world at this time in history in pretentious or elitest ways to only the privileged that maybe its day is over- and it certainly pails completely in comparison, in my humble opinion (lol), with an emerging underbelly of work worldwide- whether performance art or improv based- which aims to meet and transform communities in a genuine attempt to make the world a better place, starting with being real in respectful ways. To me, all else seems shallow, egotistical, just dull and somewhat lazy... when faced with so much to actually change. Sometimes I want to tear my hair out. So yay for the likes of Anna Halprin and a legacy of powerfully healing community work.

And thanks to Alice Masprone for sharing the love. The world needs more of it as we know, and I hope to pass it on... to beloved Aotearoa. Which has so much potential for genuine love as well. If only we could really realise it. Europe is defs not the be all and end all of everything of course, just more stuff. Lots more stuff. Thanks Cat for reminding me! It's all about sharing.

Steel Ballerina

Steel ballerina
Tempo 09 Dance Festival
4:00pm Sunday 4th October 2009, TAPAC Theatre, Western Springs, Auckland

Reviewed by Rosemary Martin

I was hopeful that Steel ballerina might just be a production that would offer the ‘real, rough and raw’ side of the balletic environment, through a production inspired by the life of Dame Margot Fonteyn, Prima Ballerina Assoluta - the woman who was possibly the epitome of all things ballet. As the advertising stated, Steel ballerina was to explore “... the idea of a creative expiry date and the private versus public face of a dancer”, I was hyped.
Steel ballerina, created by Mel Dodge, Pagan Dorgan and Jacqueline Coats, and performed by Dodge and Dorgan, demonstrates that unless you have a very real understanding of the nuances of the ballet world, it is difficult to offer an audience a version of events that is free of stereotypes and clichés.

Blending fact with fiction the performance merges narrative and movement. The narrative, provided in short vignettes incorporating the experiences of Fonteyn and friends (Nureyev, de Valois and the fictional ‘Anna’), were well crafted and poised, and it was apparent that Dodge, Dorgan and Coats had done their history homework.
The downfall of the production - the part where I just wanted to close my eyes and make it all go away –was when the dancing began, which is a shame when you consider that this is a production motivated by the lived experiences of one of the greatest ballet dancers of the 20th Century. I understand that Dodge and Pagan were not attempting to emulate Fonteyn’s movement; however some refinement, originality and sophistication in both the choreography and dancing could have gone a long way in making this work more convincing and compelling.

The movement vocabulary itself was lacking in depth and substance, with the section performed by Dorgan on the floor being cringe-worthy and unattractive. The soundtrack – a blend of artists such as Bjork and Thom Yorke, Tchaikovsky, Prokofiev, Purcell, Jeff Buckley and Gary Lucas – fitted the storyline like a glove, though only further emphasised the lack of choreographic development and innovation. The lighting by Corinne Simpson was superb and provided a focus for those times when I couldn’t bring myself to view yet another sickled foot in sur le cou-de-pied.

It was clear that the focus of this work should have remained on the spoken text and sharing the fascinating on and off stage moments of Fonteyn’s life. Steel ballerina only just began to raise themes such as identity, transitions, retirement, pressure, fear, aging and pain in ballet, without looking to explore why or how such issues exist and are dealt with in the ballet world. There are hints offered that Fonteyn’s life may have been much more complex than just tutu’s, Tchaikovsky ballets and Covent Garden premieres, however we never find out much more that the subtle suggestions offered throughout the work.
I learnt two things from this production, firstly that I shouldn’t have got my hopes up, and secondly you should always believe the wise words of Public Enemy - “don’t believe the hype”.

Tertiary Colours

Tertiary Colours, 30th September-1st October, Tapac Theatre

By Cat Ruka


Tempo Auckland’s Festival of Dance 2009 kicked off tonight with it’s first show Tertiary Colours, showcasing 7 works from 5 of Auckland’s leading tertiary dance institutions. A fine idea in my opinion to begin the Tapac season with the future’s talent!

The programme begins with the University of Auckland’s ‘Woven’ choreographed by Juanita Jelleyman. Woven demonstrates a threading together of Maori, Pacific and contemporary movement, resulting in a subtle and clean vocabulary neatly interpreted by 9 female dancers. Crisp formations roll and dive into one another, fitting together like an M.C Escher puzzle painting. Also representing the University of Auckland for the evening is Juanita Jelleyman and Ai Fuji-Nelson’s duet entitled ‘Whisper’, a delicate interplay that explores the dynamics and relations between two females.

‘Hokkai Bayashi’ is a solo piece performed by Pamela Sidhu (East Auckland Performing Arts School), whose physical prowess is well suited to the athletic and technical balletic style of choreographer Patrick Sunderhauf. Sidhu performs each moment of this piece with an attacking precision, mirroring the fierce drumming music that accompanies her.

Dancers from the Apollo Theatre School perform 2 pieces for the evening, ‘Sing, Sing, Sing’ from the musical ‘Fosse’ and ‘Latin Fever’. Both pieces are executed with high doses of energy and strong commitment to movement, and a genuine sense of enjoyment and pleasure that only fresh young bodies can achieve!

Human Scenery is a modern ballet piece choreographed for 13 dancers from the Auckland University of Technology. Choreographer Phillipa Pidgeon does well to manage this number of young dancers on stage, who although at times seem to drop away from the performed moment, still do well to maintain the general form of the piece.

Those Left, choreographed by Shona McCullagh and performed by 11 female Unitec dancers is a dark and brooding choreography set to an amazingly emotive piece of music by Gorecki. Having already seen this piece performed in 2008 I had a fair idea of what to expect, and I would like to congratulate these young dancers on interpreting this challenging choreography with passion and heart.

I commend all of these young dancers on their obvious professionalism and dedication to movement, and look forward to seeing them grow through the years to come. Great start to Tempo! Hugs.

WE HEART HONESTY

A conversation between Rosemary Martin and Cat Ruka

Cat: The other night Kristian Larsen performed a solo improvisational dance/text piece at the Kenneth Myers Centre as part of his Masters research in Dance. You know how blockbuster movie trailers all have that same voice-over narration guy on them and he always says in that really gruff hyper-yank voice, "One MAN, one DESIRE"...that was going round in my head whilst I was getting seated. Kristian. Alone. With a niggling problem....And enough bravery to want to solve it.

Rose: It was good dancing in my books. Despite the fact that at times there was more talking than dancing, this only made the moving part all the more interesting, leaving you wanting to see more of the improvisational movement business that Kristian so clearly articulates. I enjoy good dancing, thinking dancing, intelligent dancing; dancing that has the ability to move you to consider things from a new perspective, that creates an imprint on you as an audience member, or that can just make you laugh, in a good way.

Cat: Yes it was good dancing, effortless dancing, dancing that didn't apologize for being there or being clear. And speaking of laughter, there was this one moment when Kristian sort of shed himself, he was talking about something mundane-ish...and he just sort of cracked up at himself and shattered the performer ego and it just lifted the mood, along with the illusory distance traditionally set between audience and performer. From then on we were all in it together. I suspect that this might be hard to do, to minimize that distance, to create intimacy like that, particularly in an improvised setting where we're all waiting for the guy to drown anyway...which of course he didn't. Not once.

Rose: It was apparent that it was Kristian's intention to interweave and frame movement within spoken text, something he achieves with ease, providing a running commentary, strewn with humor, of the intentions, processes, notions or narratives pertinent to his concept of improvisation and performance. Clearly the influences Kristian speaks of – Paxton, Forsythe, Hawkins, Ralston – emerge through his movements which are refined yet real, set to a score of breath and impromptu lighting cues.

Cat: Refined yet real is definitely the crux of this performance I would believe, and the crux of his investigation into improvisation too. How hard is it to show good technique without being a wanker right? Without losing oneself in the process? And you know I said to Kristian after the show that for some reason I had no desire to tell him how amazing he was or to give him feed back because why would I give someone feedback for just being themselves? You know it was more like I was just having a conversation with Kristian and he just happened to be doing all the talking. Honesty is quite a pleasurable thing to see on stage huh.

Rose: The integration of William Forsythe’s Improvisational Technologies into Kristian's research demonstrates that you don’t have to be in Europe to do this and that it doesn’t make you look like a ballet dancer, rather it just makes you look like you know what you are doing, creating a valuable set of movement tools to draw from.

Cat: LOCATION. I think Kristian said the words 'context' and 'space' quite a few times in the piece, and I do recall a bit of the old 'inscribed', 'written upon', 'agency' etc being in there too. What exactly are we doing when we make 'contemporary' (European) dance in New Zealand? Coz, you know, we're kiwis eh....What is that actually? Are we copy-cats? Are we borrowers? Are we hybridizers? I think Kristian likes to ponder this in his practice. I wonder what Forsythe would say if he saw the piece...

Rose: The most satisfying element of the performance for me though was that Kristian was prepared to acknowledge what so many of us dancers experience and understand; that we dance because of love, for love, in love, around love.

Cat: Yes. And I think that may have possibly been the problem that Kristian wanted to solve actually. In my opionion, Kristian has been investigating or searching out Love and Truth by way of discipline, technology and rigour. I don't think he knew it at the beginning though. And that's quite the beauty of the practice isn't it is that you don't really know what you're doing until you get in there and do it. You know I think the relationship between improvisation and Love could quite possibly be, perhaps, unfathomable?

Rose: Oh, and I really want to see that roll in the top right hand corner of the stage again, it was splendidly breathtaking.

Cat: I would agree.

'Gustavia' (2008) by Mathilde Monnier and La Ribot at 'In Transit 09' (Resistance of the object) in Berlin 19-21 June

Two aging female dancer/choreographers (Monnier- French, La Ribot- Spanish) from very different discourses collaborate to make a dance commentary and ironic cabaret on womanness performed, much like NZ's biped productions presentation of 'Fishnet' in 2006. So back to gender and sexuality as 'cultural politics' performed in a classically western/european deconstructionist entertainment style. How can I resist reviewing this show? It's right up my alley so to speak and I've been doing this stuff for years. So this is unashamedly for me I guess... (personal is always political and vice versa in my opinion) and for anyone in NZ interested in differently located performative perspectives via this reviewing website. As it's now crystal clear to me that we are located so specifically inside a cultural/performance context and make work to and for this, pretty much alone. Curated by performance theorist Andre Lepecki this year's 'In Transit' ('best') dance festival in Berlin invited 'Gustavia' to present at Haus der Kulturen der Welt as part of its tour.

Gustavia is the main city of a fancy island off the coast of France called St Barthelemy. Your guess is as good as mine but I like it. Metaphorically the title speaks volumes about tourism, land, isolation, romanticism, elitism, origin. But I really wouldn't know. I'm from a paradise island too, which as we know ain't always paradise.

Before I left NZ I'd been told 'French women use their sexuality to claim power back off men'. Having done a B.A in women's studies back in the dirty 90s I thought this was a pretty crack up statement, yeah women's one and only power is sexuality got it. Don't get me started coz it's a quagmire and I thought that strain of thought died peacefully in the 90s (I jest). It's 2009, nearly 2010 and these things remain complex. But so ok, what is it about French women eh? And mediterrean women for that matter. Just to generalise our precious lives away. Anyway.. so I'd been warned it was boring by some, amazing by others and I was curious, having loved Lyne Pringle and Kilda Northcott's 'Fishnet' so much. I want to know how these 2 women will do it differently.

And they do. Because their cultures are markedly different from NZ and so remarkably unisolated in its use of deconstruction as a tool for performance work. Whereas in NZ it is used sparingly, here it defines the work. The humour never ceases. You know they are fiercely serious about the ridiculousness of gendered performativity. It therefore makes me question, who is the audience- in every case? You would never see this in NZ work.

These women are incredible performers. They have a fierceness of face, intensity and highly trained muscularity which makes them almost look like men as they age. Their bodies are still highly agile and limbs extremely long. They enter the stage wearing black leotards and take their place at the microphone. For 20 minutes they take turns whimpering and sobbing from the silence after trying to saying something unsuccessfully into the microphone and tripping on the carpet in their high heels to replace each other. The clowniness of their performance becomes clearer and clearer as they increasingly try to out do and undercut each other with feminine posedness. All of this is executed with unflinching seriousness and intensity which illicits increased mirth from the audience.

Each section they perform has a clear beginning and end and each idea introduced is repeated in that postmodern performance art way (that only Mark Harvey seems to do in NZ) which both exhausts and transforms the action/task and idea they are futily performing. It is very clown. The power games played out are classic sidekick and star roles.. (grumpy/happy clown) with one walking around confused while the other walks about purposefully and meaninglessly with a plank to bash the other on the head repeatedly as they turn. It seems to speak of unconsciousness and the repetition of patterns and mindless habits women play out within femininity, without change.

The main strategies employed are repetition and satire. The clown must be highly serious for the humour to work. The strongest part for me is the ending. Both women stand on chairs and blurt out over the top of each other (in english) every 'type of woman' which is so humourous and layered it goes beyond other sections with its density and becomes poetic. The freedom of this section and claiming of womenness in its complexity retrieves power back from the futility of sexualised womenness in the former sections. Again this is something which interests me personally, using the strength of female intelligence to have fun with stereotypical roles for women. It is fierce, it is powerful in both simplicity and complexity and it is funny.

The only problem with rendering something culturally performed down into nothing is what are you then left with? Always the deconstructionist way. What I saw was two very strong, talented, beautiful, intelligent, powerful women from some of the most privilged (colonial) countries in the world almost mercilessly discarding feminity only to say that one can only be strong if one is never vulnerable. I saw no vulnerability in these women, no earth womanness from 'Fishnet', no softness. It was cold, it was hard. It was simplistic even. And I guess this was the point. Were they Euro women claiming back the power? I've no idea. The irony is that they were performing to and for such a specific audience the concept of deconstructed performance.

It did make me consider though the cultural context of performance with great interest. Where there was room for softness, complexity, ephemerality, humour, power and vulnerability in the NZ work (of the same subject matter) 'Fishnet' and a freedom which comes from having no audience, this performance of gendered subjectivity relied heavily on well used deconstructive conventions straight from the intellect only, highly trained performers and really less heart in my opinion. If that is not too harsh to say because they make up for it in passion and intensity.

And this is very easy for me to judge of course, Europe feels like a cold place compared with NZ. People's vulnerability lies buried far beneath the surface. If you show emotion you really are weak so you better get on with it. And strut. That is the cultural veneer of this place and probably especially for women. It is therefore a land of very strong women, this is womanness. There's no pathos here! And the strength of sensuality is a given.

Getting the picture? I want to make no judgement or comment of what is good or bad here btw, it is just very different. NZ work is often quite cathartic or atleast emotive and women are by no means meant to be vulnerable. But the modes of performance communication reflect the culture and thinking around the art form. And performers perform to that culture, unconsciously or not. They speak with and reflect it. An audience so educated as in Europe can handle so much satire and deconstruction. It is actually normal, perhaps even unconscious? Very different from NZ. Where deconstruction is used in some choreographers work more than others, but when it is it really really does want to mean something. And is often balanced by something rather ernest.

Unless I missed the irony of 'Gustavia', which is entirely possibly, and they were also satirising the strong woman. But I didn't think so. Maybe they didn't actually know themselves. Sounds like from the talk they gave, that they agreed on nothing, which usually creates an interesting dynamic if nothing else. Some thought it made them cancel each other out but I thought some interesting things were performed and communicated. Go collaboration.

Obviously from the festival's title (Resistance of the object) it was pretty clear they were resisting or atleast playing with the ever objectified and narcissistic female/dancer body/being. As we know this is always a minefield and no easy task. Use and abuse the stereotypes? Hats off ladies, hats off. You got me thinking.

Review by Alexa Wilson (Berlin correspondent :))

Cultural Contemplation, Compassion and Celebration of The Savage

Playing Savage

A Dance Solo/Protest
By Cat Gwynne
May 29, 2009
Kenneth Myers Centre
Auckland
NZ

Reviewed by Sarah Gavina Campus

As light illuminates this half-naked female body, she appears stark, brazen, opulent and ready with an animalistic psychology that forces us erect in our chairs. Hello savage. The brown woman, slung low body over chair, treacle poured over the object. Honey, with that kind of body pour we know we are in for a wild ride. She sets the stage straight – makes it clear she is here to formally and forcibly introduce us to a stream of performance characters that stretch historically through time and space of culturally oppressed peoples and into the delicacy and fierceness of Cats relationship to iconic and stereotypical (mis) representations of ethnicity, ethnocentricity and enlightenment.

The gathered, excited crowd was a mix of friends, family, artistic cultural consumers, musicians, academics and other motley virulent supporters – young, medium and old age. Yay. In other words, a healthy cross-section of the population into performance art as political protest, as revolutionary and timely personal expression. The ‘performance art’ medium, filled with elemental practices in contemporary dance, Maori performing arts, body as symbolic device to represent the ‘voice of the people’ and use of various implements and objects, both traditional and ‘modern’, wielded powerful and startling imagery for the punters that witnessed this cyclic modern day ritual.

As Cat’s languid, strong frame began to scribe space, she oozed female sexual gallantry in a Josephine Bakeresque, burlesque, lioness and hootchy mama kind of a way, embodied with physical and delicate finesse. Cat moved from ‘post’, ‘station’ or ‘state’ with a quiet dignity and respect for not only her indigenous culture, but for the psyches, hearts and minds of all women, and of all subjugated and misrepresented peoples.

She followed the forms of culturally recognisable stereotypical characters – noble, fallen ‘other’, exotic lover, temptress, seductress, faithful cultural ambassador, revolutionary, protestor, indignant ‘bad mother’, ageing kuia, obstinate challenger. Each was associated, derived from, or transformed by her tenderly embracing the internal essence of various plays on the ‘savage’. Shifting her intention between each station, the artist morphed through a series of ritual transformations, not necessarily related to the previous image, but grounded in a deep and thorough creative act of Maori tikanga and ritual passage of Maori women and people of colour. My feeling is her spectators ached for her to linger longer with each character purely because we were so fascinated with her relationship and depth of commitment to each transformation of ‘woman’.

Guys, I don’t know how you felt about her speaking of female experience, but we ladies were comforted, consoled, challenged, caught and quite frankly, a little turned on by the creatures laid before us. Definitely stirred and shaken to the depth of our own bodies – who without words, shared an identification and empathy with the artists arguments for the perils and pearls of the black, brown, red, yellow and white body to be heard. Those of us exposed to the distressing state of cultural dislocation and ensuing experiences of ‘oddness’ could breathe quiet moments of contemplation, relief, appreciation and thanks for her brazen openness with the specificities of this condition – expressed through the makeup of each image and in the pores of her skin, breath and blood. This fortunate space of living within such cultural margins - feeling both pain and the birth of possibility evoked through identification with ‘both’ and ‘other’ are a reality for many people who struggle with cultural affiliation and identification in a world still beset by often underground and unacknowledged racism, and/or misguided attempts by peoples ‘sympathetic’ to ‘the cause’, but who fail to understand the complexities of cultural dislocation and oppression through, put bluntly, a lack of lived experience.

The final image, of Maori woman in black leather jacket, proudly wielding the deftly swinging poi as tuning instrument of anger to empowerment was for me the summation of all that previous characters had brought to the stage - pure boldness, contrasted with deep sensitivity and psychic power. A perfect accompaniment to the driven words of John Key’s ‘victory’ speech. In the language of her body, carefully pulling the cotton wool of her ripped open poi/heart Cat said to me “this does not fit, I do not need this, neither do any of us, go back to where you came from and let us do our own job, our own governing, our own policing, we do not, nor have ever needed you for our people to be the continued rightful representatives of our bodies, our lands, our lives”.

Wow, that’s a big statement coming from such a small act. Gentle, but empowered – protestual, processional and ritualised art that asks us to face our own prejudices and institutional racism but does not seek to perpetuate violence and aggression through a creative act.

Performing fragments of image, (like reading the one line in a poem that really grabs you and takes your breath away), proved to be a winning formula for this young informed Maori artist, who beautifully combines her dance practice with the intelligence and tenacity of her research, academic interests and expression of her experience in Maori performing arts. I can see this work being developed into a full-length piece in the future, and look forward to the deepening of her exploration. Keep playing savage strangely.

Long Live the Queen

Playing Savage
A Dance / Solo Protest by Cat Gwynne
Friday 29th may
Kenneth Myers Centre

At the outset let me make this clear; my role as mentor / advisor / friend / supporter to Cat in the making of this work means that this is not so much a review as a personal endorsement. Written as a review.

'Playing Savage' was a solo work that I consider to be significant by dint of its astute conceptual clarity, and its wholesale trashing of cliche and catharsis. It was a powerful politically charged piece of performance art that transcended its makers artistic ego. Instead it succinctly foregrounded the performed image. Those images ultimately called the broader culture out on its own complacency. Yes that's right....us. Not the government, not the corporations, but us. Gwynne touched on a fleshy hypersensitive collective unconscious that is li'l ol' New Zealand. And I felt it flinch.

From Gwynne's program notes - "Playing Savage is a performative ritual that attempts to re-organize, hyper - extend, and subvert some of the ideas, symbols and images that wahine Maori (Maori women) are perceived in relation to. " Gwynne's opening image was of a sexually aggressive seated figurine. Her face made up like a cartoonesque skull, torso naked save for a fake gold neck chain with a chunky dangling gold dollar sign, and a piupiu (traditional skirt). This was a brash and dense image to greet the already intensified crush of a predominantly white audience. It both set the tone for the work and set the barre for an extraordinary hybridisation of the fictitious and the realistic within each of the characters that emerged throughout the performance.

This character made her way off the chair and moved on her knees emphasising femininity and precision within a spectrum of 'beautiful dance' postures. Intelligently though in placing herself low to the ground whilst making direct eye contact with her audience Gwynne distorted status, simultaneously undermining herself and confronting the gathered crowd. This continual undermining/confrontation became a signature cycle making the uncomfortable images weirdly palatable. As her character began to eat her own hand in a self cannibalizing gesture to the hyper sexualisation of pop culture Gwynne made her graphic vulnerability opaque.

Taking the performance into a kind of 'solo as heroines journey' territory Gwynne made physical pathways through the performative space via stations. Each station had its own objects. Each object with its subsequent discovery along the pathway carried its own dense narrative and triggered a transformation of Gwynne's character. Although predictable as a device this was easily forgivable given the power and heft of her character images, and the content of the work itself.

Images such as the washing off of her mask / make up with a sodden Tino Rangatiratanga flag, Or the self sellotaping of a plastic Maori girl doll to Gwyne's mid riff which provoked odious connotations. For me though the most pleasurably jarring image was that of an intimidating leather jacketed (and patched) cigarette smoking solo mother wielding an over sized poi. It was in this character that Gwynne made her naturally powerful presence shine through and spark up the warning lights on the dashboard. The music of Currer Bells (Angeline Churnside, Tim Coster) defragmented thus completed the design of this section. As this character swung her poi in a perpetual warning, the aggressive tone of the gesture was ultimately made futile by its repetition. An empty gesture brokering no mutual agreement as to its meaning, and garnering no sympathy it just died.

Gwynne's final image was defused by a slow lighting fade out during which a highly processed version of the John Key victory speech was played. Directly evocative of that moment in the last election when it seemed New Zealand had signed its own political suicide note. Jill Singer wrote in Sydneys Herald Sun "New Zealanders had voted for change...a leap from right to left - with all the enthusiasm and reasoning power of a doped slug." And our resolve was dissolved. Fade to black.

Although this all may sound like essay on wholesale hopelessness I came away from the performance with a quiet optimism. This was borne out of the experience that I had just been witness to someone saying something important with depth, humour, skill, and from a deeply informed position. This isn't the part where I say "Kia ora Cat", this is the part where I say

"Encore"

Kristian Larsen

Mashed up Key Speech avail. here

'Hell On Earth' by Dorky Park: Choreographer/director Constanza Macras in Berlin

Can I even write this review not understanding most of what was said in the theatrical scenes? My German is so bad. But I dare so. As they also dare create dance theatre on the margins of culture in Berlin in so many respects. So fresh off the plane from NZ I do it in my best Kiwi fashion and 'give it a go'. Coz this show moved me.

Staged at an acclaimed experimental theatre Hau (as old as they come in Europe) in Berlin's Kreuzberg, 'Hell On Earth' is the second incarnation of Argentinian choreographer Constanza Macras' collaboration with youths from one of Berlin's Turkish areas Neukolln. The first was 5 years ago, the young people younger. Now they're teenagers, not only facing a continued history of cultural marginalisation but an adolescence in which gender and sex politics awkwardly and sassily take the stage. What better place for an outlet and expression of so many clashes and liminally intimate interactions between displaced and entirely community based individuals?

With a blend of non professional youths and professional dancers/actors this work interweaves like moving ephemeral street scenes which dissolve, confront, entertain, move, amaze, enlighten, transform, embarrass, celebrate, protest, explode and then dissolve again. The set is idiosyncratic; there's a club (it is set up like a club actually, guarded by a bouncer), a diving board, a shower, plants, balconies..? and the lights are glaring through the whole work. Inside a mesmerising execution of dance with theatre is awkwardly placed video projections which scream volumes about isolation amidst the crowd. We're in the middle of Europe, do people even really notice each other? Cultural and sexual politics are squirming and writhing in the chaos of scenes between groups of sexually charged young Arabic boys and sexually evocative and intelligent young women, of a variety of cultures, claiming their individuality.

While a bouncer guards the stage and keeps a telling eye of the performance goings on- to begin with he blasts a group of young women in dresses with a massive fan, while an incredibly adept (actually flabbergasting) male break/dancer solos in a deconstruction of masculine fragility and strength combined. A group of male breakdancers together do the same thing falling over and over to a retired stasis, while text between people (evidently humourous judging from the response) prods at further adolescent sexual and cultural awkwardness. A striking young South American woman (who speaks alot) running into young boys and knocking them down with her large breasts to their and her horror is apparently drawn from real life, as is the enactment of a flamboyant gay Israeli confronting these youths with his eccentric behaviour.

People ignoring, teasing and provoking each other is highly charged. Young girls fight for the mic to sing their favourite R&B and Amy Winehouse songs while guys show off their best moves. Amidst all the posturing and goading and showing off are the most moving moments of intimacy between couples and individuals. One refuses to be part of masculine competition whereas a young woman shows off in red heels her amazingly sharp breakdance routine. The bouncer and the young South American do an uncomfortable duet which addresses attraction and abuse (within an age gap/paedophilia?), while a female and male breakdancer engage in a similarly awkward and aggressive love duet which goes nowhere. All these deconstructed pop cultural movements and references are so well executed and crafted that genuine moments of vulnerability and intimacy are heightened within and outside them. All performers are impressive. Whether they're speaking, posturing, leaping from balconies, hiding in the corner behind their mates, fooling around, doing beautiful dance solos and duets or just standing their looking lost, they're dynamic and clearly themselves.

At the forefront of this work conceptually is gender politics, real for this community and these people. Women celebrate their ability to move and their sex appeal which is powerful. They also speak a lot and take the piss. Similarly their continued vulnerability is leeked within such moments as a woman videoed running through an underground and being locked in while she is pursued by the bouncer. The camera lingers on her banging her fist on a glass door which is locked and screaming for help.

Anyho. It was pretty choice eh. It was so layered with cool performance art and subtle moments too. And while I don't understand a lot of the language and specific cultural references I can appreciate that the beauty of dance theatre is that in the moment, in so many spatial layers, issues of personal and collective cultural alienation and celebration can be evoked, heightened and transformed like in no other art form. While the work deals with serious themes of prejudice and dislocation it is ironic, humourous, intelligent without falling into rhetoric and most of all expressive. Together these things gave a fullness and richness in both generosity and love for both audience and performers. This community of performance makers and people created an authentic sense of hope and despair, age old themes readdressed in post-colonial, post-modern, urbanised and cynical times in a decolonising (eh Cat?) way. What a breath of fresh air. It was fresh, really truly. And I dunno if like 6 bows is normal in Europe either but the audience wasn't ashamed to express how much they liked it either and I was like, yay I'm in Europe!

Review by Alexa Wilson



http://www.dorkypark.org/ for anyone interested

"Carnival Hound" A Welcome Anomaly

post script

The Print Factory
Wellington
May 2nd 2009
Closing night

In my (predictably) forthright opinion this show is a technical, theatrical, collaborative, and personal breakthrough for choreographer Maria Dabrowska. Despite being in step with offshore theatrical progressions Carnival Hound is of a lineage that hasn’t really taken hold round these parts. And that’s the anomaly. This is essentially theatre where dance and choreography are the meta language. Despite repeated exposure to adept choreographic sophisticates overseas no one here has been able to convince a New Zealand dance audience that this kind of shit is current, worthwhile, and downright fucking enjoyable.

This devised work played in imaginative detritus offering up complex but direct imagery. No single person or genre or idea seems to have taken overall lead in the construction process. The choreography, music, theatre design, dramaturgy, and performance all roamed together on a horizontal plain as a pack with fun and dangerous motives. Deliberate without being cautious, this creative group hasn’t flipped the bird at audience expectations. For example when performer Mariana Rinaldi leaves the stage as part of a solo to confront and lick an audience member there was no transgression of spatial convention - the audience had been inseparably integrated into the theatrical space from the beginning. Anyway it has been implied that maybe Carnival Hound’s crew jumped the shark. Can’t say I agree with that though.

When expectations surrounding specific content (built out of marketing and program notes) are jettisoned in favor of actually seeing and listening to the work itself, starting points are more of a point of interest than of direct relevance to what’s in front of us. I don’t care if the word ‘post apocalyptic’ is in the program notes, despite text being used as a useful interface for dance, ultimately programs and marketing are for the tourists.

There was a narrative inevitability built into the two female and one male trio that eschewed all of the weighty notions that the show had been built on and subsequently departed from. I got into my own reading that Josh Rutter’s clown prince puppet master of the ‘deep subtle’ character lived alone in a contemporaneous somewhere. In his own personal junkyard he imagined female mannequins coming to life and playing out fragmented duets of displaced violence. Dabrowska’s punky Warholian hyper kinetic doll character found company with cold tongued sexually charismatic Rinaldi, All three performers communicated deftly using an open palette of materials, props, costumes, text, and movement aesthetics.

This impressionistic reverie was floated by the masterful theatrical hand/eye coordination of Jo Randerson, and by Eden Mulholland’s sensitive, sonically weighted, and ultra sorted sound composition. Kudos to the designers’ Stu Foster and Piet Asplet for making use of the gruff plasticity and depth of The Print Factory. Lighting was a heavily dealt hand; metallic, foggy, and cold, making use of television ambience and fires. With the exception of the eerily cool floating stage most of the objects were of the found variety; a rubbled pile of plastic body parts, the Orwellian TV face specters, the small fires, and bandaged chairs.

Carnival Hound has been dogged (sorry no pun intended) by the gap between its creative berth and its voyage. But that argument is of little consequence. The piece itself is at a point where its artistic development would probably best occur under the pressured conditions of continued performances. That said however it’s not coming to Auckland as advertised. Guess you can’t believe everything you read now can you.

Kristian Larsen.

Ellis reviews Forsythe at the Tate

Nowhere and Everywhere at the Same Time
The Forsythe Company
Turbine Hall
Tate Modern
London
30 April 2009

Turbine Hall is vast, almost as high as it is long.

From the cafe we are guided down the long ramp, given cushions, and enter the Hall. The audience surrounds the performance space (except for a narrow 'entrance' at the far end from which the dancers come and go), and in the space there are many many plumb-lines (described as pendulums in the programme), weighted by cone-shaped metal 'heads'. They are effectively conical arrowheads, willing the lines downwards, and stopping about 30cm from the floor. Each set of (perhaps) 10 cones is connected to a puppeteer-like rig, set amongst the lighting rig.

The geometry of the space is striking, and in it the 16 dancers are already busy with that relentless angular freneticism so typical of much of Forsythe's movement. On the walls are digital clocks, counting upwards as the natural twilight filling the hall is gradually drowned out by a very simple lighting design (profiles directed as downward as the plumb-lines). The sound sparsely echoes throughout the hall: simple electronic harmonics calling and responding to each other.

The dancers are very clearly engaged with particular tasks directly related to the geometry—and movement possibilities—of the pendulums. Occasionally they brush too close to a weight, and gently correct their own 'mistake' as if they are responsible for resetting the drive of the pendulum towards stillness. At other times they very deliberately (and gently) set large areas of the weights into motion. That they are following instructions (or a 'score') is very clear, but what these instructions are does not seem important to me.

Dancers come and go, sometimes for a rest (out of sight), other times to stand and watch.

And that is it.

Over the 90 minutes (30 minutes shorter than advertised), the tone of the work barely shifts, the audience wanders about (or not), and ... that is it.

But, as in much of Forsythe's more 'formal' work (so different from Decreation for example), this deep simplicity inevitably reveals a mesmeric complexity. The drive of the weights towards stillness is framed by the dancers useless attempts to keep moving, or to resist gravity's pull to inertia. The physiological inevitability of their fatigue becomes increasingly apparent, whilst their weighted witnesses keep pulling: pulling downwards to stillness. At times, almost the entire room of weights is tilted off vertical—the slow pendulums of time—as if the dancers have made Turbine Hall itself sway to and fro. The scale and gentility of these effects is remarkable.

Forsythe himself is standing behind the audience across from where I am sitting. Occasionally, he calls a dancer over (or even off the performance space), gives instructions and then sends him or her back into the 'playing field'. And it is a very much like a coach calling an errant player from the field, loading him with new instructions, and firing him back 'out there'. The dramaturgy of this act is puzzling and I am still not convinced Forsythe expected to be noticed doing this. Combined with the design of the puppeteer-like structures for supporting the plumb-weights I find it hard not to think of Forsythe as a kind of Petrouchkan puppet master, willing his puppets into action, demanding that they resist the fatigue, and somehow overwhelm the relentless march of the plumb-lines towards the centre of the earth.

One more thing. At approximately 60 minutes into the performance, the building had a power surge of some kind. The music stopped, the clocks stopped, and some of the lights went out. I glanced at Forsythe at this point and he hardly skipped a beat, but the flurry of activity at the other end of the hall suggested that this was definitely not planned. It was a shame in so many ways, not least because it broke the company's play with—and the audience's meditation on—time, with their inevitably dying dance amongst, around, and against the geometry and physics of these long long arrowheads.

Simon Ellis

Note: Some images (taken on my phone) are here.

Read more: http://skellis.posterous.com/nowhere-and-everywhere-at-the-same-time-turbi#ixzz0ETgjRU5f&B

Push: Getting High on Detail

Push
Russell Maliphant and Sylvie Guillem

The Introductory Bit
On Sunday 26th April around 9pm night at Aucklands ASB Theatre about 2000 or so paying spectators attended a dance performance. At the end of the show they gave a standing ovation and 3 rapturous curtain calls to a pair of dancers. I'd never before seen a New Zealand dance audience do this after a contemporary dance performance and I felt suspicious.


Part 1: The Part Where I Talk About Guillem's 'Technique'.
Let me state this up front: Sylvie Guillem is one fuck off dancer. She has the looks and proportions of a supermodel combined with a contortionists range of motion and 110% of the bizzo that makes a great classical dancer. I witnessed an exceptional artist in her forties make very restrained and dignified choices. Occasionally Guillem would turn herself into a Swiss Army knife and her abilities became incomprehensible - almost alienating. But for the most part her expertise was applied to executing tasks that were well within her range. As a performer Guillem was invested but at a relatively low level of risk.

Watching Guillem was not a transcendent experience. The demi god like status so frequently assigned to her in the press should be more appropriately recognized as rock star status. Guillem's onstage presence was commanding without being overbearing. However the situation seemed theatrically and aesthetically overplayed. Emphasis on top lighting in both of her solo's turned her face into a mask and her body into a hyper-real, semi-human intrigue-athon. This combined with the music was doing way too much work creating an atmosphere of 'mystique'.


Part 2: The Part Where I Discuss Maliphant's 'Choreography'.
'High end mild' is how I'd summarize Maliphant's aesthetic, 'contemporary dance' for ballet aficionados.With an emphasis on the standing body Maliphant wrote from a generic globalised movement vocabulary. Whilst departing from the classical ballet movement repertoire, this vocab has actually entered the stable of the ballet movement lexicon -bum rolls, handstands, partnering generated from contact improvisation, bits of capoeira, knee spins all performed with well stretched feet.

All four of the works; Solo, Shift, Two, and Push, were Maliphant's choreography. Each piece bore consistent signatures; medium paced tempo, and soft body dynamics. The unerringly even tonality of the whole evening was lifted by the consummate skill explicit in the dancing. What drove me mad though was that I couldn't locate anything in the choreography that told me where it was from, not geographically, not culturally, not politically, not socially, not sexually, and not emotionally. The work was safe as houses. It could have been made anywhere. In that respect the choreography seemed to be of a globalised culture, and somehow unilaterally white.


Part 3: The Bit Where I Talk about the 'Audience'.
At the beginning of this piece I referred to '2000 or so paying spectators'. The notion of spectator is different that of being a witness. A witness has some degree of responsibility to the situation. In this context however people paid their money and got high on the detail of the performative cuisine. You don't usually take responsibility for what you see when you are busy being exultant.

Maliphant's choreography was unchallenging without being completely unstimulating. Guillem's body and cult of personality gave it wings. Beautiful and unchallenging; an effective recipe for popularity anywhere in the developed world.

Kristian Larsen

Battle Scarred Girl Power Super Group Dance on Edge of Sword, Threads Bared

Littered with ironic self reflective critique and biodegradable props, Toxic White Elephant Shock is indeed a dangerous jumble sale overflowing with earnestly vital attitude and a genuine desire to say something.

A series of simultaneous statements, the work constantly accumulates and disintegrates, the molten (yes, hot) performers weave an interdependent web of movement, sound, situation, and riotous theatrics that threatens to overwhelm, barely under control, displaying characteristics of the natural disasters so often referenced in the piece. All performed strongly and deserve credit for their effort, execution and commitment. The group emanated a strong identity which was an invaluable expressive component of the work. I feel this was a desired and intentional part of the works anatomy. Wilson's approach to her work addresses more than it's brief incarnation on stage, she is keenly aware of the wider social and historical contexts of her performances and these are constantly referenced in the work, exhibiting a desire for it to explode from the formalised event and commune with the wider world - starting by literally smashing the fourth wall and demanding audience participation.

Each of the participants (7 women, 1 man) have a distinct identity/look that is maintained throughout the work (excepting Packham's brief incarnation as Alexa Wilson herself). This identity seems to be a ritualised version of themselves. Not a persona, more of an offering - to be burnt in sacrifice, part of a faith healing for society? Their bodies are treated like banners - slogans, attitudes and motions pass through or are spattered over them, a sort of psychophysical action painting. The use of group nudity near the beginning of the piece was very strong, both confrontational and grounding, that particular section generated a lot of atmosphere and opened the door to the rest of the work, an overture of sorts containing all the major concerns of the piece.

More expressive than explorative, Wilson and co have a lot to say. They cram an incredible amount of ideas into a scant hour and a half. Rarely settling for one thing at a time, Wilson uses simultaneity to achieve density. Although her images and staging can be interpreted a number of ways, the actions and intentions of the dancers are sharply defined. Thus simultaneous layering of many strong elements (as opposed to one thing which isn't quite anything exactly but almost many things) is a sensible choice for generating depth. Having seen and been involved in a number of Wilsons works I recognise this tactic and am tempted to think this is an easy choice for her creatively. However this is easily the most complex and large scale work she has tackled and it was satisfying to see her style achieved with assurance and higher than usual production values.

The movement language was a mash up of functional actions, martial arts, wild krumpy urban tribal shit, contemporary softness and, um.. Power Shapes. Naked Power Shapes! Love it. The theatrics and movements are generally affected - this isn't a criticism in itself cos it's mostly very watchable. When the performers are required to be intense they do so either with force of personality or often violent physicality. This certainly has impact, but only for so long. To Wilsons credit she does find a remarkable number of ways to make it work but I feel the law of diminishing returns should be acknowledged: As the piece progressed conceptual and emotional complexity accumulated, but expressive complexity not so much - the same wild aggressive approach was used throughout most of the piece and I felt it began to misfire towards the end. Anyway, what are the other options? would they dilute Alexa's strong style?

The work is cabled with a healthy dose of electronic current. Live video feeds lend the drama of confrontational breaking news, live effected vocals from Brennan saturate the space with murky bestial textures, dance floor killers and soulful odes to the moon. Pre composed sound from both Brennan and Charlotte 90 jousted and slid back and forth to support each of the many many sections of the work. I liked the almost sound clash set up of the musicians; one just offstage to either side, taking turns to fill the invisible spaces of the theatre. Their co operation/collaboration almost seemed to provide an example of the communication and clarity between sexes that was desperately called for by dancer Yee at one point.
Both had notable onstage moments: Charlotte 90's stone cold chorus support for Alexas rap song, and Brennans wild thrashings and wrestlings as Box Head.

Toxic White Elephant Shock has the frenetic energy of a film trailer and an admirable desire to be current and involved with the world. Refusing to retreat into discipline bound obscurity it claws at the boundaries and draws in many energies, all wound into an ecstatic dance of celebration and warning. A truly spiritual effort. Thanks guys.

Josh Rutter

Violent Babies: Improv duet with Kristian Larsen and Julia Milsom

Man, I've been a party hardy kinda girl lately, in all the most unlikely and likely crevices of Auckland doing shameless things so seeing two of my dance peers Kristian Larsen and Julia Milsom duet in 'Violent Babies' as part of an evening of performance with music improvisational collective Vitamin S at Whammy Bar was next level.

Ok, so, it's a rainy wild night and its a bar, not just a bar, but a very familiar one. It's Auckland's most Indie bar for live experimental bands and performances and these dudes rocked out on the floor to 8 people (maybe 10) muso's and one girlfriend to begin a duet labelled 'a punch drunk love duet'. I was like, I'm brave, but THIS is brave. Hats off. I know they these two are a Vitamin S special team but I ain't seen it before and it was inter- resting! There were so many layers. Ouch.

First of all there's the bar, the 7 attentive male gazes and maybe 2 females peering through the dark with intent through beams from corners of the bar and various passersby, who thought at moments that they were punters at the bar. Second, there's what I bring to this duet in my own post man/woman drama phase... there's always this. Near impossible to extricate. So what DID I see?

I saw two friends/peers, a man and a woman, dance improvise together in a near empty bar on a rainy night, competing with several other shows. They come from very different places inside their dance practice and are probably in very different spaces right now, but they somehow found a common ground. What is that? A tension? A chemistry? A need to express together in a particular way? It's all good!

They are both beautiful movers and seem most comfortable when soloing. But soloing around one another is still a duet. In fact its the duet of our times. Two people immersed in their own journey, themselves, the intricacies of their own embodiment and feelings and the performance of that to us. It is totally apt for me in that moment. And I'm getting drunk!

Milsom is strident, she is bold, risky, articulate and comfortable within her power as a mover and a woman. Her attentiveness to the improvised music is on, and her interaction with Larsen timely and sensitive. She's in your face (in a good way) and she knows how and when to retreat to dark spaces of the bar for variety. Larsen muses in his dancing. I thought at one moment during a solo when he was quite close to us, 'you know what? It is so bloody good to see a man dance in this way in this context in a such a masculine space'. His gentleness and thought processes were hiding and revealled simultaneously inside this vulnerable explorational dance. It too had power. I didn't know what the hell was going on but I was really intrigued by the gender dynamics because whatever was going on for each of them they managed to still hold a space with and for each other which had respect.

The moments of contact were loaded and vulnerable. Whether it was an intimate confrontation or a placing away onto a pillar (repeated nicely to the sound) only to slide down or a leap on top to crush, it smacked of relationship. It's hard to say what this relationship was, two people, dancers, friends, man and woman, happy to dance around each other for each other, with each other, for us. Steps in the strange narcississm vs entertainment factor of performing. Who is improv for? Who is dance for? Milsom performed more for us while Larsen was happy to perform for himself and each worked and juxtaposed. Of course this line was and is blurry. I liked all of that.

They both supported each other, they were not alone, while their was still a major sense of space which created solitude inside this duet. There was also the fact that they both knew I was there and maybe gonna write something. God but who cares what I or anyone thinks? Have a good time I say, which it looked like they did. It was working for me and judging from the applause, for the rest of the onlookers too. I'd say most people could relate as well as admire, because the duet spoke volumes about relationships. Plus I was projecting I'm sure. I love the way dance is always so appropriate and inappropriate in public spaces, how it makes people uncomfortable because it is the body talking and we are largely so fucking unembodied as a culture these days.

Sweet shit guys. Keep up the explorations. It's really cool.

Review of Yellingmouth review website

Hey I can see some movement in the dark. Is it people fumbling around searching for a voice, a community, freedom, discussion, alternatives, each other, a life, SUPPORT? In Auckland contemporary dance march 09 its starting to happen. Thanks the internet.

For something so 'ephemeral' and misunderstood, especially in a stage of metamorphosis between old skool and new skool ways, NZ dance needs real support. New voices need space to grow and bounce off each other. AWAY from formalised institutions. Its called progression.

It has nothing to do with rebellion or frowning upon the establishment as some may accuse but rather to do with creating ACTS, which stir authentic responses into a literary next level practice of call and response communication from current dance ACTIVISTS. I call them activists because they are pushing way for new and diverse spaces, ideas, ways, processes and presentations to emerge.

It has been happening this entire decade and prior to this with the likes of Sean Curham, Charles Koroneho and Mau. I call it a MOVEMENT. A gesture if you will, performance art ACTS, happenings, postmodern introversions... extroverted. I have been at the heart of this ongoing emergence and struggle for new ways to come out of new people this decade and its been tough but FUCKEN EXCITING.

Things seem to take time to really gestate in the rhizome way but they have POWER because no one or no thing is making them grow, they are just growing. Alone together. These practitioners are responding to the world, to their own call to be alive in the world in these uniquely embodied and highly intelligent ways. Just as any plant or animal does. And they deserve our attention and love. Not to be ignored and marginalised. That is an old skool paradigm.

For years, dancers have struggled to have a voice and be honoured in NZ within the realm of writing in a public space. This maverick vs institutionalised organism has created some fascinating tensions and debates, to which I have also contributed. I consider myself a forunner in this MOVEMENT. People doing stuff, together, anywhere, everywhere, with or without money and support. Really LOOKING. Really SEEING and FEELING. Creating because they want to, in/outside an increasingly commercialised, capitalist world market. Dance thinkers are on the go. And there's nothing that can stop them.

Late Night Choreographers stopped breathing when it got funded and institutionalised itself. Riddled with internal and bad blood politics we learnt that the cut throat way is not the way of activists. Or 'revolutionary'. It died a natural death because of the fight for money.

So we now have a website (how cohesively anarchic) linking minds, bodies, ideas, gestures, acts, etc etc together. I say jump in. Don't be shy, but have respect. Anything that doesn't come from respect is not the new skool way. You can examine and criticise and tease if you want but if you do it because you LOVE it your intention is clean.

Thanks to Cat Gwynne we now have a reviewing website for practitioners and dance thinkers to have a legitimate and musing space to move and be interpreted through a genuine lens and understanding which comes from other practitioners looking at their actions and somatically transmuting them in 'phenomenological' (thanks michael) written texts. Ha. Ie. reviews. Dance can't evolve without thought processes and ideas evolving before, after and during movement. Discussion, articulation, communication, reflection helps SUPPORT this action.

Chur Cat.

And just to contradict myself because I can't and will about rebellion I have a quote to end with from The ABC of Enlightment by Osho:

“The birth of the rebel is the death of the old. To me, rebelliousness is the essential quality of a spiritual person. It is spirituality in its absolute purity.”

The shock of the fragile - - "Regression Test"

Performed by Josh Rutter, Dave Hall, and Tim Coster. @ The Basement Theatre last nite.

These three gents pulled off an understated coup with Regression Test. That is to say that the work came over as a flawless and witty understated interaction. What made it even more special was the absence of hackneyed angst, critique of dance, and clichéd self commentary so common in an increasingly feminized, hyper polite, touchy feely form of performance. These guys are making art baby! So remove the dance carrot from your arse and go see this work.

The performance began with Dave Hall standing in solo wearing diapers and holding an umbrella. His proximity to the front row as a pseudo nude caused an immediate tension with the audience but his sustained vulnerability disarmed any sense that he was there to confront. His exit with the umbrella conveyed an implausible sense of fun and set the tone for Josh Rutter to enter.

Rutter began his solo behind the audience and immediately turned on the charm - not an easy thing to when you’re performing something that looks like butoh. Rutter’s movements became like micro lectures, brief but intensely informing. The two opening solo’s served as an introduction to the ship of fools we were to be spending the evening with. After that the party started.

It’s got to be said that both Hall and Rutter used duration and timing cogently all the way throughout the performance, thus allowing the eye to rest on the image. But although the images in Regression Test had a harrowing comedy there was a spookily undetectable dynamic within them. That dynamic acted as an invisible slider that moved the image from amplified banality to hilarity, and then to profundity every fucking time.

Hall pulled off the undetectable transition particularly well in this piece. His skill as an artist in performance has been borne of economy of choice. Hall makes no extraneous movement statements and his concentration is inspiring. His comic timing is on the up and up too and this is where Rutter should be high fived.

Tim Coster’s live music although ever present was sidelined by the visible. Its subtlety was foregrounded only momentarily when Rutter scraped his fingernails along the floor. But Coster’s sonic decisions and deftly observed interplay with the dancers provided a constant elemental swim for the show to lightly occupy.

The dance duo’s sustained depictions were graphic and potent; the woman in the dress blithely greeting everything, the shrieking white faced fool with the amplifier, the manimal in the bucket, the ineffectual head-in-the-sand of the umbrella-ed body corporate, the twittering finger tip and leg beastie thing, the impossibly thin fragility of the fabric of the umbrella intensified by a feeble croucher vainly looking for protection. Through all this the evocation of a thermonuclear future replete with radioactive rain, cosmetically gross jelly, complete unknowingness about what to do about anything, and effete’ madness of the last remaining inhabitants seemed to just sit there to be laughed at. Which is what we did, without anger, without cynicism, and without making it all way too important.

Kristian Larsen