Brolly Arts H2O

Brolly Arts transformed the Rose Wagner Center for Performing Arts into a playground for over 40 artists to fill vacant public space with aesthetic works concerning H2O. Whether it was a decorative umbrella laying on the ground or vessels made from recycled water bottles, there was always something that caught your eye. Unlike a playground, however, some of the works at the Rose were scattered in a manner that turned the evening into somewhat of a scavenger hunt rather than the intended gallery stroll. Nevertheless, a gathering line outside of the women’s restroom ushered viewers to what Kathy Adams names, “One of the two most intriguing dances of the night.”

This dance was Mallory Rosenthal’s driving work, titled with the women’s bathroom icon, in which six women – resembling a skilled company – displayed outstanding feats of technicality and intricate gestural play. Rosenthal’s use of space was imaginative not just in the foreground but also away from the audience’s immediate view; the dancers would leap behind a wall into pedestrian movement to provide a witty sound score involving the flushing of toilets, the jetting of faucets, and crinkling of paper towels preceding and subsequent to the pulse of “All The Girls Standing In Line For The Bathroom,” by N.E.R.D. This work’s success lies in its inventive craftsmanship and multi-viewer-friendliness. Perhaps the only thing lacking was a shift in dynamics.

Taking place on a table in the laundry room was “Divided,” from which flowed a tensely elegant duet composed by Sofia Gorder. Dancers Ursula Perry and Jersey Riemo embodied Gorder’s visceral movement beautifully. The most interesting movement took place in the dancers’ torsos wherein a collapse or a slight shift was repeated consistently throughout the piece, yet by the end the viewer still could not grasp which bones they had moved. The pace of this work was adverse to the mercurial lure of the lighting, albeit a short stillness, in which one dancer was on top of the table and one beneath, which cast a beautiful but fleeting image. I craved more of these moments.

Trailing in after the dancers were images of rivers agleam in willows, light moving from waters, and quiet trees holding their breath in lavender. In a brief poetry reading, Joel Hall eloquently conveyed these images that persisted in my mind even as I ascended the staircase to see Brent Schneider’s water/video installation. This installation allowed the visitor to walk into a dark space where the shroud of lobby chatter dissipated and where crystalline shimmers illuminated a mesmerizing video in which a dancer, totally submerged in a body of water, reeled and twisted to the trickle of delicate water. This installation was not complex; there were a few facets that had been flourished enough to keep the visitor interested for the duration of the video, however the decision to leave this world was a difficult one to make.

I have never seen the Rose in such great spirits. The opportunity to walk leisurely around among works of art before taking your seat is more than enjoyable. For those of you who arrive exceedingly early to formal performances, suggest more pre-shows because Brolly Arts’ “H2O” was thirst quenching.

Becca Dean is a BFA candidate at the University of Utah

Salt Lake Art Center -- Dark Horse

Sometimes I get tripped up by the labels of things. “Installation” is a term in particular that I can be very picky about. The word makes me yearn to be immersed in something otherworldly and strange, something I can enter into and wonder whether the rest of my day was more real or less real than this other environment.

SLAC’s main gallery this weekend has been (and currently is) the site for a “nonstop performance and site specific installation”. There is a large square of white on part of the floor, with lighting trees at each of the four corners. One edge is lined by sixteen metronomes. There is a chair, and a red phone. A cord separates this area from another in which there resides old wooden bleachers. There are two gramophone horns on one side pointed at two chairs on the other. Finally, there is a small staircase that bridges the two spaces. Couples are invited to enter the space and slow-dance in silence. Individual performers wander the space doing their own dances. An ambient electronic score washed over the room.

Here’s my line of thinking as I entered this space: I thought there would be more. I’m happy there’s less. It’s nice to watch people dance. I don’t want to slow-dance. I don’t have a partner anyway. Maybe if I take my shoes off I can pretend to be one of the performers and dance my own way by myself. Why is there the sound of a woman panting? Is she running from something? Is she having sex? Somebody just came out of the bathroom. Wait a minute… this installation is remarkably like a stage.

And there you have the more-or-less ten minutes of immersion I could sustain before I realized that there was literally no reason this “installation” couldn’t just be some stage somewhere. Moreover, the space has windows into upstairs hallways, and the orientation of the audience to the stage meant that everything we saw was framed by us also watching people enter and exit the bathrooms behind the stage.

Still pondering what slow-dancing and horses had to do with the various bodily functions being performed in the background, the special 9pm performance started up. Here I feel like we arrived at the meat of the work. The dancing was splendid and the choreography was fresh. I was glad to be watching this in SLAC’s gallery-turned-black-box, and I hope that SLAC continues to explore the idea of providing an alternative venue for the performing arts.

In sum, it was an evening of some very refreshing dance presented in an unusual space. I wish the installation aspects of it were stronger and better integrated. Why bleachers? Why rules about what we can do or how? Why not let us wander the space freely? Why not construct the dance to immerse us more instead of maintaining a traditional audience/performer barrier? While the invitation to cross this barrier and become performers ourselves (in couples, dancing in a specific way, in silence) was intriguing, why not create a situation in which perhaps we’re not sure anymore who is watching and who is doing?

And please don’t pretend that we’re not going to notice the bathrooms, or that having the bathroom hallway as background isn’t going to change the meaning of your work. I’m interested in many of the ideas that went into Dark Horse, and I was impressed by the dance that was embedded in it. But for me the execution did not support those ideas enough and left me with a lot of questions about what the artist really intended. Or maybe I was just disappointed that this idea of installation didn’t fit my idea of installation.

Matthew Beals is a Modern Dance MFA candidate at University of Utah.

inFluxdance

This weekend Sugar Space presented the premiere of their artists-in-residence inFluxdance. The group is a dedicated team of women under the direction of cross-continental collaborators Alysia Woodruff & Rose Pasquarello Beauchamp. With a large team of video, sound and design artists, inFluxdance certainly presented a lot of material to consider.

In its best moments, justice for all some presented honest and complex partnering between the uniquely all-female company. Their energy toward one another was sensitive and engaging. No matter your opinion of the topics they tackled each performer maintained strong investment in their subject matter and in one another. In that way, the piece was a pleasure to see.

In other moments the piece resembled another recent work which tackled protest and social justice. The work was reminiscent of David Dorfman’s underground and both dances feature strong performance and physical research. Unfortunately both works also share problematic parts. Featuring a lack of performers of color yet employing traditional iconography of civil rights creates tension. Both also use strong visual and aural components like video montage and an identical “step forward if, step back if” dialogue regarding the dancers’ relationship to social struggles like internment or suffrage.

In the end was another startling similarity where all the dancers started placing cloth figures of people about the space. Dorfman did the same thing but with graphics. And in both cases there was a startling sense that the piece was still figuring out its ultimate direction and what it wants to show regarding such a massive topic as protest.

inFluxdance seems at a crossroads of choosing whether the subject matter of the protests they support is where the piece lies (let’s not forget the Tea Partiers are protestors too) or whether, (as I imagine) that the piece lies more in about what protests do– bring bodies together and then watch bodies dissipate, show bodies in both revelry and suffering. The lingering image of all those small figures in the space alludes to this idea, that it’s more about the body and less about the design elements. In  justice for all some the dancing told the story and I would be interested to see what more it has to tell.

Ashley Anderson runs loveDANCEmore programs through her non-profit, ashley anderson dances. 

Black/Light

I went into Allen Gardner Dance Theatre’s presentation of Black/Light with a lot of questions. I had heard that Jerry Allen, director of the group, had studied with Kazuo Ohno and was heavily influenced by Butoh. Through the program notes, I learned that he also studied kung fu and corporeal mime, two disciplines that I have also had experience with. I read several articles previewing the show, some calling it Butoh, some calling it Butoh-influenced, some trying to explain what Butoh is. My experience with Butoh has been through Dairakudakan and Eiko + Koma. While these two groups in some ways represent opposing ends of the spectrum of whatever Butoh is, I believe there is a common seed.

Here’s what myself and some friends came up with over post-show gelato: when a child drops their ice cream, they do Butoh. We all know what this feels like. The incredible upwelling of emotion and sensation overtakes the nervous system from within, and the body becomes accessory to this outpouring of raw expression. It is overwhelming, and even casual spectators cannot help but be engulfed. One of the original goals of Butoh was to subvert other forms of dance that were seen as too superficial.

So let me rewind and say that Black/Light is not a “Butoh show”, as many people described it. It was an eclectic evening of performance, some of which was Butoh. But it also included a comedia dell’arte piece, dance, and video. So all of the questions I came in with, including “What does American Butoh look like?”, were overtaken by another question: “Can Butoh share the stage with these other forms?” The answer I came away with was a solid “No.” The rawness and depth of the Butoh elements made everything else unpalatable. This means there was some very solid Butoh happening, in particular from Patrick Barnes and of course Jerry Gardner.  But it also means that the dance was out of place, the comedia dell’arte seemed farcical, the photo collage distracting, and the silhouette work sort of boring. This wasn’t a flaw in performance. The performances were quite good, in fact. I could have watched Michael Watkiss run in circles, mouth agape and arms pathetically extended, for hours. He was a pleasure to watch throughout. It was the course of the show itself that confused.

Another aspect that was less than satisfying was the use of music. I felt that the choices of music were such that they forced some of the other creative choices, particularly the timing of certain sections. Often I felt that a moment was cut short, or that a piece was stretched too thin, because a musical cue had to be met. Please, let’s all find a composer or sound editor who can work with this group. I think it will give them the freedom to do some really excellent work.

Perhaps my Butoh beef is also ultimately about creative freedom. Jumping from one form to another is not as satisfying as abandoning form and just doing the work that feels true. I think this was a fascinating presentation, and I would love to see more work from Jerry Allen. But next time I would like to see his work, in his style. Maybe it will be Butoh, maybe it will be dance theatre, maybe it will be some sort of crazy synthesis of all that he has studied. But Black/Light felt like he forced his work to fit the styles of others, each piece a distinct element that had his creative touch but ultimately was not well integrated into the whole

Matt Beals is currently an MFA candidate at the University of Utah

Hunting the Hemo Goblin at Sugar Space

Last weekend, the Sugar Space presented a new work-in-progress by Andrea Dispenziere. The hour-long work, “Hunting the Hemo Goblin,” was comprised of a scattering of vignettes touching on themes of hunter and hunted.

The dance began in a modern setting—the grocery store. As the audience settled into their seats, dancers casually wandered around the stage, “shopping” among tables laden with vitamin water and peeking into a number of tall, cylindrical wire cages that carried labels like “Quinoa” and “Yogurt Pretzels.” From these slow and pedestrian beginnings, the dance gradually developed into a hunting scenario in which dancers pursued their prey across the stage. However, it was not until the performers were given a chance to truly start dancing that the work picked up its momentum. Moving with unrestrained physicality, the dancers displayed impressive commitment and athleticism, though the limited amount of space caused several collisions. The work then took a violent turn, as performers began tackling and throwing each other across the stage—even simulating the cannibalization of a few (presumably weaker) dancers. I particularly enjoyed the number of inventive and surprising ways in which the dancers took each other down; the impact of the dancers colliding—and I mean full on tackling each other—was especially powerful when it happened less than ten feet in front of my face.

In the next section, Dispenziere drew from Greek mythology concerning Artemis, goddess of the hunt, and Actaeon, a hunter who was transformed into a deer and then killed by his hunting dogs. The myth of Actaeon was spelled out in “old-school rap” by a Greek chorus as dancers portrayed the action through gesture and dance. Dispenziere’s rap contained clever lyrics, yet was difficult to hear over the music and some fumbled articulation. Through some inventive rearranging of the wire cages, the dancers transformed the stage, creating forests, waves, and walls. However, under-rehearsed transitions between the configurations made the props seem unwieldy and difficult.

The final vignettes featured strong dance sequences—most notably, a quartet of women performing quick, precise articulations of the arms and torso, as well as a series of overlapping solos accompanied by a Discovery Channel-style narration describing the elusive “Hemo Goblin.” The humorous, meandering text managed to simultaneously amuse and confuse me, and the ending of the dance—in which the audience was invited to come onstage and observe the performers before they were led away, tethered together like cattle—left me with all my questions unanswered. The work incorporates interesting representations of the health food movement, hunting, shopping, consumerism, and mythology, but does not seem to tie them together before its completion. I feel that “Hunting the Hemo Goblin” put forth some provocative images and associations, but ultimately stopped short of articulating a discernible message.

Emily Terndrup