Ananya Dance Theatre visits Utah

Friday, February 11 at Kingsbury Hall, Ananya Dance Theatre performed Dastak. 

The playbill summarizes Dastak as “a meditation on borders, loss, belonging, home, and liberation. Structured through four elemental journeys — Earth, Water, Fire, and Air — the work traces the knockings (dastak, in Farsi) of global injustices on our hearts, and echoes the subtitle created by writer Sharon Bridgforth – I Wish You Me – indicating the cross-generational love that has carried communities through difficult migrations. Dastak invites viewers to imagine what freedom is possible as it expands the realms of intention and trans-dimensional connection through spells that invoke rest, forgiveness, love, and freedom.”

Ananya Dance Theatre is a company entirely made of of BIPOC women and femme artists and their presence on stage was extraordinary. Both the dance and the score was inspired by many multi-layered histories, ancestries, and influences, and it was made for the BIPOC women and femmes both performing and witnessing it. Spirit McIntyre specifically acknowledged the influence of Farsi and Hindi in the sound score. Ananya Chatterjea had a special dedication for her performance. She said, “My solo is dedicated to so many women and femmes from marginalized communities, especially those who have suffered so much torture in state custody. Lal salaam in particular to Soni Sori, Safoora Zargar, Gulfisha Fatima, Nodeep Kaur, and many unnamed others: I dedicate my fire to you.”

Images courtesy of UtahPresents.

The raw power coming from the performers was so exciting, it was hard to not get swept up in the movement. But there were so many things to appreciate about the production. They had pieces flying in from the fly rail, they had projections, consume changes, and props. And they had a live musician interacting with the sound score as well as living inside the performance. I felt like I was on a ride for the entirety of “Water.” It felt like it was happening to me instead of me actually watching it from a distance. The first two movements were performed by almost the entire cast on stage performing together as a community. They would flow from unison sharp movements to traveling steps and rhythmic stamping of the feet as they moved. The flow washed over me and I was transported to a world that was both new and familiar. The dance almost felt like it was happening to me instead of being something I was actually watching from a distance.

And then I was snapped out of my trance as “Fire” began with a fierce solo by Chatterjea. She managed to command the huge space of Kingsbury with her presence. Another striking moment was a sensual trio between three women. They weaved in and out of each other. Sometimes it seemed there were only two people instead of three, and then they would unfold and pause in still life poses. It was a beautiful dynamic and it was performed to an equally beautiful song, the lyrics making explicit the ways in which the performers asked each other to “light my fire.”

Chatterjea herself performing.

The dance closed with “Air.” This was the part that stuck with me. I wanted to buy tickets for the next night to see this section again. I couldn’t stop thinking about it. The dancers all came on with props and it seemed to be a huge celebration and also to be reminiscent of an offering of some kind. The musician was singing to the dancing group. They called to them, while the lyrics in the recorded music seemed to be both echoing that call as well as coming from within the dancers themselves. At one point the entire cast was moving so powerfully to the sound of someone repeating, “I am sacred ground.” That was so visceral. It was empowering and freeing all the way to my bones. The dance kept building and the dancers shifted from quartets to trios and they tossed props back and forth to each other, then placed them in a small altar down stage. The singing shifted to the subtitle’s song “I Wish You Me,” which was a loving farewell. The dance became gentler and more enchanting. The projection was a beautiful collage of stars in the night sky and falling rose petals. The dancers kept moving past the end of the dance, and the lights faded until they were just silhouettes against a starry sky. It was so beautiful and raw I felt sad. 

If I ever get the chance to witness Dastak again, I will definitely be taking it. It reminded me of my roots in classical modern dance in the narrative structure, but it was so enriched by all the different styles, the different people performing, and the magnificent sound score. 

arin lynn is an artist and stage tech in Salt Lake City. 

RW looks to fill the void

Ririe-Woodbury’s Fill In The Blank on Thursday, January 27 was a wild ride of dance, throwbacks, and emotional tension.

The show opened with the premiere of jo Blake’s coincidences, when we meet up. jo Blake is the only Utah based choreographer in the program, but it’s nice to see Ririe-Woodbury reaching out to the Salt Lake Community for choreographers. In Blake’s dance the first thing I noticed was I could see all the dancers' feet planting into the floor. The space was so close and intimate, those finesse movements were a new aspect of Ririe-Woodbury that is usually lost in the grandness of the Rose Wagner Theater. The closeness was an important aspect for the first work, as the textures and energy of the movement was gentle and tender. The dancers weaved in and out of each other using both gentle brushes of contact as well as firm supportive lifting. It was a virtuosic and totally androgynous. I felt as though I was watching energy carving and weaving through space. It was a wash of satisfying technical skill as well as a familiar energetic ride. The gentleness of the piece was a grounding experience that gave us time to settle in for the wildness of the dances that followed.

The Company — Megan McCarthy, Fausto Rivera, Peter Farrow, Alexander Pham, Connie Lohner and Miche’ Smith — in I can see myself in your pupil. Photo by Stuart Ruckman.

I can see myself in your pupil was the most vivid case of deja vu I had ever experienced. Until about a quarter of the way through the piece I had realized it: this was the first contemporary dance work I had ever seen. This is the dance that made me think “I have to dance.” I saw this work as a teenager when Gallim Dance visited my home city and I’ve never been able to remember the title, the choreographer, or even the year I saw it. Now, at the Regent Street Blackbox of Salt Lake City in 2022, it all came rushing back to me. My discovery of the limitlessness of dance, my first time learning repertoire, the memory of being told my body was full of glitter and to dance is to shake it up. It was a wild ride to compare this real dance experience to the dream-like memory from my adolescence. It was a confusing experience of being excited and also acknowledging how far I’ve grown since then. The dance itself started the same way I remembered it on that fateful day, when they all came out one by one, shaking and giving wild fleeting facial expressions. To see Ririe Woodbury do it was thrilling, like running into an old friend unexpectedly. As the dance went on, I started noticing some things that my naive eyes had not. The dance moved to a solo performed by Megan McCarthy, and it may be the bendiest thing I’ve ever seen in dance. I witnessed tension and physical anomaly followed by a powerful trio of men. The dance flowed through a duet with both humor and discomfort, and then to a trio of fighting for the spotlight. The dance ended with powerful group choreography. Their facial expressions were wild and constantly changing. As it kept going their power kept growing. The dance ended abruptly, and I was left stunned. I can see myself in your pupil checked every box.

The Company performing Stephanie Batten Bland’s new work. Photo by Stuart Ruckman.

Look who’s coming to dinner is a dance by Stefanie Batten Bland based on the film Guess Who’s Coming To Dinner. It opened with the dancers entering the stage masked, and they dropped their masks to reveal plastic looking smiles framed with overly posed hand gestures. The dance began with theatrics of the dancers in nervous introductions, setting tables and chairs, being ignored and pressuring others to join. As the theatrics began to blend with more conventional contemporary dance, the tables began to literally change roles. The dancers moved them through the stage so the three tables were stacked on ends. Personally this was my favorite part of the dance, when the tables turned into doors which everyone had a turn knocking on. They slid apart to reveal the person on the other side, and they slid through the space to hide others again. The movement of the tables settled on a magnificent solo performed by Alexander Pham. His interactions with this table-door continued to build on itself and defy gravity. It was exciting to see the support and power of the stabilizing dancers as Pham floated along the top, and leaned in with his whole body weight. The scene began to shift again until the tables formed a wall through the center of the space and the spotlight shifted to Miche’ Smith. Her solo was a tangible expression of anxiety and working up the courage to speak. Her theatrical performance heightened the intensity of the entire work. As she was plucked from the ground and set down behind the wall out of sight, the spotlight kept shifting between the rest of the dancers. Each one physicalizing their own experiences of anxiety about owning your own identity. The last to have a feature was Corrine Lohner. She was surrounded by the other dancers as they moved around her, sometimes framing her and sometimes enveloping her. As the intensity grew the movement became slower and more controlled. The dancers found themselves huddled together in the downstage corner, and they all knocked on the unseen yet understood door between the audience and the stage. Lohner raised her hand in a wave and said “Hi.” And with that, the show ended. 

All in all, Fill in the Blank by Ririe-Woodbury Dance Company was a fun night of concert dance. It was lovely to attend a show in person and feel generally safe about it, as upon entry they checked Covid vaccination cards and identification. It was fun to sit around other people and hear them exclaim about the parts they liked. One audience member whispered, “look at her toes!” during a slow motion walk from Megan McCarthy. It was endearing to witness the young audience members in awe of the technical prowess and the roller coaster of energy throughout the evening. I hope to see Ririe-Woodbury in such intimate spaces in the future, and I hope they continue to commission other local choreographers. 

arin lynn is an artist and stage tech in Salt Lake City. 

A new series, 801 Salon, showcases new work at Vis eyeware store

On the third Saturday of each month, Vis optical shop stows away its designer eyewear and opens its doors to the local arts community for intimate evenings of art curated by 801 Salon. 

November’s installment featured dance works by Jasmine Stack (accompanied by musician Benjamin Swisher), Corinne Lohner and Peter Farrow, Courtney Mazeika, and Myles Tracy. 

Stack’s choreography for The Fifth Season was pedestrian and repetitive, yet elegant. The movement vocabulary consisted of pensive steps forwards and backwards and pivot turns, mostly taking place on the downstage right to upstage left diagonal. Every now and then, she added sweeping, linear arm movements to this patterned footwork. Swisher’s live score was minimal and atmospheric, complementing Stack’s simplicity. A sparse, post-modern dance work, The Fifth Season lulled me into a bit of a peaceful trance within a few minutes. When I refocused myself, I realized that the pattern-making, repetition, use of linear and diagonal lines, and Stack’s bobbed hair and A-Line midi skirt that both whipped cleanly from side to side with each pivot turn reminded me of Belgian choreographer Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker’s Fase.

The 801 Salon audience. Images courtesy of Roxanne Gray, organizer.

Lohner and Farrow, both company members of Ririe-Woodbury, presented Ambulation. Much of the piece consisted of them leaning the full weight of their bodies onto each other, and taking quick and calculated steps across the floor while doing so. When they parted from each other, they performed a series of angular, quirky, gestural movements side by side. Each of them held that classic, unaffected, modern dancer stares past the audience gaze throughout the majority of the piece, which felt like a bizarre choice considering the cozy, intimate setting of the crowded boutique. However, in the few instances that the two made eye contact with each other, I felt a deep sense of care and friendship emanating from them.

Mazeika’s Heart, Innacurate.

The word writhing comes to mind when I recall Mazeika’s Heart, Innacurate. Her twisting movements and contorted shapes communicated uncertainty and discomfort, but her ever-pleasant facial expression (she even fully smiled at one point!) revealed a sense of acceptance, maybe even gratification. The incredible sense of control that she demonstrated over her supple spine and hyperextended joints was refreshing, considering the amount of seemingly aimless noodling that many have participated in via Instagram over the past year (myself included).

Myles Tracy performing his solo.

There was a square of white tape on stage right of the performance floor. I noticed it at the beginning of the show and wondered if one of the dancers intended to interact with it. When Tracy, clad in all white, entered for The Thing We Made of the Thing, I just knew the tape was there for him. As the Salt Contemporary dancer meticulously moved in and out of the floor, it became apparent that the tape was not actually part of his solo, just coincidentally positioned there.

For inquiries about future 801 Salon events, contact 801salonslc@gmail.com.

Alexandra Barbier is a dance artist and performance-maker. She received a modern dance MFA from the University of Utah and has taught courses on creative process, queer performance art, and dance in culture.

Junction Dance dives in

This past weekend, Junction Dance Company director Megan Adelsberger welcomed the audience to their first show of the season. The program notes explained the symbolism of each character in the show and gave a story line synopsis and a definition of the show’s title: Hypnopompic. The “hypnopompic” is the state of consciousness leading out of sleep — we were about to be taken on a journey through the subconscious by dance.

In a bed in the upper left corner of the stage, we see soloist Lydia Forsgren (who portrays Roya) for the first time. She lays there while a projection of her is shown above. Forsgren’s moves matched the music perfectly. She never missed a beat, while showing off flexibility and clean lines.

Courtesy of Junction Dance.

After the opening number, the audience began to understand the work’s relationship to the hypnopompic. Roya’s dreams would include multiple characters. “The Sand Sweepers” were first, a projected night sky giving us more context than the movement alone provided. Inspired by Neil Gaiman’s “The Sandman,” these young women created circular visuals as though they were casting a spell on Roya. Seamlessly, they whisked both Roya and her bed offstage to make room for the next stage of dreaming. “Ehno & The Protectors” were next with sharp, staccato movement. They flew through the air and mixed dance with difficult tricks. I had to reach for the program to remember what Ehno represented — he was a protector, but could also be representative of Roya “putting up a wall.” 

As the show went on, the audience was introduced to other characters, such as Bastet, Daryah and Ghadra. Costuming and projections helped me to understand exactly who these characters were. Bastet was Junction dancer Allison Wright, who represents Roya’s feminine side. As a “Lady Leopard,” she was fierce and feminine, her group's movement was clean and cute. Ghadra the Gorilla came in next — dancer Josh Curtis was featured on the front cover of the program. While the rest of the gorillas danced behind, Josh and Lydia had a duet and finally established the relationship I had been waiting the whole show to see.

After Ghadra came Daryah. She was the first soloist since the beginning of the show, and it was great to see something more than unison. Daryah’s movements flowed one into the next and there was breath in everything she did, she hit every beat, and moved like a dolphin.

During intermission, discussions of how Roya and the other dancers related to each other ran through my brain. It was difficult to understand what were her dreams and what were just unrelated dances. Roya herself was only seen interacting with others in four out of eleven pieces in the first half of the show. Hoping the second half would bring more cohesion, I watched the curtain bring us back into the hypnopompic state. We would see Roya interact with all of Junction’s main members in both duets and large unison.

Courtesy of Junction Dance.

There’s no denying that these dancers are trained well and are all extremely talented. Junction stands out in that they know how to work the crowd, as well as boasting excellent costumes and music. Cheers arose from the crowd throughout the show, creating a loving and supportive atmosphere. When it comes to storyline, I am unsure where I stand. After one more duet between Ghadra and Roya, I was left wondering whether Ghadra represented something good or evil. I also wondered whether he was only a part of her dreams or if there was a stronger relationship between them in real life. His symbology and the notes about him from the program failed to bring more clarity. Overall, the production relied too heavily on costuming and projections to tell the story. Without these elements, the movement and facial expressions didn’t cohere — only showing off what the dancers could do, not how their characters might interact. Junction needed to dive deeper into narrative and character development. Hypnopompic was fantastic and unique, but in the end, it slightly missed the mark.

Alexis Guerrero is a Salt Lake City born and raised dancer and choreographer. Creating and performing for the majority of her life, she will graduate in 2022 with a BFA in Modern Dance. She recently performed in a new work by local artist Alex Barbier and will present a work of her own this spring. 

And Artists and Dan Higgins bring a split bill to the Rose

Industrial lights in hand, five female dancers shared the stage for the opening of Sandbox this weekend at the Rose Wagner. The opening soloist, Rachel Andes, pushed boundaries physically and her commitment was breathtaking. The remaining four dancers – Melissa Younker, Haleigh Larmer, Kellie St. Pierre and Laura Baumeister – followed Andes with their lights. No music for this collaboration by And Artists: the dancers embraced the silence and filled it with breath and laughter. All that was heard were the sounds of the audience and dancers' responses to each other. These casual encounters pulled the audience in and kept our attention for nearly an hour. 

St. Pierre above and Larmer below, photo by L.M. Sorenson.

Once the first solo was over, the lights were hung up and the intimate setting opened to include all five of these Bold, Bad-ass, Beautiful women. Simple but colorful costumes allowed the dancers’ movement to shine as they switched seamlessly between partnerships, solos and a short section of unison. Each dancer took their turn showing what they had to offer and making the choreography their own. These five women work so well with each other. And Artists chose such an incredible group of artists to present this piece. Their strength, commitment and friendship shone as each section played out in front of our eyes. Changing notecards in the left lower corner of the stage allowed the audience insight into the choreographic process at play. The dancers seamlessly changed these cards, the transitions so subtle I almost didn’t notice this beautiful little recurring surprise. 

Mertz in her solo, photo by L.M. Sorenson.

After a brief intermission, Dan Higgins presented his newest work. This included another group of five local artists, traditional theater lighting, and varied but cohesive costumes for the performers. Higgins’ piece also opened with a soloist, Cameron Mertz. Her commitment to staccato and sharp movement was in beautiful opposition to her flowy, smooth costuming. Sharp, clear movements prevailed throughout, showing off the work’s skilled performers. Unison sections were so in sync I believe they could have done them with their eyes closed. Performing without masks, facial expressions added to the movement something that audiences have missed for almost two years now. There was not only emotion bleeding into what the body was doing, but their faces matched these feelings. After a unison section, a partnership – Kayla Hansen and Bashaun Williams – took the stage in a display of trust and strength. Hansen soared through the air and effortlessly transitioned back down to the ground and into new movement without a hitch. Here Higgins highlighted Williams’ strength, and yet there was a sense of artistry that was feminine but masculine at the same time. His capability to encompass both is such a rare find. Higgins also chose to highlight Hansen’s beautiful female lines and flexibility throughout this astounding duet. You could tell that they had spent hours rehearsing together and building on a natural artistic chemistry.

Williams and Hansen, photo by L.M. Sorenson.

Lastly, the Mertz entered again and danced through the static. Her movement took turns going with what was coming through the speakers but also sometimes pushing strictly against it. A soft spot light showcased her quick, sharp kinesthetic signature. With a slow fade to black, these artists closed the show and all bowed together to a standing ovation. And Artists and Dan Higgins put on a great show. They created a sense of space for the community, a place for where both artists and non-artists felt invited to savor in the choreographic process. 

Alexis Guerrero is a Salt Lake City born and raised dancer and choreographer. Creating and performing for the majority of her life, she will graduate in 2022 with a BFA in Modern Dance. She recently performed in a new work by local artist Alex Barbier and will present a work of her own this spring.