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| | Photo by Steven Schreiber | | | Mariko Kurihara and Kile Hotchkiss from TAKE Dance
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September 11 and beyond
DanceNow 2009 keeps NYC healthy
By QUINN BATSON
Offoffoff.com
The DanceNow show on September 11 was a heartening reminder that 8 years later, we move on and thrive through dance and creation. As before, the following is chronological and loosely punctuated.
Betsy Fisher: Homage to Mahler um, choreographed by Hanya Holm and inspired by Martha Graham
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| DANCENOW 2009 TWO | Choreography by: Hanya Holm, Takehiro Ueyama, Jane Comfort, Luka Kito and Megan Boyd, Wallie Wolfgruber, Gina Gibney, Aaron Draper, Stefanie Nelson, Sidra Bell, Lane Gifford, Malcolm J. Low, Zvi Gotheiner.
Dancers: September 11:
Betsy Fisher: Claudia Gitelman
TAKE Dance: Mariko Kurihara, Kile Hotchkiss
Jane Comfort: Jessica Anthony, Jane Comfort, Leslie Cuyjet, Peter Sciscioli
Mute: Megan Boyd, Luka Kito
Wallie Wolfgruber: Janet Forward, Ryoko Kudo, Jake Laub, Daniel Madoff, Rebecca Bliss
Gina Gibney: Natsuki Arai, Joshua Palmer, Hannah Seidel
Banana Peel: Kimberly Almquist, Nicole Mitchell
Stefanie Nelson: Matthew Oakes, Alison Schecter, Ariana Siegal
Li Chiao-Ping
Julian Barnett: Julian Barnett, Jocelyn Tobias
other nights:
Sidra Bell: Jacquie Dumas, Leslie Hubilla, Alexandra Johnson, Amber Lee Parker
Lane & Co: Jesse C. Beck, Billy Blanken, Rick Busser, Durrell Comedy, Rachel Talley, Raleigh Veach, Marcos Vedoveto, Jay Voelker
Dusan Tynek: Alexandra Berger, Ann Chiaverini, Matthew Dailey, Eden Mazer, Elisa Osborne, Satoshi Takao, Dusan Tynek
Jamal Jackson: Tiffani Harris, Jamal Jackson, Meredith Moore, Asha Rhodes, Sean Thomas
Amy Larimer
Formalstructure: Anna-Louise Herzog, Mark Schmidt, Malcom Low
Misnomer: Brynne Billingsley, Jenny Campbell, Jennifer Harmer, Coco Karol, Val Loukiano
Comedy Trio: Matt Morgan, Mark Gindick, Ambrose Martos
ZviDance: Jimmy Everett
David Dorfman
Monica Bill Barnes .
Lighting design by: Lauren Parrish.
| | SCHEDULE | Dance Theater Workshop
September 8-12, 2009
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TAKE Dance: Whispering Within this pairing of a gentle white giant and tiny "Indian" princess is a beautifully soft synergy of movement, music, lighting and story. tenderness reigns.
Jane Comfort: Four Screaming Women OK, one is a man, but the accuracy of the vocal/movement phrases is immaculate. an amazing piece, with very human robots trading calls and responses that shift meaning over time. may be political commentary or simply brilliant wordplay.
Mute: Exposition #2 music by Luka Kito gives a spaceship/ghost-airport ambience shimmering with bells and chimes and electronic pulses and makes it hard to separate the movement from the mood; mesmerizing.
Wallie Wolfgruber & Company: Sacred Things/My Dream Support System really pretty piece with similar ambience and bigger, more geometric dancing, full of x-splits, lifts and spins to ground, fugueing music and movement and a lovely ending with an Asian standout held aloft.
Gina Gibney Dance: View Partially Obstructed quiet but heated, also beginning in ambient music (a trend here?) with a lovely duet by a smooth and springy guy and sharply soft Asian woman. a subsequent running trio also feels frantic but smooth. newly vertical movement and perhaps the man give this piece the feel of a real and welcome departure for Gina Gibney.
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| | Photo by Steven Schreiber | | | Jocelyn Tobias and Julian Barnett
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Banana Peel Dance: Riptide racoon-eyed space creatures full of energy and tension dance this piece into significance with looseness and snap and elements of pulsing, pausing, stalking, undulating and even puppeteering. surprisingly fresh choreography and sound editing from Aaron Draper
Stefanie Nelson Dancegroup: Prey/Pray what an apt title for a nifty piece of male/female interaction with two predatory/hopeful women dancing hyperactive and skittish attempts to get attention from a laconic man who occasionally engages them. a clever ending adds humor and one more layer
Li Chiao-Ping Dance: Becoming a solo of power and grace, fast and slow, almost overwrought but engaging
Julian Barnett Project: Wooden Heart rich rich duet of great movement to cutup Portishead music, with moments of singalong lipsynch and odd travels with a mic cord. slinky and really interesting.
And the rest. . .
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| Photo by Steven Schreiber | | Misnomer Dance Theater
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The quality of dance and performance at DanceNow is consistently really high, but to pare the length of this review, these are impressions only for additional pieces on other nights that felt suprising or covered new ground:
Sidra Bell Dance New York: your distance kept sharp and angular but fluid and smooth, spotlights and costumes enhance a fierce ballet-in-a-cabaret feel
Lane & Co: Jake's Dilemma spoken poetry delivered and danced well enough to make us care about his dilemma and recognize our own
Dusan Tynek Dance Theatre: Middlegame always worth watching and often surprising, his mixture of music, movement and pageant is unique, with vivid partnering and group tableaux
Jamal Jackson Dance Company: Supplant, 2008 sheer joy of movement from beginning to end, to kuduro music by Puto Prata, with African softness and swinging arms and a quality of being simultaneously floating and weighted, ending beautifully in silo, silence and perpetual motion
Amy Larimer: Swim never predictable and always interesting, Larimer finds comedy from nowhere like no one else, using pregnant pauses and sly entrances to full effect
Formalstructure Inc. The House that Jack Built low light and music of yummy pulsing ambience drives darkly erotic dancing of smooth struggle and big movement
Misnomer Dance Theater: Too Late Tulip who knew Chris Elam could do pretty and flowing? sure, women moving like birds remind us of his quirky side, but these are beautiful birds
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| | Photo by Steven Schreiber | | | Monica Bill Barnes
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The Comedy Trio Happy Hour: Robes three guys in bathrobes and nothing else. yes, it's funny.
ZviDance: Zoom Jimmy Everett moves like butter with muscles to chugging/grooving Brazilian music, with odd twists, headshakes and flipbacks and soft descents to ground
David Dorfman: solo from Lightbulb Theory robust poetry about human fragility, with words to introduce the piece and none needed to end it, danced with passion and pathos
Monica Bill Barnes & Company here we are OK, this solo is only surprising if you've never seen a MBB solo, but it brought the house down and ended the "base camp at DTW" series, and it would be hard to leave out something so scintillating. It's as if she has a superfast processor in her head and the body to translate this speed to movement; the pace and amount of her scenarios and allusions in seven minutes is staggering.
The opening night of DanceNow was reviewed in a separate piece.
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SEPTEMBER 14, 2009
OFFOFFOFF.COM • THE GUIDE TO ALTERNATIVE NEW YORK
Reader comments on DanceNow 2009 two:
Wow from Pauline, Sep 19, 2009
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