PARTS aliens
What is it about training systems in dance?
I went to see second cycle PARTS students perform a quintet of their own works at Theater Kikker on Tuesday (21/04). The performances, with one exception, were frighteningly lifeless. Only when facial manoeuvres were choreographed did they disengage from the disengagement, at which point their faces would invariably take on the life of a botoxed whomever.
I am not sure if this is peculiar to PARTS, but I was reminded a great deal of the way in which cool (in so many forms) infects dance training systems. It seems a minor tragedy that, in training humans to be sensitive to—and aware of—their body-minds, the systems fail to find ways to support the dancers dance and perform as people with histories, memories, thoughts, and freedom. Perhaps it is simply the ghost of the wildly uncool expressionism from so long ago that propagates the cool of absence.
It made for a long night.
The exception to this was Daniel Linehan’s ‘Not about everything’ which started with a strongly conceived proposition, and a simple physical strategy (of constantly turning in circles). His mantra, “this is not about everything”, repeated ad nauseum was riveting, up until the point where he proceeded to make it about everything (about half way through).
The performances included were ‘In circumstances’ by Stav Yeini & Elisa Yvelin, ‘Folksonomy’ by Noé Soulier, ‘Aron & Mikko thinking duet…’ by Aron Blom & Mikko Hyvönen, ‘Star-dust’ by Marco Torrice, ‘Not about everything’ by Daniel Linehan.
