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The
Martha's Vineyard Times is a weekly publication.
August 4 - 10, 2005 Edition
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Dance:
Young Yard dancers push the edges August 4 , 2005 By Julian Wise
“Lift Off,” the opening piece by choreographer Leonard Cruz, featured dancer Benjamin Rasmussen darting about the stage in a Superman shirt and tight briefs, slowing down to take bodybuilder poses before racing about at a frantic pace. The piece created a sense of disjunction, a theme that would be revisited throughout the evening. “She Said He Said He Said She Said Remixed” by choreographer Cheng-Chieh Yu featured gender-blending antics as a male dancer sported a woman’s dress and necktie, while female dancers dressed in outfits that looked like they were assembled from dishrags and leftover scraps from Madonna’s 1980s videos. Against the backdrop of fluttery flamenco rhythms and Brazilian lullabies, they performed catwalk struts across the stage while a duo of dancers on an elevated box stage in back did a series of twirls that would have been at home in a Cirque du Soleil performance. The dancers below mixed the icy frisson of the fashion catwalk with the primal heat of Afro-Brazilian rhythms as they transitioned into more kinetic movements. Leonard Cruz’s “Opus Wahn” featured dancer Suzanne Chi lit by a spotlight from above as a screeching, feedback-drenched drone played over the sound system. The lone figure writhed and trembled as though emerging by sheer willpower from a frozen, paralytic state. As the music switched from a jazzy tempo to a series of surreal, guttural exclamations and squawks, the dancer’s motions became increasingly agitated and frenetic, as though she were embraced with a seizure-like rapture. This was one of the more hermetic pieces of the evening that challenged the audience to decode its inscrutable movements. “Tongues and Limbs” by choreographer Erica Essner featured dancers LoMa Familiar and Paul Singh clad in Asian peasant garb creating a tableau of male-female strife enacted through graceful, interweaving motions. The two dancers twirled each other about with Rogers and Astaire precision as their movements signaled division and rapprochement. “Perhaps I Have Been Listening” by choreographer Peter Sciscioli began with a projection of leaves, branches, and blue sky against a white backdrop. Dancers Benjamin Rasmussen, Courtney Smith, and Wen-Shuan Yang performed soft, elegant spins and turns against strains of classical music played on a crackling record. The mix of sounds and images created the impression of a slow summer afternoon as the three dancers moved like mythical nymphs, holding hands and weaving among each other against the strains of operatic singing. The evening culminated in a sense of grace and elegance that sent the audience into the summer night feeling lightened and elevated by the evening’s proceedings. Julian Wise, a teaching assistant at the Oak Bluffs School, is a frequent contributor to The Times, specializing in music, film, and performing arts. |
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