Aynsley Vandenbroucke Movement Group’s “Full Circle”, review by Shea Settimi
Audience Review
8:15pm: The dancers, percussionists, Matt and Aynsley, and a few others stand outside the studio, studying the sky. “Which way are the clouds moving?” Matt goes inside to check the weather. Radar shows rain over the reservoir, but nothing in Mt. Tremper. The decision is finally made: Full Circle will be performed for the first time outdoors, in the field above the studio. As the percussionists break down their gear and trot it from the studio to their cars to haul up the hill, the sky darkens and a few distant lightning flashes are visible over the mountain in the distance. “I’m getting kind of nervous,” says Matt. But there is no question. “We’re committed.”
9:00pm: Most of the guests have arrived and either begin the 8-minute walk up the hill, or climb into the car shuttling guests to the field. Each guest received a flashlight before heading up the hill, and many make use of the spray-bottles of OFF! on the ticket desk before heading up.
9:20pm: I get in the car for its final shuttle up to the field. It’s dark at the performance space, except for the tiki torches (which will soon be extinguished) ringing the perimeter of wooden folding chairs arranged in a circle. Two percussionists are on opposite sides of the circle. Between them and the crickets and the frogs (and the distant rumbling of thunder that we’re not trying to hear), the performance is in surround sound.
The dancers begin. Each holds a flashlight; sometimes they place the flashlights in the grass, and the light beams projecting across the circle show the lines of their bodies through their white skirts. Sometimes their movements are smooth and flowing, synchronized. Sometimes they are herky-jerkey, the dancer closest to me is pawing at the wet grass with her sneakers and she reminds me of a horse pawing at the ground. There are flashes of lightning in the distance; they seem to be getting closer as the performance goes on. Thunder adds its voice to the show, louder and closer. The dancers are so close that I can hear them breathing, hear their bodies as they hit the ground, the rubber soles of their sneakers squeaking on the wet grass. They lie sprawled on the grass and as they move it’s as if the earth itself is moving, breathing. Aynsley and Kristen are doing a duet. One encircles a part of the other, and the encircled dancer slips through the loop like liquid. They trade off, one encircling the other, one slipping through the circle. I didn’t know that bodies could move like liquid.
Finally a bolt of lightning strikes startlingly close, the thunder right behind it, and now it’s raining. Everyone grabs their flashlight and moves up to the shelter of the cabin. The rain passes quickly and everyone is game to pick up where we left off.
I’m back in my chair and when I turn around, I see a long string of flashlights bobbing down the hill back to the field. The dancers pick up the performance, running around the outside of the circle with their flashlights. It is a performance of incredible endurance—50 minutes of hard work that looks graceful and effortless. The four dancers sit in the center of the circle, each with two flashlights. They push the lights across the distance to each other, and this simple movement—someone pushing a flashlight through the grass to the woman across from her, flashlights crisscrossing through the grass—seems of another world. The stars have come out, the crickets and frogs are still at it, lightning bugs sparkle in the trees.
10:15pm: We’re sitting around the firepit roasting marshmallows for s’mores, talking about the performance and other things. The fire brings us all together and it seems right to say anything, or to say nothing. Another one-of-a-kind evening at Mount Tremper Arts. Thanks Matt & Aynsley!