It all started so simply. Three large white boxes rest on the floor. A voice describes the choreography of a dance: “She grasps her bent elbow, runs hand down to wrist. He kneels on one knee.” Then a box begins to move, an unseen someone inside, perhaps grasping a bent elbow? The box slides along, without feet....
The photo that MTA sent out with their reminder email the week before, showed the performers inside the white boxes and my first reaction was skepticism. Being relatively new to the movement arts, I generally think about movement and dance in a somewhat traditional way (think ballet or contact improv)....
An artist named “Foofwa”—don’t we expect the bizarre, the incomprehensible?
But here he is—a normal-looking guy--casual and relaxed in sweatsuit and gray socks, chatting with the audience while warming up…deceptive, for this is only the first of an electrifying range of characters we will meet in this fine-tuned and flowing solo performance.
There is no “backstage” here—his “Grand Entrance” will be made from the great outdoors of Mt. Tremper, through what looks like the fire door—but we’ll speak of that later…
First, we must be educated—for too many in the audience (myself included) are not that familiar with those two giants of Dance; Pina, Merce, (Michael, we know)—their quirks and characteristic styles of movement, their motives and mannerisms. Professor Foofwa to the rescue! A concise and clear history of Dance, Dance Evolution…yes, he’s a natural teacher-- what? You expected him to dance, not talk? Like I said, there’s many people in this show—all of them him.
Well that was fun. I don't know quite how to say what it was, but it was fun.
Foofwa kindly led us through a brief history of modern dance in order to give some 'context' to the piece. He highlighted some of the idiosyncrasies of the dancers he was about to tribute -- Micheal Jackson, Pina Bausch, and Merce Cunningham -- which was fascinating in and of itself not just because of the info he gave, but how we naturally embodied the dancers, channeling a signature motion with a turn of his head, thump of his pelvis, sway of his arms.
Foofwa wove a tale, told through his Italian mummy man character, of the 3 dancers navigating the afterlife.
Wow, Fantastic! Interesting, Different, Funny, Very creative!
I enjoyed the performance very much. This was the first time I attended a performance at
Mount Tremper Arts. Foofwa d’lmobilite was a great way to be introduced to Mount Tremper Arts. I love the venue and the intimacy; the surroundings are beautiful. My 15 year old daughter and my 13 year old son came with me and enjoyed every minute of the performance.
In Montgomery Park, or Opulance limbs and mouths move not in expression of an inward motivating spirit, but as prompted by a mandated simultaneity, the regimented coherence of the performance piece as aesthetic whole. The dual or multiple voices can only speak in harmony, in unison, in time with a metronome that functions like an organ regulating the aesthetic with a mechanical precision that replaces the heart's figurative emotive function.
Where there is surface there is language -- on the face, on the page, on the white wall that differentiates inside from outside -- and depth of feeling is signaled yet absent. Longing appears only as an afterimage, conjuring the faint memory of a past in which emotion was possible. Then, longing is directed toward defunct signs which remind us that longing has left us. The dancer in an apron is replicated in her partner and then the breathing woman becomes an archetype or reproducible typeface.
written spoken, flash frags, cases on film... walls that open to oceans and worlds of intensely personal experience; many times expressionlessly expressed. as in shock. as in out-of-body. as in automaton.
words about walls, sometimes comforting, many times predatory. always alive and breathing.
boundaries, safety, deep disturbance,ruins, songs and silence in motion, in choreographed harmony. walls that open to ocean. walls to uncover. to waves upon waves.. to dissolve.
first ourside with karinne, a caricature of a chef, a sign on her chest about goldfinch wall. 'your stomach will improve.."
i thought something in the past had upset her stomach..
was it the wallpaper that burned? wondering, wondrous, prosaic.. a touch of mystery and warmth on a cool summer eve. 'i have come from afaarr..' my kind of language.
"Census: the seed of an apple"
A musician acts like a scenic instrumentalist and not only to accompany the dancer. He creates a profound relationship whit the other two artists in the environment they inhabit, breaking through conventional forms to make a sound. Without hiding on a different level or in the pit of an orchestra, he takes over the entire scenic space. A complete man who uses his techniques, his body and his voice to express the whole human being without adornments.
A singer creates a dialog with dancer and the musician uses and internal, instinctual language that vibrates in the space.
The dancer is like a giant in a cabin in the Catskills who shows the audience a Darwinian Evolution using his body. In the beginnings he moves as a primitive cell on the earth and changes into an upright human being. In this transformation, he explodes creating a dramatic and potentially dangerous condition. he travels past an intermediate level that evokes this transition between primitive and modern times.
Experiencing “CENSUS”: Let me count the ways…
It started with a smile—not something one expects with a dance performance—
And the joy—oh yes! of being barefoot, all of us, in this gracious and welcoming space—(shoes not allowed) beamed ceiling, gloss parquet, relaxed seating, and three persons, three performers, sitting and smiling…as if in conversation.
Or not…the words are simple, complex, puzzling—the classifications of animal groups—“pride of lions, stream of trout”—all human inventions of the mind. Why? Are we driven to name the beasts, to count, to corral—to subdue?
Now Will’s dance, and his vocal repetition of “a brief history of numbers”— these swift and simple motions, positions of arms, torso, feet—rudimentary, minimal, evocative. As we watch, we are gently unhinged from time…Will’s form slides from Egyptian pose to modern slouch, and beyond, at the speed of thought—
It all started out very friendly, light, open,
dancer reclined comfortably on the floor, gazing about the audience, taking us all in like sipping wine,
then proposing, with the inviting, the gatherings of words,
a pod of whales
a pack of dogs
a flock of birds
a gaggle of geese
a colony of ants
an exaltation of larks
a wisdom of wombats
a wisdom of grandmothers
a pod of dolphins
a clutch of hens
a wardrobe of clothes
an exhalation of housewives