Dance Edits, February 9th, 2024
I do prefer watching work-in-progress rather than a finished and polished dance work. 'Dance Edits' is the format for showing first drafts, sketches and blueprints of new choreography that residents of the Dance City in Newcastle made in the previous summer. This work is often experimental, fresh and projected into the future. An unfinished work gives the spectator the opportunity to enter the choreographers' creativity, to join in the authors' imagination, to appreciate the choices they've made and to suggest something of your own.
Andrew Lennox Scott, 'In between all of this'
Watching 'In between all of this,' a performance by Andrew Lennox Scott, I suddenly had a vision of the smooth surface of the sea and the performer diving in the waves. Andrew made a spider web from a ball of woolen yarn, a new kind of environment full of knots and entangled threads, to immerse and to move in it. It was like a new element: moles dig themselves into soil, fishes live in water, and Andrew moves in the middle of a ball of woolen threads, stretched and entangled: he is this kind of strange but very attractive creature. The knotted and mixed surface he created is a precise metaphor for being confused, perplexed, desperate to get out. I feel like that buying train tickets online, lost on the railway site which is far from perfect. Unlike me, Andrew untied the knots and got out without too much of a trauma. The success of his work-in-progress is in having a clear idea for a performance, an original prop he made for himself at a low price, and the unfailing optimism of youth, plus the flexibility and lightness of his body and wide, free movements - I loved the way he runs.
Lila Naruse, 'Feral'
Lila Naruse dances on an aerial rope rather than a pole. She called her performance 'Feral', but for me the movements of her super-strong and flexible body looked elegant. Feral was the rope, white and luminescent, which Lila struggled with, climbing to the top, falling and hanging from, submitting to and conquering the giant snake. I do not have a suggestion of how to develop this work-in-progress: I should learn to climb a giant snow-white snake first.
Be it a giant snake or a ball of wool, props are good for choreography: they are like a partner the performer dances with. It's much more of a challenge to create choreography when it's just the body on stage. Yet, Lucia Piquero Alvarez was not afraid of the challenge. Nor was she shy in choosing the most twisted, succinct, acrobatic movements, sculptural poses and expressive gestures. Her beautiful clean-cut face adds to the expression. Lucia wrote a dissertation on emotions in dance, on the way the dancer's movements resonate in the feelings of the audience. Through her research, she discovered secrets of how to make the spectator tremble. Her 'Epione' was a pleasure for the eyes and fuel for feelings. In which direction is she going to take her work-in-progress? I personally would change the music accompaniment, at the moment rather lacking structure and accents, not on a par with the dance.
Lucia Piquero