Reflections
Performances by the Saint Mary’s College of California MFA in Dance Program
Lincoln Theater, Yountville
January 27, 2017
By Heather Desaulniers
I’ve never run a marathon. No half-marathons, no relays; organized athletic competitions just aren’t my thing. When it comes to these kinds of events, the spectator role is more my speed. And having watched my fair share of them, I have noticed a trend. While of course every race is different and sometimes there is a frontrunner way out ahead, more often than not it seems that it is a cluster of folks who together are leading the race.
I’m fascinated by the bilateralism that this group represents. On one hand, they are preserving and honoring the rigor, vocabulary, conventions and legacy of their field. No question. But at the same time, they are on the cusp, pushing and advancing the field forward, challenging existing assumptions and taking risks.
Saint Mary’s College of California’s current MFA candidates in dance share this unique bilateralism. Reflections, their recent concert at Lincoln Theater, showcased eleven choreographic projects by this cohort of thoughtful, talented and innovative dance artists. Artists who clearly understand that with careful attention to approach, methodology, structure and content, it is absolutely possible to simultaneously uphold and upend (in a positive way!) a discipline.
This concurrency played out in a number of exciting and unexpected ways during Reflections. One of which was the exploration of world dance forms and contemporary choreography. Four of the works in the evening’s first half fell into this category, each positing different movement genres in a single choreographic container. Instead of creating a hybrid movement style (which also could have been an interesting exercise), these diverse compositions considered how two traditions might converse through movement. And in each case, the dancemakers held fast to the integrity of their chosen forms while experimenting with them as interconnected entities.
The first of these pieces was Byb Chanel Bibene’s Mabele Oyo (This Land), an exuberant trio inviting Central African and contemporary dance into the same performative space. Danced by Bibene, Afia Thompson and Nafi Thompson, Mabele Oyo (This Land) had a strong and compelling narrative – a shared ceremonial ritual. I was definitely curious about the ritual that Bibene was depicting, but for me, it was another aspect of the work that spoke volumes – how Bibene anchored his chosen dance forms together, sussing out their relationship through a fundamental commonality, the circle.
As the three dancers cycled through the choreography, traditional African dance abounded: grounded percussive footwork sequences; hip isolations; expansive, open torsos and pulsating arms. At the same time, Bibene infused this rich phrase material with contemporary vocabulary, things like chaîné turns, grand battements and barrel rolls. And it worked. Not only did the movement fit very well together, but the dance’s flow was not at all compromised. Mabele Oyo (This Land) never once felt like it was making an abrupt turn, which can happen when two different vocabularies are being utilized. This is because all the movements in Mabele Oyo (This Land) shared the same anchor, the circle. As the upper body opened to the sky, the spine was curving; as the foot completed a phrase, it circled out into space; as the leg was released in battement, it traveled not in a straight line, but in an arc upward and back down. Everything was circular. Even Bibene’s staging followed this theme, the dancers traversing circular pathways and routes throughout. Again, certainly a narrative work (and I don’t want to gloss over that fact), but the kinesthetic and corporeal connection that Bibene made between the two genres was truly engrossing.
Performer Aneesh Seth sat in chair downstage left, facing the audience. While he stared intently to the front, three dancers ran into the space from the wings. His penetrating gaze continued as the trio danced slightly upstage of him. I wondered, was the dance a representation of his thoughts? About two-thirds of the way through the piece, Seth broke his silence and repeated a single question over and over, “Are you here?” Presumably in response, another dancer entered and added a new choreographic language to the scene. The container was shifting, evolving and as the piece concluded, it remained in this state of flux. This was Kaveri Seth’s Good.Talking 2.0, an examination of duality told through an interdisciplinary lens. With text, classical Indian dance and contemporary movement, Seth contemplated how one navigates seemingly disparate parts of their identity and how in reality, the space between those parts is extremely porous.
While Good.Talking 2.0 communicates a deeply personal journey, its highly accessible narrative also has the capacity to speak to a wider audience. Most people can relate to the independent/interdependent message that Seth is sharing - two parts of the self that appear separate, yet are somehow being pulled towards each other. These distinct, yet connected parts were aptly echoed through Seth’s two chosen dance forms. Each made its own statement (the independence) but there was also choreographic tissue connecting the two styles of movement (the interdependence). This uniting fiber was Seth’s choreographic specificity and defined precision. In the contemporary sequences, this was particularly realized in the arm, hand and finger positions, and in the Indian dance phrases, with footwork patterns, fast pirouettes and facial expressions.
Stark contrast was at play in Raúl Galván’s laughing out, CRYING IN, the third piece in the Reflections program that placed a world dance form side by side with a contrasting genre. A duet performed by Moisés Calzada and MaryAnngeline Douvikas, laughing out, CRYING IN toggled between two extremes: dramatic Spanish dance and post-modern pedestrianism. First, in a ballroom dance posture, the couple burst onto the stage, offering acrobatic, stylistic Flamenco-inspired movement, full of level changes, sharp extensions and rhythmic emphasis. Next, in a complete turn of phrase, they would stop and just walk or run with a totally relaxed physicality – completed deconstructed and drama-less. Then this binary cycle would repeat, alternating between impassioned theatrical phrases and familiar everyday motions.
While these two dance forms switched back and forth, an interesting viewership perspective emerged. As an onlooker, you were seeing movements that are likely not part of your vocabulary, followed by gestures and steps that are one hundred per cent in your wheelhouse. Things you engage in every single day. As such, laughing out, CRYING IN offered a thought-provoking comment on physical egalitarianism.
The program notes for Cassie Begley’s Submission/Permission said this, “This piece examines the bicultural straddling of Taiwanese American females with sexual oppression. The work explores connections between oppression and sexual submission as an act of love and deep trust for another.” Oppression and submission were certainly apparent throughout this ensemble work - there was bold and arresting imagery of bondage and bowing, as well as violent, haunting and creepy moments. Some of them were hard to watch, and that was purposeful; they should be hard to watch.
But the more riveting part of the piece was how Begley joined traditional, cultural movement with a totally different style, in this case, 1990s contemporary jazz/street dance. Like the three previous choreographers, Begley let each form stand on its own, not trying to merge or fuse them in any way. Her treatment and inclusion of jazz was especially noteworthy, first because it doesn’t often get a fair shot in academic environments. And second, because it made an integral statement. By placing this challenging narrative within a traditional setting and then also in a modern movement genre, Begley indicated that her narrative is not only a thing of the past, it is very much an issue of today.
Two varied works rounded out the first half of Reflections – one a solo tackling the body’s relationship to space and one, a dance film/live performance hybrid. Choreographed and performed by Zaquia Mahler Salinas, remember was a gorgeous piece of artistry. Beautifully composed, beautifully danced, just a stunning contribution to the program. As remember began, Salinas reached behind her and traveled backward in space, discovering the luxuriousness of the unknown, the possibilities in what we cannot see. Equally, she propelled herself into the forward space as well, moving outward away from the center. Palms felt the weight of the air around them, legs swung out, enveloppé-ing to the back and then into pencheé, the solar plexus soared to the sky. With attention to all of these directions - front, back, side, up and down – remember was really a poetic ode to the body in space. And in a breathtaking closing phrase, Salinas repeatedly patted her chest with one hand, while the palm of the other hand extended out into the air – the convergence of the corporeal and the atmospheric.
Act I of Reflections closed with Joy Thiesen’s Those Who Choose Death, an inventive combination of dance film and performance with a dark message – that of mortality. The film portion introduced two souls, Thiesen and Hien Huynh, each engaged in very different physical pursuits. Thiesen was calmly walking through a variety of natural environments, while Huynh rendered staccato vocabulary, very much informed by martial arts. A favorite composer of contemporary choreographers, Max Richter’s score framed the actions with poignancy and care. And as the film portion neared its conclusion, the two came together at the foot of a cross, a telling symbol for Thiesen’s narrative. The film was remarkable, at least the parts that I saw. I’m one of those people who suffer from motion sickness so when the camera occasionally ‘shook,' I couldn’t watch.
Those Who Choose Death then transitioned in real time to the stage, with Thiesen and Huynh taking the same pose that they had been in as the film ended. Eclectic in style (and danced by both with intense skill and passion), the pas de deux that followed was filled with embraces, lifts and instances of separation. A deep dive into the human struggle of staying and leaving.
Reflections’ second half was comprised of five dynamic works that revealed the breadth and diversity of performance composition – a collection of emerging choreographic voices, all working in distinct structures. And again, each was an example of holding fast to the significance of the chosen forms while continuing to stretch these fields with fresh ideas and strategies.
In a lovely transitional cadence, Act II began just as Act I had concluded, with a dance film. Stephanie Emmanuela Engel’s A Onda Dentro (The Wave Within) opened with an abundance of water imagery and two dancers (Engel and Wednesday Manners) on a beach, swaying in soothing blue tulle. Modern suspension and release phrases, peppered with a little Hawaiian dance, mirrored the ebb and flow of the waves as well as the freedom of the natural, expansive environment. It was almost as if they were a human embodiment of the waves, making similar patterns in the sand. Patterns that would be there for a moment and then with another crest, be made anew.
As the film went on, I noticed a very pronounced change in my visual perspective. And it was all due to Engel’s film/video design. With a clever eye, she opted to have the open sand at the edge of the camera shot. And so, it felt as if that sand was continuing into the audience. Like we were actually sitting on the same spot where and while the dance was unfolding. With this one cinematic decision, Engel had transported the entire audience to the beach, at least for a few moments.
Three dancers entered the stage carrying chairs. They set them down and proceeded into a series of task-driven motions: standing up, sitting down, changing directional facing, folding arms and crossing legs. Quickly (and with the addition of a fourth dancer), Sarah Billings Wheeler’s Inside Without Place morphed into a narrative of searching and trepidation. The commonplace, ordinary movements took on a fearful quality, with ample shivering, vibrating and pulsing. Arms flung and swam through space while other bodies curled and rolled protectively in the fetal position. Accompanying this physicality was a music selection replete with whirring and buzzing. I get the choice, though for me, it distracted a little from what was happening choreographically on stage.
Rather than shifting back and forth between post-modern pedestrian tasks and more narrative-driven movement, Wheeler opted for collage technique in Inside Without Place. She didn’t stop one idea and then start another. Instead the different choreographic concepts were layered together, neither one exerting dominance. And it was successful – a case of structure and story (though non-linear, in this instance) building simultaneously.
For me, good dance theater has the following characteristics – a narrative throughline expressed through theatrical devices arranged with an avant-garde intention. Kelsey Bergstrom Young’s ensemble dance theater composition, Tangled Wor(l)ds hits all of these points with strength, intelligence and a welcome dose of quirk and whimsy.
Brown paper bags were arranged around the stage. A version of “Auld Lang Syne” sang through the air, very timely as Robbie Burns’ Day had just been marked two days prior. The cast took the space and played with the idea of groundedness, hitting the floor’s surface and then rebounding upward. Travelling in a circle, they repeated this motif, like they were constructing muscle memory. And memories, or really nostalgia was everywhere in Tangled Wor(l)ds. The paper bags transformed into lunch sacks that held secrets and stories, some to reminisce about; others to discard and forget. An array of musical accompaniments faded in, including excerpts from “Charlie Brown” and “The Breakfast Club." This was an ensemble recalling childhood, adolescence and their experiences moving through these earlier stages of life. Sometimes these remembrances were pleasing and touching, sometimes angry and frustrating. And this is where the piece really excelled; in its more comprehensive approach of the notion of nostalgia. The word nostalgia is typically used in a positive sense, but Tangled Wor(l)ds demonstrated that it can be many things – positive or negative, malignant or benign.
An emotionally charged, highly technical quartet about longing, despair, solitude and isolation, Kevin Paul Hockenberry’s The Invisible Others was up next on the program. The Invisible Others featured impressive contemporary release choreography, beautiful partnering, a heartrending narrative and some of the best dancing of the evening.
Though again, thinking about pushing boundaries, it was Hockenberry’s treatment of the quartet that particularly stood out. Often, a quartet ends up being mostly expressed through two pairings. And that was present too in The Invisible Others. But Hockenberry took the idea of the quartet much further, really delving into all of the possibilities and potential that this configuration holds. One main duet recurred throughout The Invisible Others, often while the other two dancers, each by themselves, shadowed the movement. Trios and solos; unison and canon, side-by-side and partnered – Hockenberry experimented with every compositional variance available. And in a subtle, yet telling closing phrase, the four performers (Katie Jean Dahlaw, Matthew Doolin, Hockenberry and Riley Taylor) took a final quartet formation. Dancing together in the same moment, but not with the same movement, they vulnerably and bravely shared their own personal journeys. Four simultaneous solos; four individuals processing their emotional reality through dance.
The last offering on the Reflections program was Michael Lupacchino’s I Know This Place Too Well, an ensemble work for seven dancers. In costumes that evoked a robotic tone, six women stood in a circle and a fusion of jazz and contemporary dance unfurled. Then one man was added to the ranks. As I Know This Place Too Well progressed, the cast of seven was continually subdivided into various formations and groupings, performing stylistic modern phrases. Phrases teeming with extensions in parallel second, grand rond de jambs and attitude turns; an extraordinary handstand even made an appearance near the end of the piece.
But it was the mood of I Know This Place Too Well that was its most striking feature. At first, the group seemed like they were dancing together, in a community of sorts. Soon after, a competitive vibe erupted, like they were challenging each other to some unknown contest. A combative, aggressive, perhaps even a suspicious spirit oozed from the stage for the rest of the piece. At one point, it even looked like they might have been hunting each other. What made this even more intriguing is that we didn’t see anything happen to provoke the behavior nor did we see it resolved. Instead, Lupacchino challenged us to sit with the uncomfortable interactions and not have them explained – that’s gutsy, to be sure.
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Heather Desaulniers is a freelance dance writer based in Oakland. She is the Editorial Associate and SF/Bay Area columnist for CriticalDance, the dance curator for SF Arts Monthly and a frequent contributor to several dance-focused publications.
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