Monthly Archives: July 2011

Jul18

Post:Ballet: Bringing Ballet into the Present

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Post:Ballet: Bringing Ballet into the Present

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Post:Ballet makes dance relevant to modern society. Artistic Director Robert Dekkers accomplishes this through his choreography (which is both expressive and organic) and the use of modern technologies, including cinematography and digital photography. The company also collaborates with visual artists, musicians and composers to create new works. Post:Ballet successfully completed its second season this past weekend with performance at the Herbst Theater, located in the center of San Francisco’s cultural aorta.

The program opened with Colouring, a piece that explores the nature of the creative process. Original score was created and performed live by Daniel Berkman. Artist Enrique Quintero diligently painted the backdrop with successive symbols and strokes as two dancers, Jared Hunt and Beau Campbell, reenacted a mock rehearsal. Photographer Natalia Perez captured the moment by moment action, which was projected at the end of the piece, showing everything in reverse. In essence, the audience was reliving everything they had just experienced with visual proof of how they had arrived.

Flutter showcased a trio of men, Daniel Marshalsay, Jonathan Mansgosing and Christian Squires. The piece opened with music by Steve Reich, a percussive, primitive, repetitive score, which later transitioned to the lyrical strains of J.S. Bach. Here Dekkers shows what he does best- explosive movement that made great use of three-dimensional space and highlighted the strength and abilities of the dancers, through successive turns and tours en l’air. Flutter is aptly named, for the behavior of the heart while watching their shirtless forms and the choreography – the dancers often looked as though they were moving through water…

Happiness of Pursuit, a playful piece for seven dancers, was a highlight, both for the wild abandon with which the dancers moved, and the music- this may well be the first ballet ever set to beat-boxing, flawlessly performed live by Joe Hickey.

The program closed with a world premiere of Interference Pattern, a study on the effects of observation. Dekkers was fascinated by a quantum physics experiment that showed that observation had an effect on the behavior of subatomic particles. This study lead to other questions: if observation effects the world on such a microscopic level, what other effects occur? The piece was performed against a cinematographic backdrop of the same choreography being performed during rehearsal times, both observed and unobserved by other dancers. Dekkers concludes that although the differences are subtle, they are palpable.

All of the dancers are classically trained, and collectively possess an impressive background. Post:Ballet provides them with a new expressive outlet of cutting edge choreography paired with creative collaboration. The sum total is a performance unlike any other. Ballet has taken a quantum leap.


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Jul13

Starting a Dance Company: My Journey With Terpsichore D’Amour

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Starting a Dance Company: My Journey With Terpsichore D’Amour

 

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I’ve become compelled, at age 44, to start a dance company. After decades of following other peoples’ visions and performing their choreography, it’s a welcome relief to do things my way for a change. There is no director monitoring my every move, which means less pressure in some ways, and more pressure in others. For just as there is inherent freedom in doing your own thing, every responsibility is also yours, from choreography to costumes and planning to publicity.

 

It has been about ten years since I’ve last performed, although I’ve never stopped dancing since I started forty years ago. I took a hiatus from performing from the time when my daughter was born through the preschool years, and in the last few years, the desire to perform again grew. And grew.

 

Finally, opportunity knocked when I was invited to participate in Trails and Vistas, a live outdoor performance in Lake Tahoe where the audience happens upon various performances during a docent-lead hike. Another friend had been involved for several years, and I had always loved the idea. I was thrilled to have the opportunity to join in, and promptly called another friend (and fellow mom) who was also itching to perform, and we immediately went to work. Our company, named Terpsichore D’Amour, was born.

 

Thus far it’s been an interesting journey. Our choreographic process has been both organic and extremely democratic. There are pieces that we have come up with separately and others that have arisen out of experimentation and discussion. As I was watching the film of yesterday’s rehearsal (we’ve begun filming every rehearsal so we can see what we’re doing and what might need fine-tuning) I realized that the piece is such a cooperative effort that I can no longer even remember who contributed what. And the beautiful thing is, it doesn’t matter! We are dancing purely for pleasure and we are both old enough and experienced enough to have left ego out of the equation altogether.

 

Trails and Vistas is happening on September 17th and 18th,. We’ve finished choreographing (mostly) except for a few minor adjustments. We have placed our costume order. For now, we continue to work. Luckily we have plenty of time for polishing our first piece, giving it every chance to be the best it can possibly be.

 

In the meantime, we’re working on our promotional materials (more on that soon) and looking ahead. We hope that our dance company will grow over time and that we will be able to share our love of dance with varied audiences, particularly school children.

 

Starting Terpsichore D’Amour is one of the more wonderfully terrifying things I’ve done.

 

 

Trails and Vistas 2009:

 

 

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Jul8

Sylvie Guillem: Rebel Ballerina

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Sylvie Guillem: Rebel Ballerina

 

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Rebel ballerinas. The two words may at first sound like the world’s greatest oxymoron. In tribute to the celebration of our country’s independence, this month’s posts will feature dancers and choreographers that are the living embodiments of independent artistry.


Sylvie Guillem may well be the greatest ballerina ever- but she is known just as well for her unexpected departure from the ballet world to pursue Modern dance. A rebel at heart, her non-conformist approach meant that after leaving the Royal Ballet, she refused to be aligned with any particular company as she moved into contemporary dance.

Guillem became an étoile dancer at the Paris Opera Ballet when she was 19, and now at the age of 46, she continues to create and perform new works… her way… at an age when most other dancers have long since retired.

She was blessed with every gift a dancer could possibly hope for: perfectly arched feet, long, lithe legs that are so flexible they brush her ears at the peak of her extensions, a well-proportioned strong physique, flawless technique. But it is her energy and passion, her artistry and intelligence that define her as the dancer that choreographers still yearn to work with. Choreographer Mats Ek says simply, ‘She has a blue flame within her.’

She gained the nickname Mademoiselle Non during her years in the Royal Ballet when an argument with Kenneth MacMillan was accidentally broadcast over the opera house speakers for all to hear. Although her tenure with the company was far from short (1988-2000), she left when she realized what she ‘could not take there she would do somewhere else.’

But does she ever think of stopping? ‘Mais, oui,’ she says, looking astonished. ‘All the time, and for many, many years. And sometimes you think, why do I do all of this? Because you feel a little bit lost, a bit tired. But then you wake up a bit more and you go and you are excited by what you do.’ She pauses to consider how to describe what drives her on. ‘It’s because when finally you achieve something, then you are alive and you did something that only you can do.

She performs this week through July 9th at Sadler’s Wells in London. For more information, click here.


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