JAN ERKERT & DANCERS
In what appeared to be the evening’s “people’s choice,” Erkert paid tribute to three of Chicago’s best-known choreographers: Maggie Kast, Shirley Mordine, and Nana Shineflug. Erkert directed Minutes, Hours, Days, Decades but asked the three dancers to choreograph according to the evolution of their own personal styles. What makes this piece so engaging is its personal quality. Erkert immediately establishes a rapport with the audience in a danced introduction, describing her own evolution as an artist. Ceaselessly stretching arms and extending legs as she speaks, Erkert states with unself-conscious humor that she “loved the costumes more than the dancing” in her ballerina days. Striking just the right note of self-mockery, she offers a synopsis of the youth culture of the 60s, saying: “I began climbing mountains and smoking dope. I became a modern dancer,” her arms circling to provide an emphatic flourish. When she began studying modern dance, she tells the audience, “it was suffering extinction. It drew me in.” She recounts her first encounter with Shineflug in Utah, whose “ways of moving” inspired her own growth as a dancer. Ultimately, Erkert says, she “learned to love the dancing more than the costumes.”
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The closing work of the evening was Erkert’s strongest and most visceral. Sensual Spaces is a highly evocative, lyrical piece in which all of the parts contribute to the whole. The Baroque musical accompaniment, provided by the University of Chicago Motet Choir in a live performance, enhances the dark mood. Pulsing across an open, candle-lit stage, the dancers execute some of the most engaging choreography of the concert. In a move reminiscent of Fred Astaire (or perhaps of miracles), a trio rushes to support a single dancer, who takes several steps up the side of a stage wall. Dressed in simple but sensual black slip dresses, the dancers glow in the candlelight as they alternate between frenetic and graceful movement. Laurie Goux establishes a strong presence, beautifully combining fierce determination and charged sensuality. Images of women lifting each other affirm women’s strength in the conflict between physical and spiritual planes.
