DANCING IN THIS PLACE
Veteran Chicago choreographers Jan Bartoszek and Amy Osgood, who taught the 12-week composition workshop that resulted in “Dancing in This Place,” gave a brief but moving introduction, “for the last time,” and dedicated the evening’s program to Jackie Radis, MoMing’s former artistic director and one of its founders. “Stay and talk to the choreographers afterward,” they said, “or stay and say good-bye to the space–or just stay.” And everyone knew exactly what they were trying to express–that MoMing’s existence might be briefly prolonged if the audience stayed.
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There are momentary consolations throughout the dances, finally even small triumphs–the dancers do rise from most of the frequent falls they take. But all have a sense of quiet desperation, even the most ambitious and successful piece on the program, Daedalus’s Entity . . . Entropy . . . Entrails . . . Flesh and Dust . . . Light and Blood . . . the Wail . . . the Brain Tissue . . . the Groom Stripped Bare by His Handmaidens, Even. Working in collaboration with his “Crewe” of six dancers (Maria Dicintios, Tim Noworyta, Atalee Judy, Terry Brennan, Bridgett Cooper, and Philip Gibbs), Daedalus has come up with what is probably the most propitious use of the MoMing space I’ve seen in its 16- year history, using all of its dramatic possibilities. It’s certainly the only time I can remember spontaneous applause for a set there (this one is assembled during the dance), the kind you get at the opera or at Broadway plays.
Entity does not end with the poignant antiwar slides. Daedalus begins using the raised stage behind the main space–we suddenly become aware of a long black stairway from the balcony to the stage, behind a scrim that lends the boxed-in raised stage the look of a surrealist painting. A man slowly descends the stairway, and two others quickly follow; one can’t avoid thinking of Marcel Duchamp’s Nude Descending a Staircase. At first their comically zombielike movements are wildly desperate, frenetic flailing. Soon everyone on the dance floor is zombielike, too, until all fall to the floor but one man, who begins smiling eerily to himself. When his hand suddenly shoots up into the air and he looks up at it, it’s hard to say whether the gesture is one of triumph or madness. There is certainly a desperate quality to the performers’ facial expressions when they all rise again and pair off, and a pervading gloom when they all pose atop the structure, behind the screen, ghostlike. An almost nude Daedalus dashes up the stairs, and a dancer in pursuit whisks off his only article of clothing–a red bit of cloth–which is left onstage in lieu of the dancer. It has the same impact as Duchamp’s ironic shattered-glass renderings of desolation.
Kat Letscher’s Fate ends with three women (Martha Crawford, J.P. Maton, Letscher) stretched on the floor, one foot stretched out and up higher than the other, as if pausing in midmovement. Another dancer (Bridgett Cooper) moves among them, as if trying to reconcile them. During most of this dance, the performers either mirror or echo each other’s movements. The narration that suddenly begins during one section is read in the most melancholy voice, and while I couldn’t quite decipher what was being said, I didn’t really need to–its tone was enough to get the message across.
