DANCE REVIEW: Stage of Being
22.04.2023 at ASB Waterfront Theatre
All Photos by John McDermott
When I arrive, there are wooden blocks on the stage in a line. I do not notice them until I am sitting in darkness. A performer enters the dimly lit stage and collects them in silence with great care as if they are sacred treasures. These blocks, we are later told, are the future.
Stage of Being, a double bill by the New Zealand Dance Company under interim director Caroline Bindon, performed by six dancers (Katie Rudd, Ngaere Jenkins, Brydie Colquhoun, Chris Mills, ‘Isope ‘Akau’ola, Oliver Carruthers), begins with choreographer Tupua Tigafua’s LittleBits and AddOns. Described as a “picturebook”, it feels to me like a meandering dream where I am compelled by a narrative logic that I cannot explain. Here, the wooden blocks are replaced by towers. Here, the mothers are cradling their babies. Here, a pile of cloth gives birth to a chicken farmer. Themes of capitalism are recalled in a gently satirical, but not pushy, way. I experience a fluid journey through scenes without feeling the need to dissect them. David Long’s composition, which oscillates between atmospheric “contemporary dance” sound and evocative plucked strings, nourishes the world Tigafua has built.
Characters emerge. The sound of a rapidly opening and closing mouth – bo bo bo bo bo bo – becomes the soft clucking of a chicken. The birds are pantomimed, deconstructed, sensualised and humanised in turns and all at once. It is playful, while also feeling very purposeful (again, as in a dream, when you know something is important but you are not sure why). And despite the work often appearing comic and light-hearted, there are darker shades to it – small acts of violence, and a particularly poignant scene in which the dancers sing unaccompanied. Their song is stilted and childlike and lingers hauntingly on the still stage. Before long, however, it is offset by the cartoonish scene of three captured chickens shuffling across the floor with sacks over their heads.
Made in Them, a collaboration between Xin Ji and Beijing-based Xiao Chao Wen, stands in dynamic contrast to Tigafua’s piece. I return from the intermission to find the lighting rig has been lowered halfway down the stage: Elekis Poblete Teirney designs a feeling of confinement and oppressiveness. An electronic buzz in the dark is interrupted with a loud bang that sends a gasp through the audience, followed by ripples of nervous laughter. A figure (Rudd) is sprawled alienly in the middle of the stage, now lit by sterile white light. She moves frantically, contortedly, until a big black helmet drops from the sky and the stage becomes dark again.
In the blackness, the sounds of skin slapping and sliding across the floor, and breathy, gasping vocals can be heard. The lights come on to reveal a dancer (Colquhoun), whose face is obscured by another black helmet, standing atop a struggling ‘Akau’ola. Power, and the question of who has it, seems to be an underlying theme of the work.
The helmets come to represent subjugation and assimilation, masking the dancers’ agency to express their “authentic selves” as they perform menacing sections of unison. The physicality of the dancers is emotive, and the choreography is virtuosic, but I find the idea repeating itself. Out of nowhere, a pocket of colourful lights flashes. It is the first sign of colour in the piece, and suddenly the dancing seems more rave-like than robotic. It is a brief, but welcome, shift in perspective. The piece ends with the dancers freed from their helmets, starkly human – although one helmet remains onstage, suspended over their heads ominously.
It is wonderful to see the celebration of Sāmoan and Chinese creative voices in contemporary dance – a dance tradition that evolved in the West and still often prioritizes Euro-centric ideologies in its judgment of value. I am excited to see more programming in the mainstream contemporary dance sector that “reflects… the diverse artistry represented in New Zealand contemporary dance”.
■
LittleBits and AddOns Choreographer: Tupua Tigafua
Made in Them Choreographers: Xin Ji & Xiao Chao Wen
Dancers: Katie Rudd, Ngaere Jenkins, Brydie Colquhoun, Chris Mills, ‘Isope ‘Akau’ola, Oliver Carruthers