Foreign troupes present dances to different rhythms

By Mariam K. Sutalaksana

JAKARTA (JP): Many examples of the performing arts have livened up the face of Gedung Kesenian during the Jakarta Performing Arts Theater International Festival '97.

Now in its fourth week, the festival runs to Oct. 11.

Three diverse dance groups participating in this festival were the Ilkhom Theater Group from Uzbekistan, Ricochet Dance Group from England and Ballet Goteborgs Opera from Sweden.

Each varied in its strength, quality and zest, but their mere presence in the historic playhouse should enrich local audiences.

Uzbekistan may have once been part of the former Soviet Union, but it could not be assumed to have the same lofty quality of ballet as that country.

Many strengths of Russian ballet -- high elevation, fluidity of the arms and upper body and breadth of movement -- were evident in parts of the performance.

But the heart and excitement was lacking in both its choreography and the performance of the five dancers.

Ilkhom participated in the Jakarta festival with six artists from the State Academic Bolshoi Theater of Opera and Ballet Uzbekistan. Five of the personnel are ballet dancers and the leader and producer, Sharipova Adiba Raufovna, played the piano.

The performance was a combination of piano music with dance, and it was not clear which was the main attraction.

If the dance was positioned as the dominating feature, then it was too often dwarfed by the tinkling of the piano. From this 12- section performance, four were piano solos of Chopin, Liszt and Debussy, and the other eight were a melange of snapshots of famous classical solos, duets and a few modern creations.

The first dance, See Rose, was a duet about a young girl who falls asleep on an armchair after a ball. She wore a long romantic tutu and held a red rose in her hand.

According to the synopsis of the story, the girl dreams the spirit of the rose leads her in a waltz. On stage, a man enters and takes her hand and waltzes her dreams away. The movements were beautiful but without distinction.

It was like cloth made of the finest fabric but lacking color that could make it stand out.

The next snippet was a variation from the Ballet Don Quixote performed as a solo. The woman wearing a blue short classical tutu danced energetically then disappeared into the next section, Poem of Ballet Legend of Love.

This was a modern piece which was an assembly of sharp edged shapes with steps that were a hybrid of ballet and modern. This dance was an improvement from the first two in its show of character.

The stage was then left bare with only the pianist in the right corner playing Etude Pasar. All this went on while at the rim of the backdrop a wave of shadows moved along with the music played by Adiba.

The heart and character was difficult to discern throughout the dance performances but could be felt as one listened to the tinkle of the piano keys. The piano solo ended and continued with another section to accompany the duet, Spartakus to end the first part of the show.

Second

The second part was another duet with a slight Spanish flair from the opera Carmen.

For those who love listening to piano recitals this section would be the one to watch; with three piano solos, the dance lost the limelight.

The only dance of note here was The Dying Swan. The fluidity of the arms of and upper body was a pleasant quality to have in performing this fragment.

The Sunrise, an original choreography danced to the music of Kitaro, was a tossed salad of jumps, stretches and extensions. It looked as though it was concocted at most a week before it was performed, with many improvisations.

The spirit was also missing in this combination. The last duet was the Grand Pas De Deux from the Nutcracker. Although executed nicely, it carried with it the underlying theme of that evening, a 12-course meal without spice. The only image kept in the imagination was that of the ebbing shadow wave permanently hanging at the rim of the black backdrop while all else faded.

Ricochet

Ricochet rebounded, recoiled and boomeranged on stage last week in their performance of Urban Savage by Wayne McGregor and Treading the Night Plain by Rosemary Lee.

Ricochet was formed in 1989 by two artistic directors who are also dancers, Kate Gowar and Karin Potisk.

In a never halting flow of movement, a dancer led the five- member group in jumping and traveling across the simple shadowy setting with a complex web of motion in Urban Savage.

A woman pawed her way forward with her back bent and feet moving slowly towards the angled light. She moved as if a string of energy sustained each stirring of her muscle. She pulled, stretched and reached in an endless strain of activity, building it up until other figures in black costumes entered with increasingly accelerated motion.

The second, third, fourth and fifth dances were all on the city night scene and danced in this restless array of partnering and rebounding.

With the dancing never seeming to pause, one can only wonder how the dancers had a chance to breathe. The audience, after listening to the percussive music and the perpetual flow of activity, were left sitting restlessly.

For even when the dancers seemed to stop, the pause was a ball of potential energy ready to burst. These city creatures still prowled in the dim light moving differently yet together.

They formed a line, traveled across the stage in motley formations. But all five reached their destination in various complex combinations in unison to the powerful beat.

Then came Treading the Night Plain, where again the lighting was minimal. The three female dancers walked from stage right, venturing to the night with their arms flying at their side.

Two men secure their waists, holding them back whenever they look like they are going to fall.

In contrast to Urban Savage, this choreography was not an embodiment of nervous energy. The movement was more rhythmic and more enjoyable to watch. The group worked together to create shapes to Terry Riley's Cadenza on the Night Plain played by the Kronos Quartet.

There were distinct characters to the dancers, with repetitions of combinations, such as the man holding on to a woman bending slightly with one foot in the air. She was held and turned slowly on her axis before she was hoisted.

The other dancers ran on stage and filled the audiences' senses with visions of leaping dancers and a complicated set of dance steps.

Ricochet is an entirely apt name for this group as dancers bouncing off each other was the core of the movement.