Enter a world of golden bodies that whiz and stare, breaching divine grace one moment and repulsive barbary the next. Masked creatures wander into your periphery; animalistic movement and sound pepper the scene. Enter the living dream of Zoe/Juniper’s A Crack in Everything.

The Bates Dance community experienced the evening-length work on July 30 and 31. The ambitious production included original choreography, light design, costume design, sound design, and visual art installation. Getting two artists to work harmoniously toward a single vision is challenging. What then, when the number extends onto two hands? Zoe/Juniper proved cross-discipline collaboration is not only possible, it is worthwhile

A Crack in Everything is not for the faint of heart. Its use of video projection triggers memory and regret. It forces audience members to ask “what if?”. The piece begins with dancers conquering the stage with driving, refined footwork. It takes them into the air and into the floor. In an instant, the real dancers are replaced with shadows of their selves. The projected movers dance with linear speed, cutting above the space like ghosts. It is like stepping into the dancers’ memories. Throughout the remainder of the piece, the audience’s attention fluctuates between projected dancers and real dancers. It mirrors the mind’s transitions between thoughts of the past, experiences of the present, and hopes for the future.

The hour-long piece comes to an arbitrary end, hardly flowing from a defined beginning and middle. In one of the opening episodes, a woman sits downstage and stabs at her hand with pointed energy. Zoe neither preceded nor developed this unsettling theme. Likewise, elegant Schubert arias interject the otherwise contemporary soundscape. The transitions are moving, but the songs simply come and go, as passing moments in time. The lack of arc is frustrating. An audience expects exposition and hopes for conclusion, but A Crack in Everything does not indulge these expectations.

I suspect this disjunct organization was intentional. The piece explored different perceptions of time, zooming from slow motion to real time in an instant. Zoe and her collaborators had the courage and sense to mirror this winding micro-structure in the whole.

-Brianna

Pearsonwidrig playing with space, motion and line.

When it comes to healthy collaboration, festival co-teachers Sarah Pearson and Patrik Widrig could write a book.  “I’m not big on ownership of ideas,” Sarah says, “everyone in the room is a collaborator.”  And she means everyone.  From her co-director Patrik, to the dancers, to the attentive viewer.  With all-around focus, Sarah and Patrik agree, an idea becomes greater than the sum of its parts.  Strengths are swapped like trading cards to interrupt habitual patterns.  With this environment, Sarah calls the studio a “magic place.”

Mutual trust is the artistic duo’s secret ingredient.   Patrik trusts Sarah to lead rehearsals.  Sarah trusts Patrik’s artistic intuition.  They never stop learning from one another. Sarah explains a typical studio session:  “I tune into Patrik.  It may look like I’m in charge just because I’m the one talking…Actually, we co-direct everything.”

This year, Sarah and Patrik share their knowledge with Bates via Making Dances and Site Specific Exploration. Merely observing their harmonious co-teaching is a lesson in its own right (never mind the class content!).   Leadership passes seamlessly between them.  Sarah explains a concept; Patrik demonstrates.  Patrik pauses the class with a clarification; Sarah nods to continue.  It appears their collaboration is as much about silence and energy as it is about speaking.

Patrik explains that he and Sarah have a catalogue of exercises and teaching tools.  “We draw from that catalogue to plan, but let the class lead us.”   They teach in the moment, gauging the class energy, strengths and weaknesses.  Then, the lesson plan shifts accordingly.

This dynamic duo began working together in 1985. (It’s no wonder their collaboration is smooth).  They met while dancing with the Nikolais/Louis lab in New York.  When Sarah saw Patrik dance, she recognized a talented artist, and they “fell in love on the dance floor.”  They founded the Pearsonwidrig Dance Theater, an experimental dance company that grew to tour the world.  Check it out here: http://www.pearsonwidrig.org!

-Brianna