This past month’s dance common link was ceremony. Yes the shows I witnessed were presented in a concert context but they weren’t primarily about entertainment. In each case the entertainment factor was ancillary to other operations at hand.
First up I went to see a double bill presented by Moogahlin Performing Arts as part of the Yellamundie Festival. Yellamundie Festival has been running at Carriageworks since 2013 and has slowly expanded from its original theatre agenda to include disciplines of song and dance. On the second evening it was Harlisha Newie-Joe and Maddison Fraser performing a duet titled Currents Beneath Skin, followed by Jo Clancy working in collaboration with Stuart McMinn to present a larger scale work titled Warriwal with an ensemble cast of seven.
Maddison Fraser is a proud Palyku and Yindjibarndi, while Harlisha Newie-Joe is a Zenadth Kes woman from Mabuyag and Badu Island, belonging to the Goemu and Wagadagam tribe. Harlisha spent most of her life growing up in Weipa, Cape York on Algnith Country. Their collaboration on Currents Beneath Skin is an acknowledgment of their connection through their proximity and concern for the coastline.
The work began slowly with both of the dancers recreating a horse shoe shaped shoreline with a generous repository of shells carried by one dancer as the other placed the shells on the floor with great consideration. However one end of the shoreline was punctuated by, what my imagination surmised was, tiny reefs, mangroves or man made fishing traps, as one dancer stood still while the other created little circles at the standing feet before they resumed drawing the overarching bay.
While the dance bore little of the urgency the program suggested, I was definitely taken to the water as their bodies undulated in waves as a cannon and together like the merging currents crashing. My favourite moment was in their exploration of the deep water recreated with a sheet. The effect of their bodies scribing a constricted pathway, before bringing the sheet back to a larger circumference was meditative in its repetition, like a bellows stoking a fire. I could see the underwater landscape being shaped and reshaped with this simple, yet very effective device. I could imagine that this apparatus can be utilised further to express the disruption occurring well below our eyeline.
I am curious to see what, if any effect the dancers will articulate in their redefining of the coastline with the shells in the next iteration of this work, as curiously the shells, after being dramatically disturbed by their actions, were placed in the same configuration as when the show began. I wondered if, by their exact reinstatement, I was to understand that man’s destructive footprint is of little consequence after all? That nature will win out in the end and our actions will only ever hasten our demise on this planet?
Much to ponder.
Next up was what we later discovered was a mere excerpt of a larger piece in Jo Clancy and Stuart McMinn’s Warriwal about the Milky Way. It was presented as a narrative with the features of the night sky imbued with anthropomorphic characteristics and trajectories. This aspect of the dance is particularly pertinent as there is a renewed interest in Aboriginal astronomy of late. I am also interested in how scientific data is held within narrative and metaphor in an Aboriginal context and how Western science has had to reconcile with knowledge that is embedded in layers of secrecy only to be unlocked through rites of passage rendering Elders, not necessarily academics, scholars.
Afterwards Jo Clancy spoke of the ideals behind the construction of the set, which was luscious in comparison to the sparsity of the preceding duet. Clancy informed us that it was her husband who made most of the set through repurposing and upcycling most of the materials. This is an aspect of performance I also hold dear, however as opposed to the realisation of Clancy’s dancing ground which appeared like a haven in the bush, my sets place us firmly in the place where the materials are sourced, in the metropolis.
Clancy’s work belies a much more substantial period of development than the two weeks allocated by Moogahlin for this presentation. The composition of the songs and the choreographic composition of the bodies on stage allude to something that has been brewing for a long time. It is the utilisation of the stage space, especially the intricacy of some of the floor patterns which I found most engaging. The cast worked well together to realise Clancy and McMinn’s vision. My eye was drawn again and again to dancer Gary Cheng whose conviction and concentrated gaze when holding a spear made me see his prey. His ability to be in the moment superseded performative affectation elevating the overall narrative. Ena Illume’s haunting timbre as she sang the lament for the passing of Cheng’s character provided another highlight.
This work deserves to tour as part of larger outdoor events as Jo Clancy intended. Or similarly as part of smaller regional outdoor events where maybe the local community can help make the set and learn language to help sing up country.
The second festival I attended was FORM’s IDEA. In its second year, it offered workshops and performances from a diverse range of independent artists, from renowned improvisors Andrew Morrish, Tony Osborne and Peter Trotman to leading Indigenous artists in the likes of Peta Strachan and Beau Dean Riley Smith, to name but a few within a diverse lineup.
All right, I lied folks as sadly I only caught James Batchelor’s Resonance amongst the comprehensive 2025 IDEA program. But if ever I was going to see something this was it. Resonance buoyed my faith in concert dance of late. Yes, even I become inured to the concert stage platform at times.
I was held to believe it was going to be presented in the in-house studio of Sydney Dance Company only to be escorted to the cafe. With tables and chairs squirreled away I fell in love with the space. Its struts and columns and rough hewn wooden floor were the perfect unconventional backdrop to celebrate the life and work of Tanja Leidtke.
The program states that the work recognises the dancer’s body as a living archive and in this case the claims made were indeed backed up. For it was as if, through a combination of physical and spoken revisitations, with the help of some of those dearest to her, Batchelor was indeed able to conjure the essence of Leidtke.
However Resonance was as much a celebration of Batchelor’s achievements as it was a performative eulogy for Leidtke. I met Ruth Osborne (former longtime AD of Quantum Leap) and together we formed our own local chapter of the J.B. admiration society. To everyone else I continued regaling over seeing him perform as a boy genius of twelve or thirteen dancing in Sue Healey’s Inevitable Scenarios amongst a cast of Australia’s fairest and brightest performers including Nalina Wait and Tom Hodgson, whom I only recognised as the talented import who married fellow cast member ‘hula hoop girl’ from Lloyd Newson’s choreographic film triumph in The Cost of Living.
A stand out performer in this work was Theo Clinkard. He told of the time he lined up the back for a curtain call after dancing as a male swan in Matthew Bourne’s famed version of Swan Lake, when a bouquet of flowers was propelled onstage and within it a note that read, ‘For Theo.’ Of course I didn’t know at the time it was Bourne’s renowned rendition, this I was told afterwards, but the way his body suspended when falling slightly off kilter coupled with the incongruity of his first impression as a lilting lumberjack, could only ever be pulled off by someone with mad skills. Oh and his conception of a simple poncho style shift in chiffon as costume designer, was the perfect compliment to the ethereal quality of memory, present and palpable – yet unattainable and doomed to diminish under lengthening temporal conditions.
So many standout moments in this perfect blend of poignancy and spectacle to capture them all without at least one more viewing.. One more thought, which was not found on stage but at the corner of a mixing desk, was percussionist and composer Morgan Hickinbotham. I certainly hope it was you who doubled as drummer Morgan. Regardless drumming man – YOU WERE AWESOME! So awesome in fact I compared you to the percussionists I saw whilst watching a 25th anniversary performance of Drumming, choreographed by Anne Teresa de Keersmaeker’s company Rosas, to composer Steve Reich’s piece by the same name. As I sat in the the auditorium of the famed Théâtre de la Ville in Paris, my gaze fought over the sheer spectacle produced by the dancers which was at times lost to the competing physicality produced by the speed and virtuosity of the musicians sticks, hammers, hands and mallets who accompanied live. You drumming man, also made it hard to maintain my focus on the dancers alone. You simply can’t keep hiding in the corner hunched over your drum. It’s simply not fair on us.
From the finding of an artistic voice and cultural raison d’etre in the duo of Fraser and Newie-Joe, to the animation of country through language from Clancy and McMinn, to the perfect honouring from Batchelor, there was much to digest last month. Here’s to hoping next month lives up to the hype generated from this most recent dance offering.
Vicki Van Hout
FORM Dance Projects
Blogger in Residence