ADVERTISEMENT

Review: An incandescent journey through 20th-century dance

NEW YORK — Isadora Duncan wrote in her autobiography: “I am an enemy to the ballet, which I consider a false and preposterous art, in fact, outside the pale of all art.”

On Sunday evening, Mearns, a principal at New York City Ballet, performed “Dances of Isadora,” staged and directed by Lori Belilove as part of the Paul Taylor American Modern Dance program “Icons.”

Now in its second season, “Icons,” presented with American Dance Festival, celebrated three of the world’s most important choreographers: Duncan; Trisha Brown, with “Set and Reset” (1983); and Paul Taylor, represented by “Esplanade” (1975). It was an incandescent journey through 20th-century dance.

That a ballet dancer would be featured on a program heralding modern dance was a curious twist. (Mearns first danced Duncan’s solo “Narcissus” to acclaim when she appeared with Belilove’s group at the Joyce Theater last June.) But the twist was less bizarre than breathtaking — correct, compelling and proof that while Mearns, bold and brave, may be a ballerina of astonishing abilities, she is above all else a dancer.

ADVERTISEMENT

Duncan’s choreography is deceptive: It seems like a barefoot breeze in chiffon, but is full of contrasts and intricate feats of coordination; passages of speed and stillness; and dancing that lives on the edge of floating and collapsing. In this 25-minute suite of solos — staged handsomely by Belilove and featuring pianist Cameron Grant onstage — Mearns took on one of the biggest challenges of her career.

Throughout these works, created from 1900 to 1924, Mearns showed the edifying way she uses the rise and fall of weight to create the illusion of lightness. In the “Butterfly Etude,” she contrasted fluttering wings with daring prances to Chopin; and in “Les Funérailles,” to Liszt, she wilted with torment as her quiet poses etched themselves into space, one evaporating until another took its place.

The final dance in the suite, “Rose Petals,” to Brahms, was like a moving painting as Mearns, delicate though never diminutive, was swept along in a swirl of the petals that drifted from her hands. In “Dances of Isadora,” Mearns took a risk and fittingly so: Duncan risked everything for dance, too.

Taylor was behind the curation of the evening. It seemed like one of his sly jokes that he would be the one to bring so-called downtown, or postmodern dance, uptown to Lincoln Center — “Set and Reset” was richly majestic at the David H. Koch Theater — or to invite a ballerina to perform the works of Duncan, who rejected ballet to pave the way for modern dance.

It was only natural that these dances were in conversation with one another; Taylor likely counted on that, too. To a certain extent, each celebrated pedestrian movement: The work that he chose to cap the program was his “Esplanade,” which, while set to Bach, is a soul-stirring labyrinth of walking, running, rolling and skipping. It remains an overwhelming feat of choreographic ingenuity.

ADVERTISEMENT

The virtuosity of “Esplanade,” with its daring floor-skimming slides and perilous catches, is veiled and like the other dances on the program, seemingly simple. Taylor has said he was inspired to create it after seeing a young woman running to catch a bus — most of us have been there.

There’s also an everyday deceptiveness to “Set and Reset,” in which ribbonlike bodies caress the air and defy gravity with unceasing shifts of momentum. The choreography is meant to appear tossed off the body and improvised, yet it’s not. This cast of six creates a breathing, living rhythm that both questions and broadens the very idea of what constitutes a dance language.

With visual design and costumes by Robert Rauschenberg and music by Laurie Anderson, “Set and Reset,” performed by the Trisha Brown Dance Company, was the most contemporary work on the program — a sigh-inducing mix of cool and gorgeous.

The translucent black-and-white costumes, reminiscent of newsprint, turned the dancers’ loose limbs into pieces of silk. The way their footwork cascaded across the stage brought to mind Mearns’ flurry of traveling steps in “Narcissus” and Michelle Fleet’s serpentine solo in “Esplanade.”

Historical context gives each work a different frame, but together they’re linked by intelligent bodies whose movement — through years of study and corporeal saturation — starts deep within before unraveling out onto the stage. Moments stood out: In “Set and Reset,” Marc Crousillat had an effortlessly sensual solo in which his body, as peaceful as a tree, suddenly spun down to the floor in a somersault. And Parisa Khobdeh’s slides in “Esplanade” were thrilling and scary. Will she someday end up in the orchestra pit? But the point is that their dancing is a fulfillment of freedom. Duncan paved the way for that.

ADVERTISEMENT

This article originally appeared in The New York Times.

GIA KOURLAS © 2018 The New York Times

JOIN OUR PULSE COMMUNITY!

Unblock notifications in browser settings.
ADVERTISEMENT

Eyewitness? Submit your stories now via social or:

Email: eyewitness@pulse.com.gh

ADVERTISEMENT