Breeze Robertson reviews Big Low Dream, presented by Footnote New Zealand Dance, at Papa Hou, Saturday 19 September.
Nightmare or fantasy? Big Low Dream was both, or neither, or something in between.
My notes from Footnote’s latest production read like a Surrealist’s dream diary; strong impressions, half-formed thoughts, vivid images, uncertain feelings and more questions than answers.
And that is exactly what choreographer Jessie McCall promised. Her programme notes linked together a string of seemingly unrelated concepts in a sizable block of unpunctuated text. After a while I worked out it was looping. But looking closer, there was intention and echoes of what challenges us most about the world around us. Here’s a sample: “This dream is a landfill and the landfill is a galaxy and the galaxy is reciting war crimes in its sleep…” In further programme notes Jessie explained that the work is a “sincere and wildly imperfect inquiry into problems we might solve together if we let our conscious and unconscious beliefs coexist”.
Entering the Papa Hou black box theatre at the YMCA, an affordable and therefore critical Christchurch performance venue, the audience was welcomed with a set featuring a patchwork of blue sky and white cloud patterns framing a voluptuous pair of red lips that appeared capable of parting provocatively. Well done to ‘Set and Costume Sewist’ Anne de Geus.
The lights went up on the cast (company dancer Airu Matsuda, guest dancers Sasha Matsumoto and Caleb Heke, and intern Millie Maden) joyfully jazz dancing together in blue cloud-patterned leotards. That was unexpected, and funny. Laughter rippled through the audience.
The entire soundtrack was constructed from “Dreams”, from The Cranberries’ iconic, beloved album (if you are my vintage), Everyone Else is Doing It, So Why Can’t We? circa 1993.
The music very soon turned nightmarish, a single Cranberries chord or transition stretching out to infinity and reverberating ominously around the theatre – sound designer Thomas Arbour really meeting the challenge of the brief). Meanwhile, gold helium balloons at the back of the stage rose up to spell out DEATH and then DREAM.
Those big Dali-esque lips did open, many times, becoming a portal through which dancers were delivered onto the stage and retreated (or were devoured?) back in some unknown void.
Moments that are now embedded into my conscious, and perhaps unconscious, mind:
Helium balloons spelling EAT emerged through the lips and were soon fed back through, so in fact EAT was eaten, later cleverly appearing as ATE. And staying with the balloons, fabulously low culture, so incongruently reminiscent of 21st birthday parties, towards the end they spelled THEM with backlight, making me wonder if we the audience were ‘them’?
The hoodie duet with Caleb and Sasha was a delicious exploration of entanglement; it doesn’t get much more claustrophobic than being trapped in the same hoodie, but perhaps our movement adventurers were happily entwined? Likewise, what I can only describe as a plastic sleeping bag filled with dry ice, slipped through the lips like a tongue, with Millie inside, soon joined by Caleb, but it was a moment of effective tension – were they happy in there (could they breathe, how would they get out)?
The jazz dance routine returned periodically, like a strange, recurring thought. Blackouts were the transition between scenes, like the memory lapses in dreams and waking life – those moments when you think “how did I end up here?” Rows of floor-level side lighting were an effective feature, thanks to Tony Black’s lighting design.
The false endings were brilliant. Three dancers froze in a pose, while the fourth was laid out under some kind of shroud. The audience applauded, and… nothing. Tension, unease built, but no biggie for this audience. Behind me someone approvingly muttered ‘yes, keep it going!’ Eventually Airu got up, walked off stage and started packing up, while the others’ fixed smiles started to wane.
But there was more – another duet! Sasha, Millie and a sky-cloud shroud, tenderly holding each other, and the vulnerability of Millie’s now bare back was a beautiful moment.
Footnote has provided a platform for new artists and a dance artist community for over 40 years and continues to take creative risks. In their YouTube alumni series last year to celebrate the 40th anniversary, Artistic Director Anita Hunziker interviewed some of the talented individuals who have been nurtured by the Footnote family. Long may this company last and support exciting new dance works in Aotearoa.
The dancers were excellent and capable, but the show was demanding in other ways, such as manipulating an impressive number of props and conveying the ambiguity of perception and meaning. This was a tightrope of emotions, never giving too much away, never falling into narrative.
Big Low Dream is on next in Auckland, Friday 25 – Saturday 26 September. Information here.
