Please note: This article is published as an archive copy from Philadelphia City Paper. My City Paper is not affiliated with Philadelphia City Paper. Philadelphia City Paper was an alternative weekly newspaper in Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. The last edition was published on October 8, 2015.
September 26–October 3, 1996
critical mass|dance
Trapezius Aerial Dance Company
Conwell Dance Theater, Temple University, Sept. 20-21.
Remember when as a kid you sat on a swing, pumping your arms for all they could muster to get a motion going that felt like flying? That's the sort of exhilaration tapped into by Trapezius Aerial Dance Company.
As the name suggests, the troupe uses trapezes. It's directed and choreographed by Louise Gillette, an instructor in Temple University's dance department whose training includes studies in ballet, modern dance, jazz, tap, contact improvisation, African dance and low-flying trapeze. With Trapezius, Gillette mixes elements from several of those genres as well as gestures of her own making, to craft pieces that are both choreographically challenging and great fun to watch.
The program opens with Douglas Cornman, a company member, giving a brief explanation of Trapezius. Key components of what they do, he declares, are strength, timing and grace. I'll add daredevil spirit. That's because some of these maneuvers were right tricky, and there's but a bare floor under the trapezes.
The program opens with It Takes Three. Done to the tune of "Hernando's Hideaway," this features Gillette and Stephen Strecansky taking playful liberties with the tango, with Strecansky flipping Gillette over his shoulder and Gillette pushing him away with her foot planted on his chest. And then there's a fiery moment when the pair lie tangled in embrace while straddling a trapeze bar.
In Absolution Gillette performs a lyrical solo to liturgical-sounding music by Arvo Part. She symbolizes a woman racked with feelings of guilt and sorrow. At times Gillette drapes an arm and/or a leg through loops dangling from a trapeze. These ethereal poses are Absolution's most striking and provocative.
Me Jane plays off the notion of how a women can be both turned on and turned off by an uncivilized man. Jockey is a metaphoric acrobatic duet in which two people constantly vie for position in a relationship.
Gillette saves the most ambitious works for last. Day In, Day Out, done to Ravel's Bolero and featuring a large cast from Full Circle Theater, an intergenerational company of actors teenage through octogenarian, takes an inspired look at basic movements of everyday life. This one's more complex than it appears on the surface, since Gillette cleverly juxtaposes a repetitious circuslike cacophony of minor vignettes — to include people embracing, undressing and exercising — to highlight coincidental activity in space and time.
The finale, Romp, has 10 dancers running, doing club dance steps and making bold moves on four trapezes. As with Day in, Day Out , it plays up the funky coolness of mixed yet simultaneous motion, but Romp, with its criss-crossing action above and below, prompted members of the audience to exclaim "wow!" and "whoa!"
This eclectic slate makes for an enthralling program. Gillette's ability to explore and push the limits of human physicality while crafting new movements in the process — both surprising and compelling — is invigorating.
