{DANCE} Previews & reviews
PREVIEW ENCLOSURE 99 Janis of the apes
When Janis Claxton took up daily residence in an Edinburgh Zoo enclosure during the 2008 Fringe, she had no idea how much attention she and her fellow dancers would generate. ‘I was only doing it as an experiment,’ Claxton avows, ‘absolutely unaware it’d be considered a cool idea and get so much press.’
The Australian-born choreographer wound up with a hit on her hands and bagged a Herald Angel award. Part of the pleasure of Enclosure 44, as it was then called, was the people-watching between public and performers. Dance of a kind materialised inside the enclosure, in the form of improvisational movement games based on Claxton’s research. ‘The three main animal groups visitors tend to gravitate towards are birds, big cats and primates,’ she says, ‘but the most emotional connection is with monkeys and apes.’ This became Claxton’s springboard for a questioning yet playful study of human behaviour, social interaction and status.
Gifted and frequently outspoken, Claxton has become a real
mover and shaker on the Scottish dance scene since relocating to Edinburgh from southwest England six years ago. She’s also established links with China, having spent seven of the past 24 months there teaching, making and presenting dance. For this revival of the Enclosure project (now identified as 99, a number derived from the maximum percentage of DNA some scientists claim humans and great apes share) Claxton is one of a ten-strong cast of Western and Chinese dancers, including three men. For two weeks straight they’ll be cooped up together seven hours a day, in what Claxton dubs ‘a creative exchange between two cultures.’ As with other zoo inhabitants, feeding these animals is not allowed. (Donald Hutera) ■ Edinburgh Zoo, 314 0350, 14–29 Aug, 10am–6pm, free (Zoo admission £11–£15).
PREVIEW DOT504: MAH HUNT Endangered species?
ROCK THE BALLET Pop-rock ballet makes for pure entertainment from Rasta Thomas’ Bad Boys ●●●●● KOREAN DRUM: JOURNEY OF A SOUL Dance to the rhythm of life ●●●●●
L A V I T S E F
DOT504 made its Fringe debut in 2008 with Holdin’ Fast, a woozy, delicate work about desire. The company returned by popular demand in 2009 with the darker 1000 Wounded Tears, picking up Herald Angels, Total Theatre Awards and huge audiences.
Running for five days only, Mah Hunt is its first Edinburgh production in two years, a lean, pared- back duet created and performed by two of the company’s longest-standing members.
‘I began looking at hunting: how many animals are on the verge of extinction and how cruel a game humans have made of it,’ explains choreographer/performer Lenka Vagnerova. ‘They don’t need to kill so many animals; they don’t need to kill them so brutally. It seems to be something dark in humans. So I set this piece in a future where there are no animals: the two characters can only read about them, and when they set out to discover what it is to hunt, they have to learn it on each others’ bodies.’
A leaner version of DOT504 it may be, but the playful wit and murkily sexual physicality that made audiences fall for them is still there. ‘The strange game of struggle and desire they play is very human and recognisable,’ says Vagnerova. (Kirstin Innes) ■ Zoo Southside, 662 6892, 14–20 Aug, 2pm, £12.
60 THE LIST 11–18 Aug 2011
Rasta Thomas’ Bad Boys of Dance have come to town and swapped tights and Tchaikovsky for snug black trousers and an unashamed pop-rock soundtrack. New York-based ballet dancers they may be, but there’s not a whiff of neurotic Natalie Portman about them – in fact here the effect is definitely more Kids from Fame than Black Swan.
The seven-strong ensemble throw their fine-tuned ballet skills as hard as they can at numbers from the Black Eyed Peas, Queen and a whole lot of Michael Jackson. Classical music does feature once, in the form of Bizet’s Carmen, but then the boys are dancing with blow-up dolls at the time. There are some beautiful moments of sinuous, acrobatic choreography, but for the most part it’s pure entertainment, of the prime-time Saturday night kind. And there’s something a bit earnest in some of the rockier numbers which rubbed the edge off the fun just a touch. But it didn’t stop the crowd from baying for more twice in a row, and the Bad Boys came into their own in a brace of brawny and fabulously showy encores. (Lucy Ribchester) ■ Assembly Hall, 623 3030, until 28 Aug (not 15, 22), 6pm, £16–£20 (£14– £18).
Sometimes words are not required. Sometimes a single performer beating a frenetic rhythm on a drum suspended from an ornate frame is enough to raise the hairs on your arm. For those who love a bit of variety in their Fringe life, though, this showcase of the best in traditional and modern Korean percussion has something for everyone. Each sequence showcases a different instrument, and consequently a fresh mood and style, whether that be the relentless thundering hooves of seven large barrels playing at once or the light, playful tones of the smaller hand-held drums.
As well as the of the 20-strong troupe of performers, the choreography, by Korea’s most famous dancer, Soo-Ho Kook, also greatly impresses. Admittedly there’s little in the way of a narrative here, beyond the rituals and traditions behind the music, and there’s not much attempt to reach out to the audience apart from one moment of offbeat humour in the plate-spinning section. But for sheer joyous exuberance there’s little to beat this show. (Allan Radcliffe) ■ Assembly Hall, 623 3030, until 29 Aug (not 15, 22), 4pm, £13–£15 (£11–£13).