Brian Seibert on the Dance Highlights of 2013
International New York Times | December 13, 2013
This year in dance dawned with an ending. At the Brooklyn Academy of
Music in January, the Trisha Brown Dance Company presented what were
announced to be her final works.
They weren’t her best, but the whole program, sampling from 45 years of
choreographing, was of the quality that sets the high end of my
critical scale.
Andrea Mohin/The New York Times | Chap Chamroeun Tola of the Royal Cambodia Ballet performing in Brooklyn in May.
That same week, Justin Peck held a premiere of “Paz de La Jolla,” the
third piece for New York City Ballet from this choreographer who only
just emerged from the corps de ballet. It wasn’t as good as his first
two, but it was more than good enough — fresh, imaginative — to augur a
major career.
The greatest comeback was that of Pam Tanowitz. “The Spectators,”
presented at New York Live Arts in May, was a return to form for the
modern choreographer after the misstep of “Untitled (Blue Ballet).”
Exhilaratingly inventive, “The Spectators” was mysterious, too,
accidental-looking but clearly constructed. The back story of Ms.
Tanowitz’s artistic recovery only made it more thrilling.
For back stories, it’s hard to beat classical Cambodian dance: ancient
origins, near extinction, restoration. The appearance of the Royal Cambodia Ballet
at the Academy of Music in May, its grandest visit in decades, was a
revelation of serene formality, a tradition preserved. “A Bend in the
River,” by the Khmer Arts Ensemble at the Joyce Theater in April, and
the entire two-month, citywide Season of Cambodia festival, showed that
it is a tradition still evolving.
Another tradition evolving is tap dance. Michelle Dorrance,
the most interesting tap choreographer to have sprung up in years, was
all over the place — Danspace Project, Jacob’s Pillow, Fall for Dance —
earning the spotlight.
The highest-profile street-to-stage transfer was that of the Memphis
jooker Lil Buck at Le Poisson Rouge in April. He was marvelous and
endearing, but there were equal wonders at the Breakin’ Convention at
the Apollo Theater in June. The most extraordinary — there and at the
Beat festival in September — was Storyboard P,
a breathtaking, bewilderingly protean dancer whose talent seemed only
partly realized, in search of the right conditions and format. Maybe
next year.
No comments:
Post a Comment