Dance

Soloists. Such a self-indulgent lot. But then, how could they not be? If we’re lucky, the lone players onstage might actually seem worthy of being indulged by us.

Dance Umbrella 2006 is sprinkled with notable soloists whose shows neatly illustrate two polarities of this form of performance. We’ve already been treated to Nigel Charnock’s ‘Frank’. Mostly he projects out at us in outrageously unbridled, just-try-and-get-away-from-me fashion. Feature continues

Conversely, in the deeply impressive ‘Once’, Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker draws us right to her. Funny, that, especially considering this tight-lipped Belgian’s lack of social skills offstage. She’s the kind of interview subject I wouldn’t wish on enemies. And yet in ‘Once’, conjuring her youth by dancing to the protest songs of Joan Baez, she’s magnetic.

Melbourne-based Ros Warby is another of Umbrella’s captivating soloists. Tall, thin and facially expressive, she’s a wonderful combination of seemingly gawky eccentricity and exceptional grace. Warby has performed in London before, first as a soloist and then as part of a small ensemble touring the work of the veteran American dancer, choreographer and teacher Deborah Hay. The latter is, purportedly, a profoundly liberating influence on dancers globally. Warby certainly places Hay at the top of her list of artistic heroes, alongside the likes of Merce Cunningham, Trisha Brown, Steve Paxton and Dana Reitz (all of whom have been presented by Dance Umbrella). ‘The American dance artists of the 1960s are constantly in my system,’ Warby says. ‘I love the sustaining power their work has had through generations.’

In ‘Swift’, a dance that is also part of the two-year festival of Australian contemporary arts called Undergrowth, Warby works a strange but sure enchantment. Designed by Margie Medlin and featuring cellist-composer Helen Mountfort on live electric and acoustic cello, the performance is full of flickering images and revealing gestures. Its essence is Warby’s child-like penchant for transformation, but wedded to an adult’s sophisticated sensibility.

The 50-minute show was created, Warby reveals, ‘from a place where my experience as a dancer allowed me to play out many layers of a female character simultaneously: the innocent, the gremlin, the protagonist, the diva. I try to wake them all up in myself and let them co-exist.’ The characters start out separate, but the journey she makes inside the dance allows them to become integrated.

‘I approach performance with the whole body of the work in mind,’ Warby continues, ‘the entire environment. I make as much space for the design and sound as I do for dance.’ Medlin and Mountfort have become ideal creative companions. The three have been working together as a team for six years. ‘We’re intertwined. My work doesn’t exist without their input. I suppose I work with them as a choreographer works with dancers. I enter the studio trusting that their aesthetic will match mine, and that they’ll expand the potential of what I see.’

Do they ever. Consider Medlin. In ‘Swift’, Warby wanted to use 16mm film images. ‘I imagined them to be small and discrete,’ she says. ‘Margie made them large and otherworldly. I imagined two projectors. Margie ended up using 12!’ Placed around the theatre space, they are operated by Medlin herself from a lighting desk. This isn’t high-tech, just an enhancement of Warby’s multi-faceted, almost fairytale-style portrait of a woman.