Momix: Fall 2023 Season

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How the ten dancers of Momix create so many beautiful and mysterious images is a credit to artistic director Moses Pendleton and his associate Cynthia Quinn who, along with the dancers, create superb eye candy illusions.  In fact, the performers of Momix are billed as dancer-illusionists.

This season at the company’s New York headquarters, the Joyce Theater, sadly, there was only one new work, “Floating.”  Instead, the program, entitled “Viva Momix,” consisted of sixteen oldies-but-goodies all staged with Momix’s signature expertise.

This was a family matinee at the Joyce, but, unlike other companies, Momix performed their entire “regular” program knowing that kids don’t need to be talked down to or coddled.

Some of the works did feature adult sensuality and near nudity: for example, “Table Talk,” in which the incredible Jessica Adams Fowler oozed all over a perfectly normal table and the premiere work, “Floating” in which three pairs of intertwined dancers cavorted in slow motion on a tilted mirrored platform that gave them the illusion of being free of the laws of gravity.

The kids, as well as their parents, ooh-ed and ah-ed as the works flooded the stage with constantly changing pictures and athletic movement.

From their show Botanica they performed the nature-themed works “Solar Flares” (the full company multiplied many times in a video); “Sandpiper” (performed by Alison Coleman as a strutting, abstract avian); “Marigolds” in which the fluffy dresses of the all-female cast become blossoms, tutus and even headdresses.  “A Nest of Hornets,” performed by the male contingent, arrayed in striking black and gold sci-fi outfits—the stripes were allusions to the flying insects off the title—stomping about.

The kids particularly liked “Paper Trails” in which the dancers rolled about in what seemed like endless spools of paper, leaving the stage covered in torn newsprint.  The other kid-favorite was the finale, “If You Need Some Body,” performed to the best music of the evening, J.S. Bach’s “Brandenburg Concerto No. 2 in F Major.”  Here the dancers carried life-sized dolls that were playfully tossed, twisted and otherwise abused.

Speaking of music, Pendleton seems to favor vaguely Middle and Far Eastern tunes with lots of electronic tinkering, making for the least inspired piece of the program.

Momix flirted with vaudeville in “Daddy Long Leg” where the three male dancers—Blake Bellanger, Anthony Bocconi and Nathaniel Davis—were dressed as cowboys in chaps and cowboy hats.  The gimmick was that one leg was elongated providing some simplistic balancing movements and teetering turns.

Dreamlike was “Man Fan” in which Bocconi manipulated a parachute-like swathe of diaphanous cloth making it float and billow artfully.

This is one troupe where the women are as strong and acrobatic as the men, but are in some ways more versatile.  The quality of all the performers is high, although it would be terrific to see them challenged by longer, more sustained choreography.

As usual, all the technical aspects were absolutely brilliant.  The imaginative lighting by Bruce Goldstein, Joshua Starbuck and Woodrow F. Dick, III, made the dancers glow while Dick’s always fascinating video designs filled the stage with nature and geometric scenes. The costumes by Phoebe Katzin, Pendleton and Quinn were a show in themselves.

When they return, like the legendary swallows of Capistrano, they will hopefully show some new works, but just having Momix back in New York City is enough for now.

Momix (through January 7, 2024)

Joyce Theater, 175 Eighth Avenue, in Manhattan

For tickets, call 212-242-0800 or visit http://www.Joyce.org

Running time: one hour and 45 minutes including one intermission