| . | 11/29/2009
COMPLEXIONS CONTEMPORARY BALLET
By: Joel Benjamin
COMPLEXIONS CONTEMPORARY BALLET celebrates its 15th Anniversary with an exciting two-week season at the Joyce Theater.
The Complexions Contemporary Ballet troupe, led by Desmond Richardson, its principal dancer and Dwight Rhoden, its principal choreographer, had a great deal to celebrate in its gala two-week season at the Joyce Theater. First of all the season, dubbed “Love, Sweat & Tears” by its artistic directors, is the troupe’s 15th, quite an accomplishment, in itself and secondly, the directors have kept up the incendiary techniques and sensual style of its sixteen, multi-racial dancers intact over all these years.
Program A consisted of two multi-part works, both choreographed by Mr. Rhoden and both New York premieres: “Dirty Wire,” and “Mercy.”
The ostensible theme of “Dirty Wire” is the complexity of communication amongst people. Mr. Rhoden chose music by David Rozenblatt, who provided a nervous, electronic score that varied in mood from powerfully screechy to soothingly melodic. “Dirty Wire” was structured around couples relating to each other in powerful ways. The 12-member cast was divided into couples, each of which showed some different emotional state ranging from tender to angry. The chic, iridescent costumes of Christine Darch revealed every inch of the beautiful dancers’ bodies as they danced with and at each other. The women danced on point, spun, lifted and otherwise plied by the men.
Although the non-stop choreographic flow featured incredibly high kicks, sudden falls and fast grappling there were subtle differences in the couples’ steps and attitudes. One couple hardly glanced at each other; another appeared joined at the hip in sexual intimacy; and yet another was angrily passionate in an approach-avoidance relationship that was bolstered by Mr. Rozenblatt’s score. More intriguing was how Mr. Rhoden used the group to both connect and set off each duet. At one point the men came on and took the male of the duet off, leaving his partner bereft. At other times the rest of the cast mimicked the highlighted couple, doing just slightly different steps to bring the couple into emotional relief against them. Whether Mr. Rhoden’s choreography was effective in communicating his main theme might be questioned but he definitely ably explored his secondary theme of “instant connections” which is something dance does very well.
“Mercy,” was choreographed to a mosaic music score, which included every type of music from a booming organ & the “Hallelujah” Chorus to “Amazing Grace,” Gospel & Steve Reich’s insistently repetitive work. “Mercy” took on even larger themes than “Dirty Wire.” Mr. Rhoden’s program notes purported that “Mercy” was “an epic work” that “looks at the desire to advance without violence.” He came closest to describing his movement palette in saying “’Mercy’ hopes to provide a context for real images of pleading…forgiveness, indignation….” Dressed in Ms. Darch’s eloquently revealing white costumes, the entire company, led by the glorious Mr. Richardson, indeed, expressed through Mr. Rhoden’s choreographic language, a feeling of agitated worship and deep concern. Most of all, Mr. Rhoden managed to make the dancers into a microcosm, a community intent on working with each other to overcome some nameless threat to their sanctity and sanity. Mr. Richardson was the chief acolyte, whose solos featured mind-boggling feats of physical skill that expressed a frustrated anguish. He lifted his legs high and then dipped into splits, manipulating what looked like a small black trashcan as if it were a totem with great symbolism. Each dancer subsequently had his/her own trashcan which also served as seats for a congregation of bending, dipping supplicating bodies and even as a part of their costumes when they were placed over their heads. The pace became ever more frantic with dramatic entrances and exits through the rear of the set ending with crescendo of kicks and falls by the entire cast.
It should be mentioned here that Michael Korsch’s lighting gave shape and form to Mr. Rhoden’s work, making many movements more exciting than they otherwise might have been.
Complexions is a company that aims to excite a visceral response in it’s—mostly youthful--audiences with its amazingly fast-paced and sensual choreography. Certainly the dancers are beautiful, flexible and gracefully daring. It would be better if Messrs Rhoden & Richardson let the choreography speak for itself rather than provide pretentiously overwrought program notes. Less is more. This also applies to the choreography which is sometimes just simply overwhelming in its overabundance of high extensions and other superficial displays of the dancers’ incredible techniques. There is a definite lack of peace and calmness in Mr. Rhoden’s work. A breath here and there would give the audience time to appreciate both his skill as a choreographer and the amazing abilities of these dancers.
Complexions is in equal measures exciting and vexing in its mix of cutting edge techniques, first rate production values and its sometimes unfulfilled affectations to social meaningfulness. There’s an incredible force of nature quality to the troupe that needs no tempering, but only some skillful editing.
The company: Desmond Richardson, Natalia Alonso, Edgar Anido, Joo Hwan Cho, Christina Dooling, Patricia Hachey Gary W. Jeter II, Natiya Kezevadze, Philip John Orsano, Christie Partelow, Sabra Perry, Juan Rodriguez, Hiroko Sakakibara, Wendy White Sasser, Simon Sliva and Clifford Williams.
COMPLEXIONS CONTEMPORARY BALLET
The Joyce Theater
175 Eighth Ave.
New York, NY
November 17th -29th, 2009
JoyceCharge: 212- 242-0800; http://www.joyce.org
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