August 23, 2004
Dance fest an exercise in quantity
By Susan Walker
There was a chance that a reduction in size might have resulted in a concentration of talent at the 14th annual fFIDA International Dance Festival. But such was not the case.
Although condensed into one location, the Distillery District, and running only 13 days, down from the previous 21-day marathon, this year's festival presented long stretches where shows displayed little theatricality, inventiveness or remarkable dancing.
The wince factor ran high in the latter half of the Studio Theatre Series in Dancemakers' Cannery Studio, a small, narrow venue where not all 100 seats get a full view of the stage.
Many of the 18 shows in Series E, F and G were the work of students or new dance-school graduates, quite a few of them reappearing in each others' productions.
Small wonder that some events looked more like a dance class than a dance show, such as Tracey Norman's 14 Stairs; 1 Window, which featured three female dancers, two of them creators or performers of other fFIDA pieces, along with composer/violinist Kousha Nakhaei. All four moved randomly about the stage while musing aloud on the idea of home (''a terrycloth bathrobe,'' ''the stairs,'' ''CBC,'' ''old clothes''). One wondered if there was a typo in the title of RT Ficial muTaTions' Sanity is the Price of Genius.
Perhaps they meant 'insanity', for there was lots of that, if little genius,
in a piece for four dancers, in white underwear and shreds of tutus, running amok
to yet another tuneless electronic score.
Allison Rees-Cummings, one of a handful of fFIDA choreographers deserving of the title Independent Dance Artist, dressed Danielle Baskerville and Emma Romerein in bumblebee costumes for We Fall Apart.
Twitching and communicating with imaginary antennae, they mugged and romped as a forced twosome, as if captured in a jar.
Toronto Dance Theatre dancer Valerie Calam put in one of the truly memorable solo performances at fFIDA, with Molt. Shedding her layered costume, tearing off sleeves and ripping off a dress, she did a striptease that had nothing to do with sex, and everything to do with self-revelation and isolating one's individuality.
In a different vein, Jeffrey Chan made use of clothing in A Toast to Li Po, a tribute in which he danced to a recitation of the Chinese poet's verses with long fluttering silk sleeves, using a traditional technique to project a lyrical love of life.
Montrealer Andre Fairfield is blind and New Yorker Richard Daniels is a man living with HIV, but there was nothing pitiable about Vistas, an affecting duet created by Daniels.
Dancing together, they assisted each other's movements in a way that stressed harmony rather than interdependence. Like Vladimir and Estragon, they made a profound statement about carrying on.
Thursday night's Grande Scale Gala in the Distillery District's Fermenting Room lasted more than four gruelling hours.
It seemed an odd way to show gratitude to patrons who paid extra for the privilege of standing on a concrete floor and craning necks to see over heads as 11 acts unfolded in three performance areas.
Andrea Nann remounted her beautiful solo, Meditation #5: On Loss and Desire, inspired by Michael Ondaatje's Anil's Ghost. Mari Osani and Xing Bang Fu did an ever-so-slow and over-long reptilian duet in Sea-Watching. Matjash Mrozewski created a new dance, No One Dies, for four women dressed in what looked like fencing costumes.
The best came last: virtuoso dancing in Roberto Campanella and Robert Glumbek's Nothing Twice; Japan's Crustacea duo doing dance for an electronic age in Rassel; and a dynamic duet by Malgorzata Nowacka slam-dancing in pointe shoes with Irek Muchalski.
The festival wrapped up yesterday.
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