Dancers bring a fresh expression to painter’s work
●●Russell Maliphant: broadcasts of dance productions are ‘vital’ for access
CHOREOGRAPHER Russell Maliphant Dance Company’s Vortex, inspired by the works of American abstract expressionist painter Jackson Pollock, was broadcast on BBC Four on January 21.
It was filmed by Martin Collins from Arts Trust Production and if you missed it I can highly recommend you catch it on BBC iplayer - even if you think you aren’t interested in dance!
Russell Maliphant has described broadcasts of dance productions as a “vital” way to boost access to people who would not normally be able to watch shows in a theatre.
Maliphant said: “I think it’s vital [to broadcast these shows].
“We don’t want to lock people out of art.
“It should be accessible; I don’t think it’s a luxury.
“Just like dance shouldn’t be a luxury, it should be something we should all be able to access.”
At a time when conversations surrounding ticket prices for live theatre and dance continue to plague the sector, Maliphant called filming Vortex a “great opportunity”, and said “relative to television”, performances could have a “fairly small reach”.
He said: “It is great to put it out there [...]. In a tour or two nights at Sadler’s Wells, we’re reaching 3,000 people.
“We’ll hopefully reach more than that when it’s televised and I hope that’s a positive thing.”
Vortex opens with a figure standing before what looks like a huge canvas, surrounded by shadows.
The scene is lit in gold, casting his movements on to the surface in front of him, his movements depict the artist at his easel.
Maliphant uses the dancers’ physical gestures, simple props and beautiful lighting to mine the idea of Pollock’s action paintings so-called because of how the artist roamed around and across his canvases to achieve his drip technique.
The huge plywood ‘canvas’ platform, wheeled around the stage, both acts as a backdrop for the light shows, and tilted or laid flat for dancers to perform on.
A bucket on a wire is sent flying in ever-decreasing circles, with which the dancers play an elegant game of dodge.
Fine white sand, dispensed from a spinning canister or rained from the
flies, gradually covers the stage, swirled into patterns by the dancers’ feet and bodies so that by the end there is an artwork on the floor.
Colour filled patterns are projected onto a huge length of diaphanous fabric as it is made to billow and ripple.
The dancers are mesmerising to watch throughout, channelling the graceful strength of Maliphant’s choreography into a Zenlike flow.
All five have a concentrated
fluidity, even when somehow performing on that moving platform when it is pitched at a steep tilt.
Charlie Brittain’s light, cat-like suppleness is captivating; alongside Maliphant’s arcing classical lines are disrupted by the street-dance specialist Paris Crossley’s thrilling displays of popping.
In a solo during which she is gently covered with flowing sand, razor-sharp, juddering movements with martial arts moves swirled into the mix.
Powering it all is Katya Richardson’s evocative, Cage-inspired score, apparently created with sounds derived solely from a piano - from insistent knocks and creaks to urgently distorted crescendos that could be from the Chernobyl TV series soundtrack.
Absorbing and meditative, particularly in its first half, the piece is powerfully serene, dynamically quiet much like the Pollock masterpieces it alludes to.
Give it a go, you won’t regret it.