This show featured the third installment, or final chapter in Indigo Dance Company’s “Home” universe. The first episode being the dance film, “Home”, the second installment was “Closer to…” which was a live show at Highways Performance space and also a film version of it was shown at Stomping Ground L.A. This third episode entitled, “Husk” ends the series on a somewhat somber albeit cathartic note. Indigo Artistic Director Dani Burd also had in attendance Guest Artists Three Point Project of Wisconsin, Ashley Tomaszewski (Director and Founder of Three Point Project), and Aisha Reddick of San Diego.
Ashley Tomaszewski, Jo Brockway, Emma Domacinovich, Jade Eitel, and Greta Jenkins in Tomaszewski’s HOME(GROWN) – Photo by Catherine Fisher.
The first half of the program was dedicated to the Guest Artists. First on the program was “HOME(GROWN)” choreographed by Ashley Tomaszewski and featuring Jo Brockway, Emma Domacinovich, Jade Eitel, and Greta Jenkins. These four showed admirable physicality and movement skill. Beginning as a group, much of the syntax of the choreography was percussive and specific, with clarity coming in moments of unison. There was a general feeling of angst and frustration in the movement erupting occasionally into highly physical tantrum which was a joy to watch. Letting an emotional state seep through the body to the point of convulsion is fantastic and very hard to maintain. I appreciated the total surrender to the floor and how gravity can lend itself to our more human frailties. At one point one of the four became isolated and we did not know if she died or just irritated the group. Suddenly she was on the outside wanting to get back in and that eventuality proved futile. I like to think she was dead. This was a short and stirring work.
Second on the program was “THE NOISE WITHIN”, a solo by Three Point Project Director Ashley Tomaszewski. Apparently, there is a great deal of noise within her. Her solo was visceral and hard hitting. She does not hold back but lets herself fly only to crash emotionally to the floor and struggle to maintain some mental equilibrium in this piece where she seems to be unravelling right before our eyes. Tomaszewski’s choreography is full bodied, expressive and somewhat subtle for all of the physical exertion it demands. She utilized a long diagonal from upstage left to downstage right and up left was a set piece of a door in a frame with a lamp beside it, giving the impression that she was indoors in some kind of domicile where whatever was bothering her was on the other side of that door. It worked.
The third piece was by Guest Artist Aisha Reddick which she performed with one other dancer, Odessa Uno. Titled “CO-LAPSE” it was also set on a diagonal and had to do with fear, angst and agitation at approaching the upstage door up right of the stage. The movement syntax was entirely different from what went before but her piece managed to unsettle us by what the progression along that damned diagonal meant to both participants. It was an emotional struggle for both parties to make any headway at all towards their goal. The moments of unison were visually strong and underscored the Herculean attempt to continue no matter what. The “CO-“ was interesting in that these two people were feeling and facing the exact same struggle. They were in it together and united by it – maybe even made stronger by their shared angst.
indigo Dance Company – Photo by Catherine Fisher.
“Husk” by Indigo Dance is the culmination of a three-part series that began with the dance film “Home”. In that first film we are introduced to certain themes being explored by the performers present. One overarching theme is what does home mean to you? We see these definitions played out by different people from different backgrounds with very different emotions surrounding the idea of “Home”. There is great turmoil in the very act of growing up and leaving the home where one was a child. A child no longer, the responsibilities and circumstances of becoming adult often leave loved ones behind and affect us as stricken and hurt. This theme was explored more in the second installment “Closer to…”. Each performer portrayed their own personal emotional aspect of dealing with life.
indigo Dance Company – Photo by Catherine Fisher.
And now in “Husk” I would like to start with a definition. Husk: 1. a usually dry or membranous outer covering, an outer layer, an emptied shell. This certainly hits the nail on the head in terms of what was produced onstage. So much of the piece had the performers physically struggling with their own emotions and why they felt them. I want to add here that I was mindful of The 7 stages of Grief during this show to a great degree. Shock, Denial, Anger, Bargaining, Depression, Acceptance and Hope, and processing grief were all on display within any given character. These are messy stages and not at all linear but can be composite and mixed at any point. All of the performers rifled through these steps forwards and backwards painting a mural of grief and loss across the space. And not all was negative or depressing as some sections cleared the sadness and had people making real connections with concern and attentiveness and caring. All the while the movement was clean, intense and demanding.
indigo Dance Company – Photo by Catherine Fisher.
The set as mentioned above was two doors each upstage left and right with a floor lamp at the up left doorframe. I want to say THE lamp as it is the same lamp in all three pieces and sheds light on what people really think and feel when no one is watching. Illumination also happens inside the performers and the lamp reflects that. Some sections have each performer isolated in their own grief and only focused on the self until someone crosses their path and they get pushed out of the way or down to the ground. Sometimes the other is recognized and given their care and attention. There is a sequence of an attaché case that gets packed hurriedly and then in the persons’ anxiety it opens spilling all of its contents out onto the floor where the person must stop, pick everything up and hurry along again only to have it repeat. Anyone leaving a dangerous or sour relationship or moving out due to negative circumstances knows this scenario well.
indigo Dance Company – Photo by Catherine Fisher.
The overall effect of the choreography was one of remembrance. Memories of an event or person who had a great affect and then were gone – It was grief in honoring what was gone through. Even after all of the angst and percussive agitation in movement, the full company all come forward and lie down on their backs as if looking up at the stars. One person in the middle traces a shooting star as it crosses the night sky above them. At the very end she reaches up and grabs it! It was a beautiful epilogue to the consternation before it and put me in mind of a quote: “We are all in the gutter, but some of us are looking at the stars” (Oscar Wilde). The performers were: Dani Burd, Erika Rik Soto, Madi Thomas, Abbey Raymond, Jessica Caulk, Savanna Rae Gonzalez, and William McAfee.
For more information about Indigo Dance Company, please visit their website.
To learn more about Stomping Ground L.A., please visit their website.
Written by Brian Fretté for LA Dance Chronicle.
Featured image: Aisha Reddick and Odessa Uno in Reddick’s ”CO-LAPSE” – Photo by Catherine Fisher.
