Pleasantly Bloodless Movement, Articulated Fearlessly
Lizz Roman & Dancers, Blue Floor Reflections
Project Artaud Theater, San Francisco
September 25, 2006
By
ALLAN ULRICH
allan@voiceofdance.com
VoiceofDance.com 2006
Lizz Roman & Dancers in Blue Floor Reflections. Photo by Andy Mogg.
The problem with site-specific dances is often the site itself. If the space is not sufficiently unique, the steps fashioned within it won't do what they're supposed to do, invest the setting with an almost totemic power. Project Artaud, a former canning factory on the fringes of San Francisco's Potrero District, has been investigated by choreographers for years, most famously by Joanna Haigood. Last weekend, it was the turn of Lizz Roman, who has previously made work in this venue, and, in the premiere of Blue Floor Reflections, she ran headlong into those problems.
In fact, she didn't transform Project Artaud as much as she adorned the scaffolding and girders in the venue with an hour of pleasantly bloodless movement, articulated fearlessly by the 10 splendid dancers, who collaborated in the process. For 60 minutes, the building became an enormous Jungle Gym and once you get over the weirdness of the arrangement, there wasn't much more to hold the attention, except for the next morsel of movement.
One can be grateful that Roman arrives at the task without agendas. She's not out to empower women acrobats or to preserve the building from demolition or to evoke the spirit of the place, simply to fashion eloquent steps within an unconventional setting.
And for approximately 15 minutes Saturday (Sept. 23), she succeeded. Blue Floor Reflections may be site-specific, but the audience is not free to wander at will. In Roman's awkward plan, the dancing starts in the lobby, moves to the auditorium bleachers and platform and then returns to the lobby, to which we are directed, two at a time, down a rickety stairway by grim monitors. Such exercises in crowd control can be annoying and they often defeat the purpose of site-specific work, which is often at its best when observers are free to wander at will. At Artaud, the monitors constantly move you away from spots where the dancers will perform. An ambling cameraman Saturday did nothing to sustain a mood. One felt like an intruder, rather than a visitor.
And Roman quickly exhausts the possibilities of her concept. Solo and in couples, the dancers hang off balconies, shimmy down girders, swing from stanchions and climb posts. Occasionally, the team descends to the floor for passing encounters. What keeps the piece from distinction is the limited range of the movement vocabulary. It's mostly all legato, and the dancers seem to have been coached to shed any sign of expressivness from their silky gestures. Intermittently, Roman tosses in a unison combination aloft.
The limited dynamic of Blue Floor Reflections (an allusion to the final sequence) robs the work of tension. Perhaps Roman might concentrate on extending the tone and rhythm of her movement style on terra firma before taking it back into the air. Wandering around, I failed to discern any grand design or submerged symmetry in the configuration of performers twisting from poles. The dancers, all shapes, sizes and genders, included Juliana Carella, Sean Dorsey, Emily Leap, the ubiquitous Noel Plemmons, Sonya Smith, Mandy Christiansen, James Graham, Courtney Moreno, Evan Saunders and James Soria.
Roman makes an attempt to create an audio-visual environment. The lighting is attributed to Clyde Sheets, who was also listed as DJ. Throughout, cellist Alex Kelly bowed and plucked his cello, which became part of a sonic environment that alternately assaulted and lulled the ear. Voices muttering in German and English were part of the mix, to what end I could not discern. Spectator enthusiasm, however, was high.
Blue Floor Reflections continues at Project Artaud Theater Thursdays through Saturdays through Oct. 7. For ticket information, call (415) 863-9834.
