Live Animals Performance Collective and Friends present GO

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Hamlin Park Fieldhouse
Oct 29 and 30

Kate Corby
Chris Walker/NoMoRune Collaborative
Carrie Hanson/The Seldoms
Emily Miller/GET DOWN PICK-UP

Talented dance-makers and intelligent performers unite to make GO; an hour of diverse dance and serious mind candy. Too many people missed out. All five of the peices take full advantage of the Fieldhouse's depth. In this space bodies move up and down stage zooming in and out; one moment appearing tiny and distant then all at once huge and looming.

Carrie Hanson's meditative duet, Right of Way, personifies the landscape of a railway. Hanson explores closeness and distance, independence and united momentum. Kate Corby is perpetually preventing Walker from moving into a new space or energy; effectively containing Walker. This is no small task considering Walker's 6ft plus height and her small frame. Walker is perpetually preventing his partner from falling. Whenever she tosses herself or allows her body to timbre to the ground, Chris catches her.

Hanson's sound score features recordings from train tracks, providing a complementary metaphor to the image of the two bodies separating and linking up. Moving bodies become box cars, rails, and rail ties with human emotions.

Emily Miller's Excerpt in Blue brings the audience from the industrial landscape of Right of Way into the a more natural setting. The connection between the two pieces provides an essential through-line for the show. Miller's dance morphs from an abstract sea-side landscape into sentimentality. The two dancers embody both the fluid movement of waves and the static structure of a land mass. Bodies flow to the floor and come to an erect halt, legs bent at the knees; feet flexed like stalagmites.

The dancers stand side by side, and Whitney Burton marks out the moving horizon with her hand. The dance grows more personal and human-bodied. They run in playful circles performing complex partnering. They have trouble embracing. Weight is connected through the chest; arms rigid and extended; like two starfish in an impossible embrace.

Both Burton and Erin Kilmurray demonstrate and softness and struggle. The partner work is intricate and full bodied. Flow is interrupted when one partner kicks the other into the air with a sudden thrust of the legs. The airborne dancer flies through the air and lands with a profound softness, then flows in to the next movement with out any recovery time.

Chris Walker is a shape shifter in Arnsenio Andrade-Calderon's Reflections. He tells the story of the life cycle of plant, animal, and mineral. Walker's arms and back writhe like a plant taking root and emerging from the soil. His spine articulates eternity. Walker's hair extends the energy that emanates from his crown. Isometric motion and Horton-esque lines give way to the circular momentum of whirling dervishes. Walker's striking has a centering effect; drawing the audience in deeper and deeper until the lights go out.

The centerpiece is Kate Corby's GO; a high energy trio that seems to dare the audience to keep watching. Emily Miller sets the mood and calls the shots for the dance; opening with a taunting solo. Corby's choreography is full of surprises. She sets up patterns and pathways and cleverly smashes them down. Anna Norman, Killmurray, and Miller execute Corby's precise and asymmetrical movement with ferocity. The dancers must multi-task since much of the movement does not prioritize one direction, shape, or part of the body.

They dance close to the audience staring us down. Miller cuts the tension with a slice of her hand and they all scatter upstage; line up and turn to face us. They move down stage changing levels, contracting, shifting, springing; never breaking their gaze.

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