Unkempt Dance in association with STRUT Dance: In Short: In Situ

Unkempt Dance in association with STRUT Dance: “In Short: In Situ” –
Uncle Joe’s Mess Hall, 30 October –

Perth’s annual showing of short works by independent artists took on a twist this year.  Instead of the traditional studio setting at King Street Arts Centre, the season moved down the road to Uncle Joe’s Mess Hall, a café-cum-barbershop.  With all the hallmarks of an uber-cool café – industrial–looking light-fittings, exposed wood and concrete – Uncle Joe’s Mess Hall provided several performance spaces, each of them bringing the audience into extra-close proximity with the dancers.  The intimacy of the performance spaces unquestionably worked in the program’s favour.

It was more than just intimacy, however, that made this bill stand out.  In contrast to previous years, in which the program often felt like a tasting plate – some morsels you like, others not so much - this selection of six works was consistently engaging.

With the audience ushered to the back of the café, looking out on its courtyard, the program began with Isabella Stone’s another lying position.  From my vantage point, dancers Russell Thorpe and Harrison Alexander Elliott appeared to tumble out of nowhere.  Moving with feline grace around the tiny, concrete space, Thorpe and Elliott were absolutely in tune with one another throughout the many synchronised phrases of this engaging work.

Moving inside the café, Nicole Ward’s Score #100 was next.  This light-hearted work sees audience members provided with headphones, which offer a choice of three music tracks.  Clad in basketball-style gear, two dancers (Emma Fishwick and Ward) perform a series of movements that seem to take inspiration from the energy and drive aerobics.  I tried to listen to all three tracks for equal lengths of time but was drawn inexorably to the only non-contemporary offering - Robert Palmer’s “Addicted to Love”.  It seemed to me to be the perfect accompaniment to Ward’s tongue-in-cheek workout.

Fishwick’s own work, Proximal to a Dance, was next on the menu, a solo performed by Ella-Rose Trew.  Lit by a powerful floor lamp, the solo dancer follows a circular trail.  In this setting, Trew was surrounded on three sides by audience members, as she spiralled through the work.  Trew has a gorgeously fluid movement style, combined with an almost zen-like focus.  Watching her dance at such close range was a treat.  

We were ushered back to the courtyard for Urban Snap Shot, choreographed and performed by Penny Dolling, Megan Exton and Louise Henshall.  Here we found the three dancers carefully posed, the markings of hipsters – a polaroid camera here, a jam jar style glass there, an oversized pair of glasses somewhere else – all too evident.  Turning slowly begin, the trio gradually build in tempo to party-level.  The audience’s personal space is of no regard as they shimmy and shake through this number, seemingly aware only of their own youthful cool.  While all three dancers gave a marvellously satirical performance, the standout was Louise Henshall, who danced with a sultry insouciance.

O&E by Louise Honeybul, in collaboration with Russell Thorpe, saw us back in the café space.  Performed by Honeybul and Thorpe, this duet felt all the more intimate because of our closeness to the couple.  Weaving and winding around each other, the pair seem to be locked in a relationship that always sees one half slipping away from the other.  

Lastly the audience was ushered to the café’s long entry ramp, for Kathleen Szalay’s Don’t Pop.  Featuring four dancers (Emily Bowman, Harrison Elliott, Emma Fishwick and Nicole Ward), this is a whimsical piece.  It’s performed to live and recorded sounds – popping, hissing and helium-infused voice-overs. Clad in sporty fluorescents, the dancers surge up and down the ramp, tumbling over one another. Brightly coloured fun, Don’t Pop was a cheerful note on which to conclude the evening.

The setting for “In Short” was novel, but what made the program work so well was the way in which each work had been developed, as the name suggests, “in situ”.  It made for a thoroughly enjoyable evening.


- Nina Levy