Modacolab in the News:
Review: Show merges dance with new-media arts
Web Posted: 08/08/2007 04:18 PM CDT
Jasmina Wellinghoff, Special to the Express-News
We don't see much modern dance on a regular basis in San Antonio, but judging from last Friday's showcase called "Merging Modes" there is plenty of talent and imagination out there.
Part of Contemporary Art Month, the show was produced by the Modern Dancers Co-Lab and presented at the International Folk Culture Center on the Our Lady of the Lake University campus.
The title refers to the fact that each piece was a collaboration between dance and "new media arts" such as video and digitally created music.
The evening started with Erica Wilson-Perkins' dynamic and attractive "Dance of the Right Arm (at the Water)" which she created for the Parks & Recreation-sponsored group Alamotion.
Six dancers wearing vaguely African costumes by Shell Benjamin began with movements that seemed to emphasize the right arm, but soon the choreography opened up, the mesmerizing score by Van Armen evoked the sounds of the jungle and the dancers broke out into a kaleidoscope of mostly synchronized moves that challenged their bodies and our eyes. While the movement vocabulary was definitely modern dance — complete with fall-and-recovery and even cartwheels — the "at the Water" in the name suggests old customs or rituals as possible inspirations.
Choreographer Christy Walsh was represented by two works, both imaginative, but her "Second Attitude Toward Others" stood out. Featuring Jayne Lawrence's wire sculptures, Walsh herself and Andrew Coronado, the work was based on Jean Paul Sartre's analysis of feelings such as desire and hate, and realized in a visually novel way. The flesh-and-blood dancers were juxtaposed with their video selves but the live and screen movements were not synchronized. At times, there were three couples, the dancers, their shadows and the video dancers. It was edgy, "adult" and sprinkled with unusual effects and configurations.
Co-Lab co-founder Amber Ortega Perez presented the amusing "Acquiescence" performed by Kristen Bolner to music by Eliot Theodore Schechter. It was really more of a performance art piece about a woman coping with the many roles in life. Bolner appeared on stage pushing her life load — a presumably heavy chest — that she then proceeded to "deal with" by rolling over it, grabbing it, kneeling on it, throwing out clothes that it contained, trying the clothes on, folding herself into the chest, etc. The accompanying video art didn't seem to add much to the work, however.
Another strong piece was "Spaces" by the Houston-based company The Living Room Project. Here, six dancers appeared in three scenes, all done in semi-darkness. What was interesting about the work was how with the help of a flashlight the live dance became modified — and amplified — by the dancers' shadows, often much larger than life. Perhaps it was a commentary on how we experience what happens to us in life — bigger than it is — but it scarcely matters. It worked aesthetically.
Laura Vriend's "Our Bodies Split the Coasts," in which she appears live in front of the animated video image of a man (animation by Philip Vriend), was most successful when she appeared to be fusing with the screen, but the piece was a bit repetitive.
The show also included two video-only entries: an excerpt from an upcoming documentary on dance by Wilson-Perkins, and Jayne King's "Floodgates," with video by Bill Colangelo. The former will probably be more enjoyable seen in its entirety while the latter, though pleasant to watch, was too demure to live up to what King told us (in an earlier conversation) was the theme — a play on the parallels between restraining torrents of water and torrents of emotions.
http://www.mysanantonio.com/entertainment/stage/stories/MYSA080207.4P.merging.12e3820.html
"Performance, visual art merge," Express News, July 20, 2006
Jennifer Roolf Lastert
Imagine, if you will, that Grant Wood's "American Gothic" can boogie.
That's the challenge — and the potential fun — facing the artists and choreographers in tonight's "Merging Modes" celebration of visual and physical art at the Radius Cafe.
"We're taking art, and making it a moveable piece," says Amber Ortega-Perez, one of the members of the Modern Dancers' Co-Laboratory (Modaco).
Art and dance lovers alike can see what she's talking about at "Merging Modes," which is part of Contemporary Art Month. The event is billed as an "evening of collaborative performance created by contemporary choreographers and visual artists," and is free of charge.
Produced by Modaco and sponsored in part by the San Antonio Dance Umbrella, the event features eight dancers bringing to life the work and inspirations of four visual artists, a video designer and six choreographers. Some performers will dance alongside the works that inspired the performance; others will incorporate the tools the artists use. Each collaborative performance, Ortega-Perez says, is distinctive.
"The choreographers viewed the artists' work and talked to them about how it came about," she says. "It was up to each group to decide how they were going to use it."
So one collaborative team incorporated blocks covered in dirt or sand into the dance choreography, because those elements were a central part of the visual artist's work. Another piece is a videotaped juxtaposition of the choreography and the art that inspired it.
Some choreography will reflect the energy of a finished piece of visual art, while others might merely have taken the same inspirational starting point and gone in a new direction. Each pairing resulted in a new type of artistic expression.
Featured visual artists are Suzanne Paquette, Missi Smith, Diane Mazur and Jennie Powers, with video designer Michael Bowyer. Dancers will perform the choreography of Ortega-Perez, Shonna Walden Cooper, Jayne King, Kristina Kuest Mistry, Laura Vriend and Christy Walsh.
This is Modaco's debut performance, but the choreographers hope to keep bridging communities in the art world. "(In the future), we'd like to collaborate with a different art form, to integrate different artists," Ortega-Perez says. Future performances might pair choreographers with photographers or musicians, she says.
But this weekend's performance allows contemporary-art lovers the chance to become dance lovers. It's a way to "view some interesting art and view it in a different way," Ortega-Perez says. "It takes it away from this stand-alone, immoveable experience, and makes it something new."
http://www.mysanantonio.com/entertainment/visualarts/stories/MYSA072106.WK.merging.8b4a33.html
"Merging modes: ModaCoLab at Radius," San Antonio Current, July 19, 2006
Dianne Roberts
The success of any artistic collaboration or multimedia fusion depends on two factors: what the participating artists get out of the experience, and whether the finished work translates aesthetically to a third-party viewer. When the Modern Dancers' Co-Laboratory formed, a little over a year ago, the idea was to create a forum for the open exchange of ideas, aesthetics, and performance opportunities among the city's professional modern dancers. Their latest project extends the collaborative model a step further, enlisting visual artists to participate in the creation of “Merging Modes,” an official CAM performance that explores the visual and physical acts of the artistic process.
The four works on Friday's program are the end product of individual collaborations. Each choreographer worked with a visual artist, some using an existing or specifically created object as a prop or thematic device, other times mimicking or taking as inspiration the gestures or working processes of their object-making colleagues.
Kristina Kuest Mistry's performance, “River Bed,” is inspired by local artist Missi Smith's “feet paintings,” in which the artist works on a paper grid attached to the floor using paint, charcoal, and other media that are manipulated in dance-like gestures, themselves evolving from Smith's lifelong interest in dance and movement. Christy Walsh's explicit use of motion, tension and momentum will be featured in “Wheel,” in which dancers move in, around, and through a large wheel created by sculptor Jennie Powers.
Artist Suzanne Paquette, known for meticulous, organic installations that read as indoor earthworks, created a group of sod-like blocks that form the backbone of three works grouped loosely together. Amber Ortega-Perez's “Crossing Canaan,” Shonna Walden Cooper's “Earthbound Determination,” and Laura Vriend's “Prairie Sweet” manipulate the blocks in various configurations, each dancer creating the physical environment for the next.
The most elaborate and unconventional work is “SPILL!,” a video work created by dance-savvy video artist Michael Bowyer, dancer Jayne King, and painter Diane Mazur. Mazur's bold, physical, and downright messy painting style and technique inspired the broad gestures of King's choreography, including the motion of the paint itself. The finished work includes footage of both Mazur and King, edited (or choreographed) by Bowyer to the improvisational jazz of Bill Colangelo, with whom King has worked in the past.
The underlying process seems to have been fruitful for the artists. The success of the translation is found in the performance, which takes place at 7:30 p.m. Friday, July 21, at Radius, 106 Auditorium Circle. Free. 212-6600 or info@modacolab.org for more information.
http://www.sacurrent.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=16938338&BRD=2318&PAG=461&dept_id=484045&rfi=6
Best of Arts 2006, San Antonio Current, April 17, 2006
Dianna Roberts
"The Modern Dancers Co-Laboratory also deserves mention. Founded by some of San Antonio's most active modern dancers, its membership has grown quickly to include an influx of highly-trained and successful dancer-choreographers, (some of them new to San Antonio), providing a pool of dancers and creative energy that has led to several creative projects and performances, with the promise of more to come."
http://www.zwire.com/site/news.cfm?newsid=16493275&BRD=2318&PAG=461&dept_id=553352&rfi=6
