Hello. Sorry no post on the Sean Bell shooting trial last night; I was busy getting some dance reviews done and up. Did anyone see Lifetime TV’s new show on Friday night? I thought it was sweet and good-intentioned but a little phony in places. Anyway, my post of that will hopefully be up today on Huffington. Here’s my Explore Dance review of Diana Vishneva’s “Beauty in Motion.”
Yesterday was a big day for trial testimony. We heard from two emergency services personnel who responded to the scene as well as a videographer who shot some video clips, some of which we saw, including upsetting footage of Trent Bennefield being put on a stretcher and taken to hospital, and we heard the first part of Undercover Officer Sanchez’s account of that night. He was called by the People but so far seems only to have given testimony favorable to the defense. We’ll hear the rest of that today. More tonight…
Tonya,
Interesting review. You called the program delightful but seem not to delight in too much of it aside from some of the bods. By the way the technique used in FLOW was a black light to illuminate the white parts revealed by the performers. I’f hardly call that segment “dance” but it was “movement theatrics”.
The most interesting aspect of the entire evening was clearly the fact that Vishneva,a Mariinski trained classical ballerina, principal in two of the world’s leading companies choose to mount her own evening of dance, called it Beauty in Motion and did no classical ballet! Not only did she choose no classical ballet, but she used some very obscure music and “libretto” for the first “act” of her show.
The twirling beads, again was hardly dance, but a “fun” visual bit with little variety. That and the black light were the kind of “things” which appeal to children and the child in us adults and rather a “low” level for the lofty and esoteric notion of “beauty”.
I suppose for Vishneva is was one of the only means to get a lot of attention her her, much more than she could get dancing classical ballet no matter how good she is at this stage of her career. And she is one of the best. So it was more about Vishneva getting attention and having some fun and breaking out of the rigor of classical ballet. The evening made me think of Anna Pavlova who made a name for herself by trapsing around the world and bring ballet with her. She was noted for her “dying swan” which is a dance Vishneva will be performing with Kirov in April (I believe). How ironic!
Only the final piece “satisfied” my itch to see dance. I give her oodles of credit for doing such a melange and doing it well. But this reaffirms in my own mind how hard I am to please with contemporary choreography and why I see so little of it. It’s too iffy!