Apparently That’s What Happened…
…though exactly what it was, well, I’ll leave that for you to decide. Jo Lloyd’s latest work is an intriguing exploration of the nature of witnessing and perceiving, observing and partaking, affecting and being affected by. As soon as the audience is invited in to the vast space of the Meat Market in North Melbourne we begin to observe each other. Jenny Hector’s superb set comprises of a vast crimson circular floor around which we sit. Upon the floor are several man size cut out figures in various states of revelling. These figures suggest that what we are about to witness takes place at a public event, a party perhaps, or some night club? The soundscape by Duane Morrison and JDFranzke alludes to similar territory, a contemporary blend of ambient electronics and thumping beats, the sort of music contemporary party goers are familiar with, suggesting vast warehouse parties or underground alternative clubs. It’s a fantastic score, providing a solid backbone for the dance work itself, offering plenty of rhythms and tones for the dancers to play with and deliberately work against. Having the audience in the round further reiterates the exploration of the retelling of incidents, we become a continuation of the cut out figures, we are therefore implicated in whatever will follow. Throughout the piece the lights always spill onto the audience, faces are aglow on the peripheries of stage in various states of observing. But exactly what is the event we are seeing? Are we at a party, a nightclub, the streets of some disturbed suburban estate? And is it a murder, a rape, a fight, a drug induced scenario of seduction? Of course this remains unclear, as it must, and it is this uncertainty the work attempts to examine.
The choreography itself at times frustrated me, and at times gave me deep pleasure. I am always struck by how bizarre and abstract contemporary dance can be, how obtuse and impenetrable for an audience member not in familiar territory. It is probably because my date for the evening had quietly confided to me that he had never been to a dance show in his life before that I kept viewing the piece through his eyes. I could tell something was being told to me, something was being said, but exactly what it was eluded me. My eyes kept shifting from the dancers to the audience surrounding them, I was amused by the stern and querulous expressions I saw, the searching gaze as people tried to make sense of what they were seeing. It’s an intriguing art form, contemporary dance; I’m always aware of trying to ascertain that place where the audience and the work meet and how comfortable that meeting is.
Jo Lloyd is evidently a choreographer of talent and intelligence. The work is intricate and precise, frenetic and fractured, held and free flowing, dictated by the sound scape and working to a rhythm of it’s own all at once. However, for me I took a while to warm to it. With such an abstract movement vocabulary the human bodies in front of me transform into something robotic, vacant, absent of feeling. The ominous sense I begin to experience is a result of the sound, the lights, the atmosphere created, but not necessarily from the dance itself. I found moments repetitive and too obscure, and the scene and costume changes felt messy and unnecessary, breaking the flow and preventing me from being immersed too deeply. Saying that, the second last sequence, the three dancers dressed in puffy white suits, was wonderful; a satisfying blend of solo and acutely timed group work that I found very satisfying. As to was Luke Georges solo, always a dancer of immense precision and connection to the material, which for me hinted strongly towards what the work was trying to communicate.
Overall it’s a strong and well executed dance work, but I’m not sure how accessible I found it. My date commented that he was mostly entertained if entirely baffled, not in itself a bad summary at all. There were a few heated discussions in the foyer about the merits of the work, which is perfectly fitting for a piece that deals with perception as it’s subject matter, though for the most part the appreciative first night audience were in agreement that it was a work of skill and intelligence. I still yearn though for something more human in the work, something more heart felt and emotionally connected. The work and I never fully met, it kept me at arms length and denied me the experience of being fully involved and affected. Perhaps just like a party goer who witnesses some terrible event but continues to party on regardless, the night a continuation of drink and dancing, the event merely a conversation piece for some other, later, party.
The Arts House
Meat Market, 5 Blackwood Street, North Melbourne,
until Sunday June 29.
Bookings: 9369 0096 or www.easytix.com.au/artshouse
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