At Brooklyn Academy of Music, also known as BAM, the performance “Run Don’t Run” took the attention of a fairly large audience. Strings could not be a more obvious sight to notice as they stretched across the whole floor, as well as extended almost to the ceiling. They were separated horizontally by a gap big enough to fit a person or two and vertically by about half of a foot. The strings seemed very flexible and easily bendable. There were also lights on the floor and on the walls.
As the dance was about to start, the whole room went dark. Then, a white light was shown on the floor. Strange music began to play as two of the dancers pursued each other in a jumping motion across the floor. As the dance performance progressed, more of the dancers came out and continued to go on with the somewhat strange dance moves. ‘Chapters’ of the performance were separated by a change in the music and its intensity, as well as the intensity of the dancers and their dances. Even the lights helped create a different mood between these transitions. During these sections of the performance, the dancers seems to do motions that fit the mood generated by both the lights and the music. There were several of these ‘chapters’ that occurred throughout the performance and within an hour, the performance had ended.
In regards of analyzing this performance, I was extremely confused at what had just occurred for the past hour. Most of the performance did not make much sense to me. I felt that it was redundant and severely extended as if it had to fill in the hour performance one way or another. However, I did understand some of what the dancers were trying to possibly portray to the audience. This portrayal was shown for me through the use of the music and lights.
An example of this would be in the first half of the performance. After very intense music and movements, things started to slow down. A somewhat dark blue light had shown itself on the floor and calm, passive music ensued. During this mood change, the dancers were executing a swimming motion next to a partner. It involved graceful movements as they kneeled on the floor doing this for about three minutes. Another example where I witnessed the strings were clamped together and a waltz-type of dance was done. The dancers moved in and out of their partner’s grasps and swings, as well as through their arms and around their bodies. As this occurred, a bright white light had shown and adventurous music played. This proceeded for about 15 minutes with many different variations and switching of partners.
In essence, I feel the main idea presented through the performance “Run Don’t Run” was the exemplification of bodily expression. If this holds true, I commend this performance for doing a fairly nice job of portraying this theme. The dancers moved their body with the music and conformed themselves to their partners when paired off. This occurred either gracefully or harshly, maybe even unusually, with the mood radiated with the music and lights. As for the strings, they acted as both barriers but more so as a way to view the body differently. The body is a barrier to the environment and represents the “I” and how one is a “being.” However, if this assumption does not hold true, I could not begin to fathom what the purpose of this performance was.
