After the first five minutes of sitting in BAM theater watching “How can you sit in the house all day and not go anywhere?” by Ralph Lemmon, I wanted to leave.  The theater seemed old and dilapidated, but inside they had really pretty columns (I posted a picture in my photjournal).  The video section of Lemmon’s dance piece was so boring- it was about an old man rolling around in a space suit and a man dressed up in a bunny costume.  I honestly am not sure what was even going on.  I wondered if the dance section would be shown on screen too or if there would be real people.  Oh yeah, and the screen reminded me of Little Foxes.  Finally the torturous video section ended and the real people came on to dance.  And what a dance it was.  I have never seen anything like it, if I could even call it a dance.  The dancers were flailing and twirling and there was no structure, choreography or apparent skill.  To me, it just seemed like watching five year olds twirl, spin and flail for a very long time.  Then there was what felt like a fifteen minute section of an empty stage with the sound of a woman’s cries.  This reminded me of Taxi Driver when Travis Bickle was on the phone with the Palantine girl who dumped him, and the camera shows the empty hallway with the sounds of the uncomfortable conversation because the stage was empty but you still heard the sounds of her cries.  During her crying I saw many people get up to leave.  I wasn’t sure why she was crying because there was no plot or anything, just twirling, flailing and then crying.  And when she finished crying, people came back and started flailing and falling on the floor again (presumably dancing).

Even though I didn’t like the dance, talking to the dramaturge changed my opinion of it.  I still don’t like the performance and I still wouldn’t see it again, but it really changed my understanding of it.  Before speaking to her, I had NO understanding at all.  Now at least I can understand it in an intellectual way as a piece of art.  The goal of the performance was to break down dance and body movement and recognizable shapes.  This avant-garde way of thinking reminds me of Picasso and Braque’s Cubism phase where they broke down recognizable shapes and objects into its parts.  Maybe one of the reasons I disliked it so much is because it is so avant-garde and far from what we normally expect, but maybe in fifty years this will become the norm, who knows?

I also liked some of the symbolism that was present in the performance, such as the way it stretched on and on, and the audience never knew it was going to end until it did.  In this way it mimicked life, and how we never know what the future holds, and we can be floating in a phase for so long, unsure how much time we have left, until it changes abruptly.

Also, when I saw the performance I thought it was weird that after crying for ten minutes the woman picked up a tambourine and left, but after the discussion I thought it worked.  In class she said that the reason she picked up the tambourine was because when the music and beat started up, she wanted to join in with the tambourine, but her grief and pain were too fresh and it was too soon so she couldn’t get into the moment.

I was also surprised about the woman’s crying- I wasn’t sure if she was crying or faking, and if she was crying, I assumed it would be like she forced herself to cry.  But today I discovered that she was actually crying and really meant it- she has a crying book filled with sad stories and pictures, and she reads them and cries for all the people who have suffered tragedies and loss.

I really like the idea of the performance, what its purpose was, and the things we discussed about it, but I just didn’t like the performance itself.  I don’t know why, but I just couldn’t appreciate people flailing and random animals sitting on a back screen.  It was just hard to understand.

Modern culture sees dance as a form of entertainment, art and something to admire.  So it’s clear that there’s more than one role of dance in modern culture.  Its fun, obviously, cause if it wasn’t, fewer people would be doing it.  But it’s also functional; dance is a means of expression, especially in contemporary dance.  A dancer puts their emotion into a dance and makes it personal, much the same way an actor might.  A dance with passion and fervor makes for a very entertaining performance where the person watching is sitting there thinking “wow this guy/girl really loves what they do, I wish I could dance like them,” whereas when a person just goes through the motions without any feeling whatsoever makes the audience feel nothing.  I can say I know this from experience because I dance, while it may not contemporary or modern, its still a form of dance.  So I can tell from watching other people dance and from dancing myself, that a performance done without vigor, energy and life serves no purpose. 

The role of dance is very important, but it’s also under appreciated at times.  People don’t get as excited about seeing a dance performance as much as they would for a Broadway show or a movie.  Even if a show turns out to be popular and well worth seeing, it might not appeal to everyone.  For example, not everyone likes ballet, they may say its beautiful, but if you tell them to sit through a whole ballet recital they might not be so willing to.  It’s difficult to find a form of dance that everyone will like, but on a specific level, certain forms of dance appeal to certain demographics, like a particular generation or age group or ethnicity.  Sometimes there are exceptions that make it into those demographics, like on TV, where shows like Dancing with the Stars and So You Think You Can Dance bring contemporary dance and ballroom dancing into the homes of millions who vote for their favorite dancer.  Movies are another form in which dance is now appreciated, any movie that contains a musical number has choreography in it that gets copied by at home viewers, like High School Musical, where every child who watched it can now dance to every song in it.

Dance is now a big part of everyday expression and entertainment, people do it to have a good time, or to exercise, or even just to spend time with friends.  Performances give those people the chance to take center stage and move in ways they wouldn’t in public (cause the average person doesn’t break out in choreographed dance on the street [unless they are performing for money]).  It lets them be awed at and feel proud. When you see someone perform a step that looks amazing or impossible you stop and admire it.  A performance is a chance for a dancer to demonstrate their skills and show off their hard work.  A dancer works as hard and as long as any writer, actor or artist on their masterpiece.  They dance because they love to and because they enjoy it.  A dance performance is their project; it’s as much a work of art as a painting or film.