The Following is my review of the dance review by Gia Kourlas “Review: In ‘Tape,’ Performers Move Fluidly and Whimsically About a Grid” published in the New York Times. I will review the article based on the reading by Wendy Oliver.

According to Wendy Oliver, all dance reviews should consist of four main things: Description, Analysis, Interpretation, and Evaluation. All four elements provide a different level of insight or explanation of the performance viewed and gives the reader the full picture of the performance in their mind as well as the authors overall opinion of the piece. In Gia Kourlas review of “Tape” in the New York Times, only a few of these necessary elements were completely portrayed.

Within the first paragraph, the reviewer is supposed to address all general information about the performance before going into the minute details later on. Kourlas states the title of the performance as well as the choreographer, however does not mention when and where the event is taking place until paragraph three. Kourlas also fails to incorporate. She seems to include a thesis statement in the last sentence of her first paragraph stating, “… Mr. Kvarnstrom’s idea of tape extends beyond the sticky stuff in this production.” But never really mentions the physical tape that is in the production after that. So is this really a thesis at all if she doesn’t back it up? For some paragraphs she does follow the “suggested format for critique” highlighted in Oliver’s writing where she will have a sentence thesis at the beginning of the paragraph and go more in depth later on in the paragraph. But she was lacking the interpretation of the thesis as a whole, and a whole thesis in general that should have been present within her first paragraph.

Along with thesis statements, other small aspects were not present within Kourlas review. While she did describe the movements of the dancers in a paragraph or two using the suggested “strong action verbs” ad “interesting adjectives” necessary, she never once mentioned what type or genre of dance the performance was. Me, having a background in dance, was able to pick up that it was some type of modern dance but the author of a critique must write to those who may not know anything about dance at all. This is also touched upon within Oliver’s reading as well. This shows that Kourlas was lacking in the analysis portion of her review.

Overall,Kourlas does evaluate the performance that she viewed, and does give her general opinion on what she saw. However, according to Wendy Oliver’s outline of how a dance critique should be written, Kourlas is clearly missing some aspects mentioned by Oliver.

-Monica Huzinec

http://www.nytimes.com/2015/09/25/arts/dance/review-in-tape-performers-move-fluidly-and-whimsically-about-a-grid.html?ref=dance