Upon hearing about the Ralph Lemon performance, I was eager to see what the choreographer had in store for us. I was hoping for a different type of dance than we had seen before. But unfortunately I was disappointed. We were once again in a small single room with a small set and barely any dancing at all. I did appreciate the technology aspect of it. The way the videos and sounds were displayed throughout the performance. But I couldn’t even link them to the “dance” as a whole. Both of the females in the show were very talented actresses but once again I feel as if I was missing out on the dance aspect of it. The only dancing I really saw in the show was the three men dancing to fun, upbeat, music at the end. This was my favorite part of the performance but I couldn’t even really enjoy it because I was thoroughly disappointed with the two preceding hours. I wasn’t even sure how these three men dancing to funk music related to the show in any means what so ever. Overall, I felt very uncomfortable with the performance, and although I appreciate that it was a type of art I do not see how it could be dance. The actresses were talking about things that none of us knew how to react to or make sense of. We couldn’t even look bare at each other during the performance and if we did happen to glance in someone’s direction, it was a look of “what is going on”, or they were just asleep.
When interviewing Levi, one thing he said he loved about New York City was that it was filled with all types of dance. That everywhere you go you can be in “direct conversation” with a different form of this art; and there are very very few places where this can happen. Coming into this Arts In New York City seminar with a dance concentration, I was excited to learn about all of these types of dance. I feel like there are very few weeks left and we have only seen or talked about one type continuously. I appreciate that post modern dance is an under appreciated art form but I really would have like to learn about all of types od dance present within New York City. I feel as if this Ralph Lemon performance really stuck out to me but not in a good way. It was unfortunately just another modern dance performance that left me confused and I was extremely disappointed.
Monica Huzinec
I’ve skimmed through everyone’s blog posts, and it seems we are all in agreement over this performance. I, too, was disappointed. Like you, I was hoping for something different; if anything, this may have been the worst, in my opinion. At least with, for example, Jeanine’s performance, we were expecting something that wasn’t dance-y. I don’t even know what I’d call this, other than the lecture-performance-musical description.
At first I also appreciated the technological aspects, but I similarly could not see its connection to the performance. I later found myself trying to watch the videos while trying to figure out its relation to the content but to no avail. I also agree that there was almost no dancing, and though I loved the part at the end, I still have no idea how it was related to the rest of the show, and at that point, like you, I just wanted to leave after the two hour performance we sat through.
I was similarly confused for much of the show and felt like it went on for far longer than necessary. I got so bored, and those screams? Never again. However, unlike everyone else, I think I could understand parts of it, and those really jumped out at me. Yes, the performance made me extremely uncomfortable, but I can’t but wonder if that was the point. The thing is, I think they were trying to say something about women and African Americans and sexuality. As a whole, society gets very uncomfortable whenever people talk about sex but especially when women do so. When men talk about it, it’s not nearly as big a deal. It’s assumed that that’s just what they think (which is also totally wrong thinking). I think the performers were purposely talking about such uncomfortable topics. They shouldn’t be as taboo at they are is what I think they were trying to get at. And they also talked about being African American and about white people taking on black culture. There was a whole rant about how white people will do something that black people did first but only when the whites do it does it become big or popularized. I got most of that out of the first half of the performance, and in the second half, it sort of fell apart, and I really couldn’t figure out what was going on anymore. Perhaps it was that the first woman was the younger version of the same person, and she was much more open and vocal and wanted to say something, while the second woman was the woman years later, burned out by all that had happened in her life. But regardless, I can’t help but think that they were intending to make the audience a bit uncomfortable–I’m just not entirely sure why.
Going back to your last point about your conversation with Levi and your expectations from this performance and the class, I sort of have to agree. I thought that we would be not only learning about different styles of dance but also viewing different types. I can understand Donna’s point and goal in having us see the performances we’re seeing, but I can’t help but wonder if people would appreciate dance and feel less alienated by it if it was something that seems easier to understand (because as we know, all dance and art is subjective, but I’d argue that people would feel at least more comfortable with something a little less out of the box). I think Lemon’s piece will definitely stick with me, but not in the way I was hoping it would.
Jessica Sun
Heading to The Kitchen, I was also very eager to see this performance, however this time it was more so out of curiosity rather than out of a hope to be entertained. After all the performances we’ve seen up to this point, I realized it’s better to go in with an open mind instead of expectations, especially after we were told that this was not a “traditional” Ralph Lemon performance.
The accompanying exhibition that we visited before the performance was both very shocking and interesting to me, and I feel it is very important to be included into a discussion of the performance. Stepping into the first, brightly illuminated white room was so shocking it was almost humorous (actually it was humorous, I heard a few of us giggle). Sexually explicit photographs hung on the walls and a stack of sexually explicit books were stacked on a stool as the focal point of the room. The books were sexually explicit as well. I remember one of the titles being “I Love Dick.” We were told already that this performance would be pretty sexually explicit, but it wasn’t until this point that I realized it was going to be so direct and “in your face.”
(Cont’d because I accidentally posted the first comment early)
Moving into the next section of the exhibition, it became apparent that race might also play a big role in the performance. The most notable part of this room was the cart that held several wooden figurines that seemed to come from traditional African craftsmanship. They were, however, dressed in modern American clothing which I soon realized were imitations of outfits worn by Jay-Z and Beyonce. It was a dramatic representation of African American culture juxtaposed with itself. We were told that Lemon did not frequently address the subject of race in his work, but I thought this might be a sign that this performance would be different.
With the background provided by the exhibition, I had the two themes of sex and American culture in mind, assuming they would play a role in the performance. They definitely did.
With that being said, I agree that it was a very confusing performance. It seemed like there was some kind of narrative, but I could not fully understand what it was. That aspect of the performance left me with the most questions, for example: Who exactly is Peter? Is the second woman the older version of the first? Did she really go to space? The “scenes” did not seem to fit very logically or chronologically with each other, and it left most of us with our heads spinning, or else putting us to sleep.
Even without a clear narrative, the aforementioned themes were very evident. The first performer sang, with a strong and beautiful voice, an explicit song about anal sex, which is a theme that recurred throughout the performance. I could tell that some of the audience thought it was funny, some thought it was uncomfortable. I thought of Freud and anal fixation, sex as a distraction, pain, and I pondered why anal sex was such a prominent theme in this performance. I still don’t know.
What really resonated with me about this performance were the speeches on celebrity worship and related self-degradation, which were explorations of the theme of American culture. The discussion of Lady Gaga’s and the implications of the “Little Monsters” title she gives her fan had me thinking for the rest of the night. The speech on Beyonce really struck a chord with me because I love Beyonce. “White girls, Asian girls, black girls all want to be her,” the performer said. I’m not a girl and I still want to be Beyonce. But why? Is she really as perfect as I imagined her to be? I’m still trying to answer these questions.
At the end of the performance, I would not say I was disappointed; I appreciated the technical beauty of the performance and the themes that were present. However, I was definitely confused, but I like being confused. It leaves me questioning, thinking more and more about the performance, and that’s what I want from a performance. Also, the ending choreography to Amy Winehouse’s “Back to Black” was on point and the dancer in the middle was really good looking and it made me jealous.