American Dance Festival Radical Systems Art Review

Like a manic carousel, each of the dancers does a rapid fire audition. When it’s their turn, they begin their ritualized imprimatur gestures, seemingly cut off before their bodies could get out more than one word. One jumps to a mutual quickie grope. A romantic pose is attempted by another. Each pops up in their chairs in an attempt to express and maybe connect. The circle agitates back and forth popping out of the ring of chairs. The circling back and forth with abrupt changes of direction reminds of a washing machine. Meanwhile, the chooser seems to do the quickest of inspections of each would-be suitor, signaling each rejection as if she’s put another coin in the machine to make the rotation move faster.

We have to smile at this Las Vegas slot machine energy made into a Tinder-made-visceral dance. By now, well into MOI — Momentum of Isolation, we’re darn used to smiling at our so human ways in circa now .

MOI opens with a man alone at his desk speeding through his work to read, stamp, and file papers. Even though we see him accelerate to accomplish these tasks with lightening speed, we get to see his inner sad sack Stan Laurel. His always-there-for-him (until it is not) trusty companion is his office plant. His filing cabinets have a will of their own, popping open and shut no matter how many elegant karate kicks and chops he gives them. He dons a suit with ropes that keep him running in place—until they don’t.

His only break is when he allows himself to be bathed in what we imagine is a super-sized TV, swallowing him in nightmares.

The ensemble makes its entry as if each is channeling their inner Frankenstein. Each dancer is so idiosyncratic that it somewhat amazes that they move as one in true ensemble fashion. Each sticks to their lane, or bubble, or solo moments showing the seemingly infinite flavors of inner turmoil. At times, these dancers seem to be tamed by a staccato whip. How confounding that they are at once abrupt and smooth. If they are on the spectrum, this spectra seems to come from another universe. As they fly across the stage we come to realize we are almost looking in the mirror.

American Dance Festival Brings Canadian Dance Troupe Akin to US Surgeon General

Do a quick Google and you will see no shortage of news articles about the loneliness epidemic. Long before the US Surgeon General pronounced this as a major health crisis, Canadian choreographer Shay Kuebler began his deep dive into the impacts of loneliness on our health and beings. In the post-performance discussion we in fact learned that Kuebler’s explorations began well before the pandemic, now credited with jump-starting loneliness into a killer on par with smoking daily. Kuebler’s study included what’s referred to as one of the most painful reads around, Solitary, a memoir of a prisoner in solitary confinement for more than four decades.

Dead serious though the subject matter be, in this reviewer’s opinion it is the astonishing athleticism of the dancers that superglues us to MOI. Wait, wait, wait, you might think— are they on ice skates? Wait, wait, wait, how many triple axles did his body just do? These dancers seem to be on millisecond timers—they are that tight. What you don’t see is lots of partner duets and pairing that might convey intimacy. This is choreography spiced with martial arts, not ballet. That said, it’s delicious! How astounding to have also learned that the recent Crowd Strike global computer failures meant that these dancers were operating on scarce hours of sleep.