OUT OF LIGHT (2009) live performance
Out of Light began in 2007 during a residency at Gasworks. The initial starting point was to examine the nature of dance performance from the perspective of the performer and the nuances of rehearsal and stage performance. In doing so, much of the focus turned to the nature of movement and memory, of how dancers, many years later, retain something of a dance learnt long ago. These memories were not only of the choreography itself, but also the personal viewpoint of the dancer and the world backstage. The exploration then expanded with the input of Steven Heather's sound, Rhian Hinkley's projections and Jenny Hector's lighting. Through the use of these elements we were able to alter the viewpoint on the action and not only remember performance nostalgically, but explore how to reveal what is occurring 'out of the light'. This became a way to create a collision between definition and uncertainty and to ask: how can we ever be sure of what we have seen or experienced?
Program Note written by Josie Daw:
I shall never forget a single detail of the scene which met my eyes; the theatre itself with its soft beautiful lights and gleaming crystal chandeliers; small lanterns hanging everywhere; coloured windows; everywhere velvet gold- another world; a place which to my dazzled eyes, you could only hope to encounter in the most enchanted fairy tale. Rudolf Nureyev
Nureyev’s quote about his first experience in the theatre that famously convinced him to become a dancer is the stuff of transcendence, magic and dreams. His encounter, profound and weighty, still echoes faintly many years on, in this new work Out of Light, which appears, deft and skilled, as it delves into the memories and nostalgia that surround the world of dance.
Sandra Parker has an uncanny knack of reaching into the realms of these invisible tones and rendering them alive for the duration of the performance. As she turns her hand to the crumbling grandeur of theatrical worlds, she works with resonance and traces left behind. Dreams are swept up, held for a moment and discarded. The dance forms around the sheer surface of the scrim and allows the projections to frame it in a dramatic way, but now we watch, cynical and smart, not expecting to be thrown asunder, to be changed forever as Nureyev was years ago.
Instead there’s an acknowledgement of what has come before, but it’s filled with new things, such as the detail as a dancer switches off the dramatic gesture and just hits the clean shifts of a solo. The precision is there, but it is in the intricate resistance of the dance and sound. The magic is caught in the small moments of surprise when a pathway unexpectedly changes course, or glimpsed in an allusive movement that carries with it a whiff of longing. The transcendence now lies within the echoes of memories that infuse the work, looking back is significant so that it can assist in understanding the reality of the present.
Josie Daw 2009
Presentation: Gasworks Theatre, Melbourne, March 2009
Choreographer/Director: Sandra Parker
Composer: Steven Heather
Projection Design: Rhian Hinkley
Lighting Design: Jenny Hector
Dancers: Mia Hollingworth, Claire Peters, Carlee Mellow
Costume Design: Zohie Castellano