DANCE FEST 97, the Association of Professional Dancers in Ireland's three week showcase of new dance, opened in Project at The Mint on Friday night with the first of two performances of British dance choreographer Russell Maliphant's Decoy Landscape. Beautifully lit by Michael Hulls, it was performed by the choreography with Henrietta Hale and Niki Hart (last, seen in the Samuel Beckett with Dance Theatre of Ireland), wearing unattractive, sleeveless Tshirts of blue silky material. All three, however, demonstrated technical skills admired by the audience.
Beginning with a series of sculptured tableaux, the short piece without interval consisted of solos, duets and trios set to an unnerving and repetitive score by Andy Cowton. Individual movement involved much tortuous coiling and weaving; with occasional flailing perhaps intended to convey struggle and suffering, while the duets suggested wrestling and tug o war, using tension and release technique with many lifts. Sexually ambivalent, the piece could equally well have been performed by three men, and I could see no choreographic or dramatic reason for the emphasis on the dancers' posteriors.
In fact, I found the movement generally neither attractive nor emotionally evocative. This seemed a waste of the `dancers' exceptional athleticism and control by choreography so introspective as to virtually exclude the audience.
In short, I felt Maliphant the dancer was ill served by Maliphant the choreographer and longed to see his fine, well trained body, and those of his excellent female dancers, put to better use.