Tonight's double-bill is a beautifully balanced evening of dance that starts slow with common ground[s] and ends on The Rite of Spring in the electrifying version choreographed by the late Pina Bausch.
This is the second time that Sadler’s has hosted this special production of Bausch’s monumental 1975 creation inspired by Stravinsky’s score, a gift to explore physically. Stravinsky’s piece is a striking response to the arrival of spring with music overflowing with rich imagery. Such musical values are brilliantly echoed in the movement. What a treat to then watch 34 dancers from 13 African countries plant feet, kick and stamp into soil rather than a hard black floor. It’s totally transporting in terms of place and time.
On this note, in an undeclared act of physical theatre, the preparation of the stage for The Rite of Spring is a visually entertaining experience in itself. Rather than scurry off in the interval for drinks, I suggest staying put and watching the stage transform. Giant barrels of soft, brown peat are emptied onto the stage as staff rake the surface, smoothing it into a muddy brown landscape that resembles distant lands a far cry from Islington.
As a dance piece, The Rite of Spring embodies themes of nature and ritualistic human traditions from fertility rites to human sacrifice. Bausch’s choreography focuses on the herd mentality. Swathes of bodies move in unison until a single human sacrifice is selected to mark the season change. Gruesomely, a scantily clad woman with a single breast exposed (part of the choreography or a faux pas, I'm unsure) is selected for sacrifice. It’s meant to be an honour, yet as the sheer terror dawns, the dancers register pain and hysteria builds. Finally, as the chosen dancer is forced to wear a red dress, the narrative is clear. Death is imminent. Grim stuff for a Sunday night.
The dancers are superb. Movements are simple and tribally infused. Lots of stamping, hysterical thigh slapping occasionally interlaced with delicate floating arms, sometimes beckoning to the audience and pointing outwards soon breaking into violent jerking, with a marked differentiation between male and female dancers. The men are all powerful, muscular and in control, whilst the women often move in fear.
Separate formations of men with bare torsos and women in flimsy slips stride across the stage in sharp lines, then form huddles, responding to the score as it swells and dips musically. In comparison, the men escape lightly, manhandling the women as one becomes an object, no longer a person. It feels voyeuristic watching the reenactment of an ancient tradition we neither know nor understand and uncomfortable because it’s hard to tear your eyes away from such aggressive action which isn't easy to digest yet still makes totally compulsive viewing.
The first piece of the evening eases us in gently. It's as if the duo are ancient goddesses paving a meditative path that leads to the tribal horrors of The Rite of Spring. Common ground[s] is a two-hander for Germaine Acogny, founder of École des Sables, "the mother of contemporary African dance", and the French choreographer, dancer Malou Airaudo, formerly a member of Pina Bausch’s Tanztheater Wuppertal. The pair were behind bringing The Rite of Spring to Africa, and their duet is a gentle love letter to friendship between two women with deep wells of shared histories. The performers move slowly and calmly, revealing subtle movement details and witty exchanges between the two.
The evening opens onto an African orange light by Zeynep Kepekli with two black silhouettes against the backdrop. After the pair walk alone, they come together to embrace, cradle each other in a confusion of limbs, then turn away from the audience exposing backs and shoulder blades or sitting quietly on stools.
It’s a joy to see older women onstage, and the dancers use this to their advantage, expressing poise and thoughtful wisdom in every poise. At 78 and 80 years of age, they offer a wealth of body knowledge in their stage presence. Rather than frenzied madness, we see peacefulness, with positions beautifully held and framed like an ancient painting. The dancers also use a pole to hold as if rowing somewhere into oblivion. It’s unclear but radiates stillness. This is enlivened by Fabric Bouillon’s score, LaForest string quartet and keyboard a mélange of classical and African sounds floating across the stage.