On 29 August, I attend the SUBMERGE Festival at LAKE Studios Berlin. The double bill featuring To Critter by Angélica Roa and Suite On Sahara by South Chicago Dance Theatre is a highly contrastful program.
A rectangle of black earth, sheafs of branches, a vessel with water. A stage set befitting an ecosomatic practice and more than human beings. Angélica Roa’s hair blends into the soil. They almost appear to be one. With slow, wave-like movements she rises from the ground to stand. Her eyes remain closed. The few moments of dramaturgical potential –the broken connection between earth and hair and her first glimpse into the audience – unfortunately get lost in the choreography. The gentle movements develop into a sequence of jumps, legs stomping and arms hurling something imaginary through the space. Angélica carries the sheafs of branches on her shoulders and later as a crown of sorts atop her head. Their shadows create several of these creatures all visible in the space at once. This gives rise to ever more beautiful images.
Between the dance sequences, Angélica talks about species extinction in Berlin’s forests. Over 75% of insects are threatened with extinction due to inadequate living conditions. But she loses me at manifesting more butterflies. The need to rub earth onto one’s body is also not entirely clear to me. I would have found instructions on what I can actually do for the butterflies more helpful. The audience around me seems satisfied with the meditation exercise in the garden of the LAKE Studios at the end of the piece. I wonder who among them will be advocating for butterflies tomorrow.
The second part of the evening could not have been a greater contrast. The eight dancers of the South Chicago Dance Theatre are thrilling in their nearly perfect technical execution, their flawless lines, and their turns, which I lose count of because there are so many. Sequences in unison elegantly transition into duos and trios and back again into movement performed together. Fractures are created through staccato movements that elicit the dancers’ more personal qualities. As impressive as the turns, lifts, arabesques, and jetés are, I find these more personal moments more exciting.
On this small stage sans dance floor, I pity the dancers’ feet. The piece seems conceived for a large stage and it doesn’t feel right to be this close to the dancers. Normally I enjoy hearing dancers breathe in those moments without music. And although I hear breathing during the strenuous parts of the piece, it feels wrong, almost too personal, too close, too imperfect. A contrast to the underlying feeling of the piece.
I actually don’t find it hard to submerge myself in the LAKE Studios festival, to dive in. However, it feels as though someone is throwing me from one pool into the next, without leaving me time to find myself in new waters, to digest the change in context. Like a film with a number of intense and rapid scene changes, the LAKE Studios sucked me in this evening and spat me back out somewhere on the edge of Berlin.