Photo collage created from images provided by the company
The second of two new programs at Fall for Dance North this year is UP NEXT: Signature Programme 4. Presented in partnership with TO Live, Luminato Festival, Toronto Metropolitan University and OCAD U, this presentation closes out the festival on its final weekend by suggesting the festival’s forward momentum. Held in OCAD U’s Great Hall, this is an hour-long, timed-entry experience where each act is proceeded by a projected countdown.
A consistent, palpable joy runs through each of the four diverse acts.
First up was Sydney-based street and club dance choreographer and performer, Azzam Mohamed with GLAD. Blending elements of African dance with urban, hip hop, his energy and intensity builds, then recedes in a thoroughly compelling articulation of his enthusiasm. The impression he gives is that he’s picking up on a vibe in the music—and in the very air surrounding him—lets his arms and legs discover the rhythm until he gradually owns it and gives his whole body over to it. Eventually the propulsive movement gives way to a gentle, playful grasping.
He is followed up by the Jingle Dress Champion Dancers, Marley Fairfield and Yanabah Whitehorse. In full jingle dress regalia and accompanied by urgent drumming by Tkaranto Open Master of Ceremony, Thunder Jack. This powwow-style presentation features Old Style and Contemporary Indigenous Women’s Jingle Dress. In a forward-looking program, this is a vital inclusion—maintaining the immediacy of this cultural practice rather than allow it to become an artifact. The drum and vocals in particular feel deeply grounded and resonant potently within the walls of OCAD as a local institution, asserting the land on which it was built.
While I applaud the intention of Dancing with Blindness, a collaboration between Devon Healey, Esie Mensah, Amelie Giusta and Kwasi Obeng; I think it flattens the form it hopes to expand. As a blind creator striving to incorporate the experience of blindness into dance and theatrical practice, Healey is contending with a monolithic history of exclusion and tokenism. I have yet to see her, however, land properly on a form that actually disrupts ableist preconceptions.
This disappointed me in a similar way to her dance-theatre presentation of Rainbow on Mars back in August. Where that show felt ultimately banal despite the ambitious artistic intentions, this entry is likewise underwhelming. Performers Obeng and Giusta are certainly a compelling presence as they connect physically before us, but the audio element does little to provide access to blind audience members nor challenge the perceptions of sighted spectators. The running narration serves as little more than the auditory equivalent of closed captioning. A bold, more distinctly haptic approach, while potentially more intrusive to personal boundaries, might be more affective.
Guista’s hand affectionately caressing the Obeng’s back as they return to an onstage microphone at the end of the piece is an understated, though fully sensual bit of physical business that ends up being, for me, the most compelling moment of the performance. Though their laboured breathing is the audio focus of this coda, it’s a shame that the entire audience—blind or sighted—couldn’t feel that touch.
Last up, ¡SÍ, BUENO!, is an Affo Latin Jazz ensemble work created for dancers from Performance Dance at the Creative School, Toronto Metropolitan University by New York-based choreographer Sekou McMiller. Madison Costa, Severyn Dahlke, Denise Igama, Ainsley Inkpen, Marisa Khoo, Olivia Morris, Bennett Richardson, Liyah Simbulan and Thandi Strybos are a young and vivacious ensembled vibing to the music of Chucho Valdes, Paquito D’Rivera, Dizzy Gillespie, and Brenda Navarrete. The propulsive movement creates an atmosphere of restrained yet purposeful sensuality. Des’ree Gray’s costumes, full of glitter and velour, are rich and scintillating. I especially enjoyed the potent sense of camaraderie as they come together and break apart to the internal logic of their shared dynamic.
