Dance review: The Hearth, Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery

The word “hearth” conjures a sense of warmth, belonging and safety, making it an apt title for DRILL Performance’s latest show. A site-specific work performed at the Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery, The Hearth explored the concept of safe spaces through the medium of contemporary dance in a creatively engaging and respectful way.   

As we trickled through the main gate ahead of the performance’s start time, the dancers were already making the space their own. In the museum’s open-air courtyard, performers clad in black followed their own desire lines. Some dashed quietly from corner to corner; others trudged up the winding entry ramp, dragging their feet on the rubber-lined mat to create crackling textural tones. 

We followed the dancers as they descended a spiral staircase into the bowels of the Museum, where the show morphed into a rich tapestry of movement and textures. Deliberately darkened, the room’s selective points of overhead lighting drew our focus to moments of controlled physical intersection between dancers. Two hands would appear, illuminated, clasping each other, seemingly suspended in the air. Pulsing guitar riffs and shuddering full-body movements created a night club-esque energy, as dancers pushed and pulled one another, falling apart and coming together in finely controlled circular rotations.  

A particularly striking moment featured two lines of dancers, each individual standing with one arm raised overhead. Collectively, they would jolt and sway, echoing the movement of invisible momentum. Were they excited and animated at a rave party, or begrudgingly commuting to work, arms overhead as if maintaining balance on a moving tram? There was something particularly beautiful about how each dancer was isolated yet responsive to the same, unseen energy. 

The Museum itself became a dynamic performance space as the dancers invited us on a journey following a route known only to them. A small foyer – a liminal space between two larger galleries – was transformed into a stage framed by suspended dinosaur skeletons. A larger wing with three interconnected galleries hosted three groups of dancers, each exploring their gallery’s unique parameters with a series of unfurling movements – arms extending and pushing, legs curling and stretching, in measured displays of balance and control. The music became more percussive and driven, more confident and expressive, in a sonic echo of the dancers unapologetically taking up more room to make the space truly their own. 

Removed from the confines of a box-like theatre, DRILL Performance explored what a site-specific work could offer in terms of perspective and spacing. At one point, we watched from above as dancers energetically leapt and tumbled in the gallery hall below. Minimalist side lighting enhanced the room’s depth and distance, projecting larger-than-life shadows onto the far wall. The dancers, striding and marching past one another in tight intersecting patterns, were multiplied in layers of shadow, light and colour. Later in the performance we found ourselves seated on the floor in this same hall, feeling the vibrations of the dancers as they moved. We were invited to become part of the space – their space – and to engage with live performance in a more intimate way than one would experience in a regular auditorium. 

Uniting all the spaces throughout the performance was a beautiful soundscape created by DENNI. The central motif evolved over the course of the evening, taking on new instrumentations, rhythms and layers, becoming pleasingly familiar through its sonic evolution.  

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The Hearth’s ensemble comprised young performers aged 12 to 25; for some, it was their first performance as part of DRILL Performance’s senior company. The variation in skill and experience was at times noticeable, but never distracting – if anything, it spoke to the very essence of this timely work, asking: what makes a space safe enough for someone to be themselves, and to be confident within their own skin? And do spaces create safety, or do we? 

The Hearth was performed  30 August – 1 September 2024 at Tasmanian Museum and Art Gallery.