Fringe World takes the opportunity to display some home grown talent along with the many interstate and international acts that flock to the boutique festival, and these three dance acts more than hold their own against that standard of performance.
Opening with The space between, Toyi-Toyi theatre tackles the political topic of Australian immigration policy, admirably keeping the delivery light and accessible despite their confrontational messages. Striking contrasts abound, the spotlight on the ‘Aussie’ Laura Hopwood sitting in her suitcase sandpit, playing idly with white grains and ‘cleaning’ out all the paper boats she finds around the edges. Meanwhile, away from the light, ‘immigrant’ Tarryn Runkel quietly drowns, controlling her body with steady smooth movements, twisting and tumbling into the depths. A radio interview with Tony Abbott plays over the two performers, one lipsynching while the other encircles her, harasses her with the unspoken message of the rejected paper boats, leading to hilarious physical comedy. With quips about the shark cull; anecdotes about a boat traveller’s experiences; a description of the physical experiences of drowning; these performers don’t shy away from expressing their opinions, but manage to engage rather than alienate the audience – an impressive achievement.
The clever quip has it that talking about music is like dancing about architecture – if anyone has nailed that dance, it is Emma Fishwick. Starting by stomping flat a paper house, A dance with no home is a brightly clever exposition of possibly every dance move ever, all out of context, all simply celebrating the joy of movement and mastery of a discipline. Surprisingly accessible to dance naïfs and aficionados alike, Fishwick blends video projections, musical mash-ups and recorded spoken word to set the (absence of) scene for her continuous movement, not dissimilar to a dance version of an eclectically programmed mp3 player set to play a few seconds of random pieces consecutively. Using her face to exaggerate the ridiculous extremes of emotion from moment to moment, Fishwick does not suffer from taking herself too seriously and her overlaid spoken word explicitly hands control over interpretation to each individual member of the audience.
Recording our lives, the minutiae of every day, is the goal of Unkempt Dance’s Creature of habit. Starting by measuring the height of each attendee as they arrive at the theatre, a height chart is attached to the wall and a medal and round of applause awarded to the most average heighted person in the audience. Using humour to accompany tally charts around the walls, they use statistical methodology and jargon to measure every aspect of life from teeth-brushing habits to frequency of motif in freestyle dance routines. The sports style commentary on one average improvisational work by Amy Wiseman is hilarious, while allowing those less familiar with contemporary dance to appreciate, on some level, aspects of the performance. The main problem with this work is the sporadic issues with the sound quality from the microphones used on the night of review. With information-dense spoken lines, this distracts from the piece on several levels, but is something that should be relatively easy to remedy. Ending with reflections on the value of the measurements, the next mental step is left to the audience.
As part of the Fringe World festival, the Summer Nights curated series again comes through with thoughtful, entertaining and skilfully executed performances in Paperland.
Rating: 4 stars out of 5
Paperland
Presented by The Blue Room Theatre, Unkempt Dance, Toyi-Toyi Theatre and Emma Fishwick
The space between
Choreography by Tarryn Runkel
Words by Tarryn Runkel and Laura Hopwood
Music by Dave Richardson
Performed by Tarryn Runkel and Laura Hopwood
A dance with no home
Choreography, design and performance by Emma Fishwick
Music by Kynan Tan and Alva Noto
Creature of habit
Choreography and performance by Amy Wiseman, Carly Armstrong and Jess Lewis
Sound design by Brett Smith
The Blue Room Theatre, Perth Cultural Centre
Fringe World
www.fringeworld.com.au
18-22 February
