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Interiorworks 10 at Ballet Memphis
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Jane Rehm in Travis Bradley's Traces. Photo:David Prete
You can see Kara Bruzina’s eyes from the back of the audience as she dances. Dark and warm as coal, they express joy, sorrow and an Anna Magnani type ferocity that actors would be jealous of. But right now, as she rehearses Jesus Pacheco’s new piece called Picking up the Pieces, they are soft. Leigh Lijoi and Stacie Williams (who also have strikingly expressive faces) lift Bruzina above their heads, take about ten steps, and gently place her on a wooden chair. Pacheco’s piece is part of Ballet Memphis’ 10th annual Interiorworks, the only dancer-choreographed show of the season, which premieres this Thursday.
Pacheco also has eyes that command as much attention as his body. (Think a young and more sensitive Al Pacino.) He describes Picking up the Pieces as a hybrid of jazz and ballet. It was inspired by the John Mayer and Amos Lee songs that helped Pacheco deal with his emotions during a break-up. He’s wanted to set a dance to the songs for a while, but because he’s primarily a dancer for the company, not a choreographer, and because he works outside the company choreographing musicals, the right time hadn’t come along until now. This is the major difference between Interiorworks and their regular season shows: company dancers who don’t normally get to choreograph, or who may never have choreographed before, can create whatever they want without boundaries.
Associate Artistic Director Karl Condon says the choreographers of Ineteriorworks have “pure freedom to express themselves. To take risks and be wrong.” Then he adds. “Really there’s no such thing as wrong. Not if you’re talking about art, or expression. I think that’s one of the things that makes this so special.” Another thing that makes it special is you get to see ballet set to Janis Joplin.
Aside from their lighting designer, the dancers put the entire show together themselves, including promotion and catering. And instead of their usual venues -- The Orpheum and Playhouse on the Square -- Interiorworks takes place in their rehearsal studio, which is comfortable, intimate, and smells nice. Essentially the company is inviting us into their home for Interiorworks. Let’s accept the invitation. And the complimentary wine.
Pieces in the series
Travis Bradley’s dance, Traces, explores life after a break up and “what happens once the other partner is no longer there.” It took him a little while to figure out how to express that with one dancer. So he used photographs, the traces we all have of past lovers. During the piece, Rehm, the dancer, hangs huge black and white prints of herself and her real-life boyfriend taken by Bradley. She deals with them as we often do with memories: she pines, wails, and rages over them. She holds them close and ultimately tries to hang them out to dry.
In At Once Well Met, Associate Artistic Director Karl Condon, who doesn’t usually get to choreograph during their regular season, created a naughty, funny, classical ballet piece set to different madrigals.
Nicole Corea is choreographing two pieces. Little Girl Blue borrows its title from A Janis Joplin song, and is also inspired by the documentary Born into Brothels. It explores “how women bond when they go through hard times together,” says Corea, ,“How they can lean on each other, but in the end they’re still alone.” Then she smiles large and says, “The other piece, Cycle Break, is just kind of dancin’.” Corea wanted to show the athleticism of pointe and push its boundaries.
Kate Feuer says Gone, Done Moved On, (which borrows its title from the Robert Plant and Alison Krauss song that appears in the dance) is “quirky and funny.” And coming from a woman who wears a green daisy in her hair with a bumble-bee yellow fleece, we believe her. “A lot of choreography is very serious and I just wanted to have fun with this, because everybody needs a little fun right now, with the way the world is.”
Steven McMahon’s Borrowed Time was inspired by Felix Gonzalez Torres’ Perfect Lovers, an instillation involving two clocks that started in synch and then fell out of rhythm. The piece “deals with time and loss,” he says. “Somebody standing in one place, somebody moving on. But you can take what you want from it.”
Jane Rehm’s Swift, uses five different folk songs for children from around the world. “It’s an adult return to youth,” Rehm says of the dance. “But certainly not in any literal way.” That would be too grown up. To get her five dancers into a child-like mode, she gave them each a white skirt and some paint and told them to have at it. Now they get to perform in something that their parents might have hung on their refrigerator years ago. (Not too many years ago.)
Show info:
May 28-30 @ 8pm
7950 Trinity Road
Admission is by donation
Click for more info
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