Holland Festival 1996 - Muziektheater, Amsterdam, Netherlands, May 31-June 29, 1996

Dance Magazine, Oct, 1996 by Helma Klooss

MUZIEKTHEATER AMSTERDAM NETHERLANDS DANCE THEATER MAY 31 JUNE 5, 1996 DUTCH NATIONAL BALLET JUNE 12-19 1996 FRANKFURT BALLET JUNE 20-29 1996 REVIEWED BY HELMA KLOOSS

The ballets of William Forsythe, the artistic director of the Frankfurt Ballet, were the focus of the dance portion of the Holland Festival this year. Indeed' except for two new ballets by Jiri Kylian and Paul Lightfoot [see Reviews/ International, September 1996, page 108] there was only Forsythe to see; no small companies or young choreographers were programmed.

Although highly praised by many critics, Forsythe's choreography is difficult for a festival audience, as all his work is accompanied by uncomfortably loud music or sound scores. Rapid dance phrases are manipulated in many different ways, making it hard to discern a work's structure. For Forsythe, choreography is organizing; making dances is thinking. Geometry, anatomy, and mechanics influence his choice of movements, which are combined with associations from daily life. He consequently builds, breaks up, and rebuilds structure, and with it, content and form. By the time you figure it out, the structure vanishes just as quickly as it emerged.

The least impressive ballet shown at the festival was Say Bye-Bye (1980), which was nonetheless performed well by the Netherlands Dance Theater. Perhaps distinctive for its time, it now seems dated. The rough group dancing, the rather hysterical relationships between couples, and the sick humor no longer seem funny, or even very interesting.

Artifact (1984), presented by the Dutch National Ballet, had a completely opposite effect. This ballet remains, to my mind, the most interesting choreography Forsythe has ever made. Artifact is full of wonderful moments, as in a sequence in which arm movements are done in many different ways by several large groups, all amid the gorgeous lighting and scenery designed by Forsythe himself. Having seen the ballet a few times I'm no longer annoyed when the fire curtain is dropped, though it is perhaps rather childish to provoke the audience in this way. The National Ballet dancers outdid themselves with their performance.

Forsythe's own company, Frankfurt Ballet, danced the two other works shown. Alien a(c)tion (1992, later reworked) is a reaction to the paranoia in society to everything that is "alien," or foreign. High on a chair sits a cameraman with mirrors and a monitor; low on the ground stretch several long benches, which the dancers continuously cross over and under. A man counts up to forty, then starts over again--and again. Your ears are assaulted by boisterous sounds. In the second part, there is more talking, but also great individual and group dancing. Dropouts, a drug addict, a whore, drikers are all portrayed. As if to comfort us, a wonderful group of gospel singers starts singing and a poem is recited. But then a gunshot is heard, and the poet is dead. We hear "Alles ist wunderschon . . . denn alles ist kaputt." ("Everything is beautiful . . . then everything is in pieces.") The third and last part includes more associations with daily life amid large, sober ensemble dances. A tent hangs above the floor. A man asks himself about life. Hope is expressed, and a certain calm descends.

Forsythe gives the audience a lot to think about in Alie/n a(c)tion. There is an evolution toward a conclusion. In Eidos: Telos (1995), this doesn't occur.

Throughout the work Forsythe seems to inject references to mythology, not all of which were clear to me. But the movement itself is interesting, particularly in the second part. Seeming to play with gravity dancers move faster than seems humanly possible. Others hang forward, their buttocks high, and twirl. A girl lies on her back, her feet up, and turns them into weird positions, reminding me of the paintings of Gauguin.

As always with Forsythe, there is a lot more [see Reviews/International' October 1995, page 105], but I keep trying to follow the dancers. Eidos: Telos ends with a complete overkill of movement. Within the group of forty individual dancers, I discover one couple performing a duet. She steps on his foot, he pulls her around his back, and takes her onto his lap. They embrace. He bites her hand, then moves her across the stage. They find a feather and blow it high in the air. He points it out in the sky: a very small detail of a huge, complex puzzle.