DANIEL LEPKOFF
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Sometimes dance is almost a language in which certain movements mean certain things–as in Balinese dance, where a hand gesture might communicate that “the man crossed the river” or “he met a tiger.” Modern dancers tend to use a movement to indicate a specific emotion, such as a soaring leap to represent sexual passion, and the viewer must know or be able to intuit its language. But postmodern dance represents certain social and political ideas not so much through individual movements as through its approach. Postmodern dance refuses to use dance’s traditional tools, a “back to the earth” approach that’s meant as a critique of our consumer society, among many other things. So the key to understanding postmodern dance is realizing what is not allowed.
Lepkoff’s brand of postmodern dance does not allow planning: most of the dances in this concert were partially or completely improvised. In You’re Down There With This Incredible Blue Fish and . . ., seven participants from Lepkoff’s workshop–Ron Bieganski, Bob Eisen, Kay Wendt LaSota, Kathleen Maltese, Donna Mandel, Cynthia Reid, and Michele Marie White–created “real-time compositions” with Lepkoff himself. The intent was to discover choreographic elements while improvising and build a dance from them. For example, White hid behind a pillar that protruded slightly into the room, then Mandel hid on the other side of the pillar; White stretched into an arabesque to touch Mandel, who supported herself on a silver-painted radiator. This image lasted a few moments until Mandel, then White, melted to the ground. Such moments seemed almost Japanese in their emphasis on the fleeting nature of things.
The Friday night concert I saw was an “off” night: the dances had many long, dull passages, and the Asian family left at intermission. By all reports the Saturday night concert was an “on” night; yet I wonder if a couple from Arlington Heights would have understood and appreciated Lepkoff’s language. What he values–spontaneity, childlike innocence, and rebellion–might be too countercultural for them. And for me, an odor of mustiness clings to those 60s values.
