Buoyancy and light were the order of the day at the National Theater in Taipei last weekend, while the Experimental Theater was filled with loneliness and despair — and cherry red jumpsuits.
The Mark Morris Dance Group on Saturday night exceeded the high expectations that had heralded its arrival, while Scarecrow Contemporary Dance Company’s (稻草人現代舞蹈團) latest production, Singular (單‧身), upstairs in the Experimental Theater earlier in the day, gave a rather depressing outlook on life.
Morris’ mixed program opened with a recent work, last year’s Crosswalk, set to Carl Maria von Weber’s Grand Duo Concertant, for Clarinet and Piano, which was light and lyrical, though with a hint of underlying darkness. The work exemplifies his musicality and imagination. The dancers — women dressed in tangerine and orange tops and skirts, the men in white T-shirts and dark pants — run, skip and tumble across the stage in bursts of energy. However, in the midst of all this fun, pushing and shoving between two women and one man belie the lightness that surround them.
Credit: Courtesy of Liu Ren-haur / Scarecrow Contemporary Dance Company
All Fours, from 2003, is set to Bela Bartok’s String Quartet No. 4, emitted a much darker mood. The demanding music evokes feelings of uncertainty, which are reflected in the stark, harsh movements of the dancers, who frequently clasp their hands above their heads as if in desperate prayer.
Symmetry is key to Festival Dance which premiered in 2011 and is set to Johann Nepomuk Hummel’s Piano Trio No. 5 in E Major. The piece begins and ends with a couple embracing to the right of the stage. The 12 dancers twirl in pairs or divide in half, joining hands for geometric line dancing. The movements are reminiscent of simpler times, of village fetes and harvest celebrations, and brought to mind Jerome Robbins’ Dances at a Gathering. The piece represents what so many love about Morris’ work — the lush romantic lyricism and grace of classical ballet, but without the tutus, tights and toe shoes.
A key element to all three works on the program was that the dancers were accompanied by the troupe’s seven-man music ensemble, in various formations. The rippling notes of the piano appeared to give added lift to the dancers in Crosswalk and Festival Dance. Dance just seems to breathe to live music and music has always been the key to Morris’ works.
Photo: Mandy Cheng, AFP
The Mark Morris Dance Group will perform at the Tainan Municipal Cultural Center in Greater Tainan tomorrow and Friday. Friday night will be the same program I saw; tomorrow night is Program A, which is composed of two pieces set to Mozart — Eleven, set to Piano Concerto No. 11 in F major, K. 413, and Double, set to Sonata for Two Pianos in D major, K. 448 and Grand Duo, which is set to Lou Harrison’s Grand Duo for Violin and Piano.
Scarecrow artistic director and choreographer Luo Wen-jinn (羅文瑾) cited US author Paul Auster’s The Invention of Solitude as inspiration for Singular, which follows a “Time Wanderer” — whose image was derived from Luo’s father — through different eras and a multitude of meetings, partings, separations and rejections.
A quick look at the names of some of the other characters in the program and it is easy to see there will be no happy endings: Kid Without Love, Lonely Woman, Mother With Hollow Soul and Rejected Girl.
Luo shows that isolation is not just a human concept, with her fighting fish scenes and a flock of panicked birds. The pain comes from the repeated attempts by the rejected to insert themselves into pairings and group activities despite continual rebuffs.
The vast white tiled wall that formed the backdrop to Singular conveyed both an image of modern urban in Taiwan, with its omnipresent tiled apartment buildings, and formed a barrier that kept the characters trapped within their stories.
Despite the painful subject, the choreography and the eight dancers, including Luo herself, were always interesting to watch. Most of the dancers portrayed multiple roles that required repeated quick costume changes, so kudos to their off-stage helpers who made that happen.
With Singular, Scarecrow Contemporary Dance Company continues to demonstrate that a troupe does not have to be based in Taipei to remain topical, edgy or adventurous.
This story has been amended since first published to correct the photo captions.
On Jan. 17, Beijing announced that it would allow residents of Shanghai and Fujian Province to visit Taiwan. The two sides are still working out the details. President William Lai (賴清德) has been promoting cross-strait tourism, perhaps to soften the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) attitudes, perhaps as a sop to international and local opinion leaders. Likely the latter, since many observers understand that the twin drivers of cross-strait tourism — the belief that Chinese tourists will bring money into Taiwan, and the belief that tourism will create better relations — are both false. CHINESE TOURISM PIPE DREAM Back in July
Taiwan doesn’t have a lot of railways, but its network has plenty of history. The government-owned entity that last year became the Taiwan Railway Corp (TRC) has been operating trains since 1891. During the 1895-1945 period of Japanese rule, the colonial government made huge investments in rail infrastructure. The northern port city of Keelung was connected to Kaohsiung in the south. New lines appeared in Pingtung, Yilan and the Hualien-Taitung region. Railway enthusiasts exploring Taiwan will find plenty to amuse themselves. Taipei will soon gain its second rail-themed museum. Elsewhere there’s a number of endearing branch lines and rolling-stock collections, some
Could Taiwan’s democracy be at risk? There is a lot of apocalyptic commentary right now suggesting that this is the case, but it is always a conspiracy by the other guys — our side is firmly on the side of protecting democracy and always has been, unlike them! The situation is nowhere near that bleak — yet. The concern is that the power struggle between the opposition Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) and their now effectively pan-blue allies the Taiwan People’s Party (TPP) and the ruling Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) intensifies to the point where democratic functions start to break down. Both
This was not supposed to be an election year. The local media is billing it as the “2025 great recall era” (2025大罷免時代) or the “2025 great recall wave” (2025大罷免潮), with many now just shortening it to “great recall.” As of this writing the number of campaigns that have submitted the requisite one percent of eligible voters signatures in legislative districts is 51 — 35 targeting Chinese Nationalist Party (KMT) caucus lawmakers and 16 targeting Democratic Progressive Party (DPP) lawmakers. The pan-green side has more as they started earlier. Many recall campaigns are billing themselves as “Winter Bluebirds” after the “Bluebird Action”
RSS