Sunday, March 14, 2010

3 choreographers working with dancers of Cloud Gate 2 to make "Spring Riot" happen on stage


By Nancy T. Lu
Huang Yi, a choreographer who shows promise of becoming the “enfant terrible” of Taiwan’s modern dance scene, will be the youngest talent among a creative trio to headline Cloud Gate 2’s forthcoming dance concert, “Spring Riot.”

If the very short video clip of his latest dance creation “Floating Domain” (See photo taken by Liu Zhen-xiang) says anything, it is that Huang at 26 is bursting with amazing creativity and energy. He is simultaneouly preparing to participate in a contest in Denmark.

Huang after the recent success of his high-tech “SPIN 2010” puts his imagination and wizardry to work for Cloud Gate 2, turning dancers into room occupants, walls, or even tables and chairs at will. With Bach’s music playing in the background, a confined space morphs with surreal effect. Pointing a finger is all it takes to begin the magic process.

Everyone’s room experience, whether solitary or shared, was what Huang basically tried to latch onto when he started creating his new choreography. His own humble family background gave him no choice but to cope with life in a cramped and shared space. Books, the Internet and creative work helped him break free from the suffocating surroundings. Necessity was the mother of invention. He embarked on flights of fancy. Suddenly his world simply opened up and knew no boundary.

Meanwhile Cheng Tsung-lung’s “Crack” reorganizes and consolidates the choreographer’s experiences in digging into narrow openings or breaks encountered in life to bring out the emotional garbage. The 34-year-old Cheng cited particularly the painful turning point of an adolescent romance, comparing it to a crack on a pavement. Composer Pan Rong-sheng has come up with a combination of electronic and high-tech sounds, even including the old record platter’s scratch, to go with Cheng's choreography.

Choreographer Ku Ming-shen caught sight of a long white shoreline from the plane during a trip to Hualien and Taitung. She found it beautiful but lacking in expression. But once on the ground, Ku saw up close water pushing and crisscrossing, breaking up and coming together, splashing and bubbling in all directions, after the waves had rolled in and slammed the coast. Ku realized that from such a picture in nature could be drawn a parallel in human interaction. In Ku’s piece, "Endless Shore," the dancers simply stand still or they clash in their moves.

The Cloud Gate 2’s“Spring Riot” will be presented at the Novel Hall for Performing Arts from April 21 to 25, the Zhong Zheng Hall of the National Chiao Tung University in Hsinchu on May 1, the Zhi De Hall of the Kaohsiung Cultural Center on May 8 and the Chiayi County Performing Arts Center on May 15.

For ticket information, try Cloud Gate (tel. 02-27122102) www.cloudgate.org.tw/cg2 or National Theater and Concert Hall Box Office (tel. 02-33939888) www.artstickets.com.tw

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