Ballet Hispanico is known for celebrating, exploring, and illuminating Latino culture. Last night at New York City's Joyce Theater, the renowned dance company did precisely that - and then some - with three diverse works by choreographers from Miami, Mexico, and Spain. Said Artistic Director Eduardo Vilaro in a post-show Q&A, Ballet Hispanico advances the concept of dance by starting a conversation that asks "What is Latino culture? And what is Latino dance?"
Here, a look at and review of three pieces from the company's repertoire that address these questions.
In Show.Girl., the first piece created for Ballet Hispanico by Miami-based choreographer and 2013 Princess Grace Award winner Rosie Herrrera, the Latina female identity is examined through the lens of the Cuban cabaret aesthetic. Rife with cliches meant to challenge the audience to consider the ideas of female strength, sex, youth, and societal value, it is a piece that is sometimes successful and sometimes not.
In one section, the company's female dancers pose and tease the audience and each other with a lively debate - both verbal and physical - about the characters in their favorite telenovela. "Who'd she marry? Which one is Johnny? Why did he kill her?" The questions are shouted and purred by the dancers as they undulate and writhe and work themselves into a spasm of twitching hands and whipping hair.
For those unfamiliar with Latina culture, the dialogue and movement might be alternately shocking, funny, charming, and discomforting. For Latinas who watch telenovelas on the regular - or whose mothers do - the conversation will likely hit home. It's the over-the-top movements and vocalizations that are less realistic.
Herrera fares better in her next vignette, a Busby Berkley-esque ode to 1950's era theatrical dance. Here, a single female dancer is at once glorified and entrapped by a gaggle of male dancers all fawning over her with large, white-feathered fans. What the audience views as flattery at first - what woman wouldn't want to be admired by every man that crosses her path? - is soon understood to be possession. The male dancers don't just admire her; they own her, and she, unsure of whether she likes the attention or loathes it, preens and convulses by turns. Performed to the 1975 hit "I'm Not In Love" by 10cc and featuring dry ice floating at the dancer's feet, it is a pretty picture with uncomfortable undertones.
Herrera closes Show.Girl. with a nearly movement-free panorama of female dancers in full cabaret regalia. Fishnet stockings, beaded headresses, and barely there bikinis dripping in sequens and pearls draw attention to the real star of this show - the dancers' bodies (versus their talent or training). The women on stage shift their hips and extend their arms as if swimming in molasses, a fitting end to a narrative arc that spans decades and has yet to reach its end.
After a brief intermission, Mexico-based choreographer Miguel Mancillas captivates with a piece titled Conquer. Raw, athletic, and brave - Mancillas tasks the troupe with lifts that at first blush seem awkward, but are so expertly executed and well-positioned within the dance that they add depth and understanding to its title - Conquer is a beautiful, and occasionally heartbreaking, exploration of the ways in which humans seek to connect and conquer spaces and people.
The piece opens with a full stage of dancers clad in body-conscious shorts and gauzy, silver over-shirts. A female dancer approaches a male dancer and inhales deeply. The two investigate each other with loud, aggressive breaths, and the dance commences with the male of the pair breaking away in a crisp, technically astute solo that strikes a sublime balance between athleticism and grace.
The other dancers join in stage right, allowing Conquer's soloist, for a time, at least, his own space. Movements are unique to each dancer: some small and discreet, others grand and abrupt. Dancers confront each other - male couples, female couples, and male/female pairs - in fleeting interludes that seem to have each asking "Who are you? Why are you? Who am I in relation to you?"
A particularly impressive pairing is a lengthier one that occurs between two male dancers. Technical, truculent, and off-kilter, it is a feat of strength, training, and trust. By the point at which it occurs, the dancers are well past Conquer's midway point and are likely exhausted and emotionally overwhelmed. Still, each hurls himself downstage with abandon, caught by the other a millisecond shy of flying into the audience.
It's this volatility that makes the pair's gymnastic pas de deux - and the whole of Conquer - so compelling. What power do we have to possess others? And what are the pressure points that cause us to lose possession of ourselves? Mancillas doesn't provide an answer, but his deft choreography is an affront to what we think we know about ourselves and others.
The evening's presentation closes with an utterly delicious gumdrop of a dance choreographed by Spaniard Gustavo Ramirez Sansano. Titled El Beso, this first work created for the company by Sansano is a spirited look at the many shades of a kiss.
Delightfully sweet and sophisticated at the same time, its movements and score - it's set to traditional Spanish Zarzuela music - have a marionette-like quality. It's as if the dancers' extremities are being plucked by invisible strings that tweak, yank, bobble, and bounce them in and away from each other, the result of which is a tongue in cheek frivolity that doesn't try to do more than it should.
Original costumes by Venezuelan fashion designer Angel Sanchez provide ballast to El Beso's clever choreography and playful music. Their clean lines and coarse fabric are modern, drilled down, and un-fussy; a stark contrast to the frenzied pace of both the movements and music.
El Beso's lighting design is sparse; at varying points, bright white overhead lights strike the stage in a manner that causes shadows to flit and flutter across its curtains and wings. The intention, it would seem, is to mirror the notion of nuance. Here, it succeeds, but it also obfuscates the more tedious choreography and induces a low-level migraine if one is seated eye-level to the stage. Overall, however, El Beso is one of the most uniquely choreographed and seamlessly performed pieces of work in the Ballet Hispanico repertoire.
Speaking about the work he does and the company's goals, Vilaro said it was about opening a dialogue and not being tied to the definitions of the past. "I'm Latino and I don't fit into any boxes." Three cheers to that!
Ballet Hispanico will perform at New York's Joyce Theater April 14 - 26. Click here for tickets and schedule.
