For “a Folia,” the stage is a pitch black void, limitless and ethereal unlike the confines of the pale box in “Acid Gems.” Through the mist dancers begin to assemble one by one, getting in touch with the ancestral act of going on an absolute rager. The title refers to a fifteenth-century tune which splices with Luis Pestana’s clubby score. The dancers, dressed in all sorts of rave-appropriate outfits kiki amongst themselves, dancing for each other in the nocturnal revelry. Throughout the work little groups form, small clusters of people tending to an invisible object before them. Whether they’re invoking ancestral visions in flames or snorting copious bumps of ketamine isn’t too clear, but surely they warrant the same end-result.
There’s a real liberty to da Silva Ferreira’s work. The dancers take up as much figurative and literal space as they please. The men are granted full permission to dance as effeminately as they desire, everyone is feeling the fantasy. This unapologetically queer tribe, who uphold each other in their ritual of liberation, dance as a company of individuals with the same pursuit. But the rare moments of synchronicity are very compelling. In one sequence the mass of bodies sway in the darkness like one moving organism, the rolling waves of a mighty lake or waving branches of an ancient tree. Must be really good ket.
Da Silva Ferreira states that “a Folia” explores “how a massive party can actually change the world.” While it may be easy to shrug off such optimism during a period of international violence, one begins to feel drawn in by the reel of the rave. If we all spent more time in our big, gay, glorious love puddles, dancing through the night, wouldn’t we all get along just a bit more? In a time where we are being pushed further and further into individualism by our algorithms and economies, to get together and party becomes an act of defiance. Raving is a right, one that the ancestors fought for.
comments