New Voices from Japan + East Asia

Japan Society presented its 20^th showcase of contemporary dance with works from emerging choreographers in East Asia over a mid-January weekend. Curated by Japan Society’s artistic director, Yoko Shioya, the festival introduced ensembles and performers representing Japan, Taiwan, and South Korea. New work and perspectives coming from East Asia are often rewarding, or at the very least, eye-opening. This slate of works varied widely in terms of depth and sophistication.

Co. Ruri Mito in “Where we were born” by Ruri Mito. Photograph by Richard Termine

The surprise of the evening was the riveting work of Japanese dancer-choreographer Ruri Mito. Prior to the formal start of the program, Mito performed a pre-show solo in the Society’s lobby. The seating set up on opposite sides of the lobby facing the central indoor Japanese garden afforded an intimate view of this mesmerizing dancer and her 15-minute work titled “Matou.” Entering the garden space unnoticed from an aisle alongside the viewers, Mito suddenly appeared in a wash of subtle golden lighting (design by Akiyo Kushida) performing a backbend onto the waist-high, square, black platform that served as her stage. The Japanese word matou means wearing, putting on, or tangled up in clothing. In the program notes Mito wrote, “I ‘wear’ my body, and yet I will never be able to see the entirety of my body.” Sparsely clothed in Tomoko Inamura’s costume design─a low-back, skin-color, sleeveless leotard with bare legs, Mito folded and unfolded her body in endless contortions like a molting creature struggling to free itself from the encasement of its skin. Most of the time, her face was not visible, adding to the tactile experience of the arduous undertaking of shedding an outer layer. In a memorable crescendo of movement, Mito executed a series of rolling backbends circling the platform until suddenly, from the contorted tangle of her body, a leg freed itself and dangled down over the edge, the foot caressing the floor. The faint sounds of the electronic score by Yuta Kumachi served to concentrate the focus on every emerging micro-movement of this fascinating dancer and her process.

Co. Ruri Mito in “Matou” by Ruri Mito. Photograph by One Dance Week

The four male dancers of C.Sense, a South Korean-based company, officially opened the program with “Trivial Perfection” choreographed by dancer and co-founder Dae-ho Lee. Drawing from pedestrian movement, mime, contemporary dance, and hip-hop, the four performers in t-shirts and athletic shorts proceeded through a lengthy series of short, sometimes humorous sketches. The movement vignettes adhered to a standard recipe: start with a single dancer performing a simple movement, add more dancers repeating the movement, merge into a collective mass maintaining the movement, move through space with it─if desired. In the post-show Q & A, Lee claimed inspiration from the art of mosaic─creating composite shapes comprised of a combination of smaller pieces. Although the scenes contained some amusing slapstick moments, the piece was more trivial than perfection as the choreographic formula, lacking in surprise or variation, was over-repeated and under-developed.

“…and, or…,” a duet choreographed by I-Ling Liu, a contemporary dance artist from Taiwan and former member of Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Company, offered a kind of physical drama within a non-music environment. Through quirky games and trials in physical partnering and human relationship navigated by dancers Wei-Ting Hung and Jyun-Yi Lin, the dance explored an assortment of choreographed and real-time decision-making. Visible physical effort accompanied by audible thuds and the overstepping of personal boundaries produced dramatic tension and sporadic glints of humor. Gentle moments offered an occasional flicker of beauty framed by Yan-Yi Lo’s lighting. As the piece continued beyond several perfect endings, it confirmed the maxim, “Less is more.”

“…and, or…,” by I-Ling Liu. Photograph by Richard Termine

The program concluded with another absorbing display of Ruri Mito’s choreographic output. In this group work titled “Where we were born,” performed by the eight dancers of Co. Ruri Mito, the choreographer continued her exploration of the body using the body as the primal sensor of its own experience. To Chie Nakajima’s score of bubbling, boiling water sounds, the dancers moved as a breathing, undulating mass of interconnected forms like underwater flora and fauna evoking the watery environment beneath and around Mito’s island home of Japan. Contracting into itself only to reorganize into continuously morphing configurations, the organic mass pulsed with life. Out of the constant flux, in a surprising penultimate moment, two dancers stretched their bodies to form a large opening─a birth canal. Through this passageway, one body after another was pushed out as the original mass receded into darkness. The work of Ruri Mito speaks eloquently for itself.

Karen Greenspan

Karen Greenspan is a New York City-based dance journalist and frequent contributor to Natural History Magazine, Dance Tabs, Ballet Review, and Tricycle among other publications. She is also the author of Footfalls from the Land of Happiness: A Journey into the Dances of Bhutan, published in 2019.

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