What did you see the last time you looked in a mirror? An image of yourself, an idea of the person you would like to be, or perhaps just a kaleidoscope of light?
These are three of the questions that inspired the Sun-Shier Dance Theater to create Mirrors, its new production and its first to be performed on a large stage instead of in an experimental theater.
The group's free associations with mirrors are to be presented in six pieces. One piece titled Jackey, through allusions to Jacqueline Kennedy, the style icon of the 1960s, deals with the obsession with a perfect appearance and the latest fashion among women. Each of the seven
Jackeys in the dance strives to establish her unique style only to end up a copy of someone else.
Changing sets up four mirrors at different angles on stage. Four dancers dance in two pairs in front of the mirrors to Bach's Suites for Unaccompanied Violin. Their movements, with their likenesses extended, doubled or cut in half by the four mirrors, show a geometric beauty closely ssociated with the music.
In Front of the Mirror, Behind the Mirror plays the trick of light and darkness with one-way glass. The audience often sees itself reflected in the mirrors on the stage, while the performers imitate some of the viewers. "We are trying to show the paradoxical relation between the
audience and performers, where role reversals often happen," said Wu, the choreographer for the piece.
Wu Pi-jung(吳碧容)and Chang Hsou-ping (張秀萍), the dance's two choreographers, previously danced in the Cloud Gate Dance Theatre, as well as other dance groups in Taiwan and abroad. Two female choreographers leading an all-female lineup has given the performance a distinctive "feminine energy both in the choice of characters and ways of presentation throughout the dance," Wu said.
Mirrors will be performed today, tomorrow and Sunday at the Dance Hall of the Taipei National University of the Arts, located at 1 Hsueyuan Rd., Peitou, Taipei (台北市北投區學園路1號). Performances begin at 7:30pm today and tomorrow, with matinee performances at 2:30pm tomorrow and Sunday. Tickets cost NT$400 and are available through Acer ticketing
outlets.
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