The Melbourne-based contemporary dance troupe Chunky Move is back in Taipei, five years after wowing audiences during its Taiwan premiere with performances of the award-winning Mortal Engine.
That show, created by Gideon Obarzanek, who founded Chunky Move in 1995, was a technology-driven piece that combined dance, video and laser projections to explore the relationship between movement and technology. It was a visually stunning morphing of live performances with computerized magic.
Back again at the invitation of the National Theater Concert Hall (NTCH) as part of its Dancing in Autumn series, the troupe has returned with Complexity of Belonging, choreographed and directed by Dutch choreographer Anouk van Dijk, who took over as artistic director from Obarzanek in 2012.
Photo Courtesy of J Busby
For Complexity of Belonging, which premiered in October last year as the flagship show of the Melbourne Festival, van Dijk joined forces with one of her longtime collaborators, German playwright and director Falk Richter, who wrote the text and codirected the production, for a piece that is more dance theater than pure dance.
Richter has been director in residence at the Schaubuhne am Lehniner Platz in Berlin since 2000. He met van Dijk at a festival in Hamburg and have been working together since 1999. Their first production was Nothing Hurts; Complexity of Belonging is their fourth show.
The show is a dark, but humorous, exploration of identity in the age of social media and constant change, raising questions about gender, nationality, sexuality and history in an ever-more connected globalized society.
Photo Courtesy of Sarah Walker
The cast is made up of five dancers and four actors, but all act and dance, in monologues, and dramatic scenes, with choreographed sections sometimes standing alone and sometimes dance in parallel with the theater action.
The nine portray fictional characters, all expatriates and therefore out of place, but use their own names and some of the stories come from their own lives that they discussed during workshop sessions with Richter, thereby blurring the line between fact and fiction.
Tying the characters’ stories together is a French researcher, portrayed by Eloise Mignon, who is interviewing subjects about the nature of belonging, relationships and community for an art installation piece. The story line is built around the questions of belonging, assimilation and how to create and maintain intimate relationships across vast distances. The backdrop picture of the Australian Outback provides a vivid representation of space and distance.
Part therapy session, part physical exploration, the show raises questions that will resonate with audiences even if they have never left home — everyone has had to try to fit in at some point in life.
Richter has built a reputation for works that focus on dislocation, corporatization and rootlessness, while van Dijk’s choreography often stresses loss of control and instability, so it is easy to see why they would be interested in the issues raised by Complexity of Belonging.
The show runs about 100 minutes, with no intermission and due to the sometimes coarse language, there is an age advisory of 15 years and up. The show is in English with Chinese surtitles. There will be a post-show talk in the lobby of the National Theater after the Sunday matinee.
This year’s Dancing in Autumn series wraps up with Taiwanese choreographer Huang Yi’s (黃翊) Objects & Under the Horizon (物&地平面以下) starting on Dec. 3. All five shows are already sold out.
Performance Notes
WHAT: Complexity of Belonging
WHEN: Tonight and tomorrow at 7:45pm, tomorrow and Sunday at 2:45pm
WHERE: National Theater (國家戲劇院), 21-1 Zhongshan S Rd, Taipei City (台北市中山南路21-1號)
ADMISSION: NT$500 TO NT$2,500; available at NTCH box offices, online at www.artsticket.com.tw and at convenience store ticketing kiosks
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