Disappointment At The ODC -- Todd Courage's 'The Trap'

What you see is not what you get. The Louis Greenfield-esque ad photo led me to expect an energetic, complex performance a la MOMIX, Pilobolus, or David Parsons. Reality turned out quite different. The first short piece is an awkward duet of jerky lifts and movements accompanied by a soundtrack of increasingly annoying repetitive words and phrases. Although not quite redeeming, the second piece featured several thrilling musical interludes of re-mixed African beats and vocals—good enough for an iPod download, but not enough to tie the disparate elements together. The obviously talented dancers switched effortlessly between classic, modern and tribal dance styles, but given their consistent lack of synchronicity, needed more rehearsal time. Moveable screens created intermittently interesting images and several signature moves emerged in the choreography, but as with the previous piece, this vision was ill-defined with no context provided for the audience. I generally like abstraction and really wanted to ‘get’ what I was seeing, but couldn't help feeling that I was at a student recital.ore interesting images, some musical sweet spots, but not the multi-dimensional creation of space as billed and certainly not enough to compensate for the distracting (and highly annoying) device of laying down red marker tape and writing on the stage during the performance. The lack of context or explanation in the program notes continued to disappoint. My wise, super-hip (and just back from Burning Man) friend summed it up best: "I don’t need a fully defined Swan Lake-like story, but I do appreciate a basic framework to process what I'm seeing."

Given the lackluster first half, I had high hopes for the namesake 'Trap,' especially given the photo and the advertised collaboration between "architects, spatial design experts...(to) create ever-changing rooms that morph in height, width, lightness, and darkness". The result was a few m

Most unexpectedly, the evening's highlight turned out to be intermission. The ODC Theater is hosting Steve Maller's intriguing photography show 'Some Of Their Parts.'  This moving exhibit features 54 black and white photos with accompanying vignettes highlighting everything from perceived deformities to actual scars.  For more info and to order the accompanying book (I did!), see www.someoftheirparts.com.  The show will run through 9.25 and the ODC Theater gallery is open Wed- Sat, 2-5pm + one hour prior to each performance.  Address is 3153 17th St. @ Shotwell, San Francisco, CA 94110.

update: subsequent performances by this group were much improved and highly recommended. See Pinpoint Shines At Project Artaud and Happy First Anniversary To The Garage Performance Space!

(photo from ODC)

Comments

[Steve Maller]

Thank you for your kind words about my show! I'd love to show you the book, too. You can see some photos of the book at http://someoftheirparts.com/buybook.html
-- Steve

[jb]

i have to second the photo show. it really is amazing. i would recommend just stopping in to see the photos, forget the dance

[Bill Bloomfield]

Disappointment At The ODC? Art is born through limits and dies in freedom.

I must say I have the opposite opinion of Dog Mom regarding The Courage Group performances at ODC. All of the performances had strong Bauhaus influence with a clear structure.

The first performance, Cold Snap, revealed to me a dance performance clearly rooted in a classical structure. While the movements may have appeared to be "jerky", they were not without structure - something most dance outside of the SF Ballet seems to lack.

Both the 'Pressed' performance and 'The Trap' performance left me wanting more. I'm not sure what "context" the Dog'smom is looking for in these pieces. I'm not sure how much the viewer really needs to 'get' as it is so stated in the review.

I found 'The Trap' to be especially compelling. In this piece, the audience watches as the performers construct the stage as the dance progresses. A red rope is first wrapped around the perimeter of the stage forming a square. Boundaries are drawn and defined on the floor through red tape marking four triangles which are further defined through white and red lights. The end result is a giant X through which the performers interact both individually and together in groups.

In a time when most modern dance is so based on "feelings" and "emotion", I find it refreshing when an artist clearly demonstrates the fact that art is born through limits and dies in freedom.

[Dominic Moriarity]

The Courage of his Convictions
Courage Group: Todd Courage’s The Trap
ODC Theater, San Francisco, CA
September 17, 2007

By
ALLAN ULRICH
allanu815@aol.com
© VoiceofDance.com 2007

Jennifer Price of the Courage Group in Todd Courage's The Trap. Photo by Susan Scherrman.

Danced allegories are always welcome and allegories that take their time are even better. Todd Courage’s sly The Trap, unveiled (or, should I say, sprung) last weekend at San Francisco’s ODC Theater, always knows where it’s going even if it takes the audience a while to catch on.

This final panel of the Courage Group’s fifth annual program was, by a considerable measure, the most winning offering on the bill Friday (Sept. 13). This is a compelling fable of shifting power relationships that develops through the movement without the kind of underlining that is deemed hereabouts as profound. The Trap works like this. When the lights go up, four women (Dorothy Fitzer, Jennifer Price, Tara Fagan, Michelle Lohmar) have bound and gagged Michael Bulatao, from whose pocket they have retrieved a little red book. But he wriggles out of captivity and proceeds to isolate his jailers. First, the man strings red yarn in a square, creating a pen that encloses the women. Next, he adorns the floor with red duct tape, creating spaces that trap and, in a way, liberate the performers.

All this proceeds at a methodical pace, backed by a mixed recorded score, performed by, among others, the Empire Brass Quintet. The women are given helium-filled white balloons, which, pointedly, do not allow them to fly over the barriers. Bulatao scribbles in chalk around the periphery. He joins the ends of a garden hose (red, again) and fabricates a sacred circle. Gradually, the women’s movement, now spatially restricted, evolves from barefoot unisons to tender partnerings. In confinement, relationships develop both from need and forced intimacy.

Thanks to a restricted palette (black, white and red) of Courage’s devising and pinpoint lighting by someone calling himself Max, The Trap looks terrific and leaves us wanting a bit more.

Courage seems at his best when he pursues an idea through movement. Pure abstraction finds him on shakier ground. Cold Snap (2007), an obsessive duet for Fitzer and Fagan, is accompanied throughout by a sound score from Bruce Nauman, one component of the artist’s video installations (which Courage confesses to have never seen). The mesmerizing linguistic repetitions and displacements frame a duet marked by austere gestures and repeated lifts. Somehow, what you see connects with what you hear.

Pressed (2006) satisfies far less. Melanie King joins the other four women for an extended divertissement set to assorted movie scores. Some of it happens in silhouette, some of it involves floor work. The choreography draws from ballet in its arabesques and developpés, but the swinging arms suggest a grounded quality. The piece, however, lacks variety and direction, though it occasionally takes off in an encounter here or a promenade there. And there’s a cheeky little ensemble in which the performers applaud each other, their faces bathed in contempt. More tonal nuance like that and some artful trimming might render Pressed more palatable. No argument about the dancing, which looked eminently centered and even elegant. Fagan’s ferocious attack stood out.

[Eric H]

Just now getting around to reading the reviews of Courage's 'The Trap' and I am surprised to see mention of disappointment as well: my impression was very much the opposite as well. I found 'Cold Snap' fresh and daring. Although the audio was at times repetitive (deliberately so), the dance was a pleasure to watch. And then the whole show blossomed with 'Pressed' and 'The Trap', revealing many twists and facets. I found it all uplifting and wanted more as well. I look forward to future shows!