Twofold. Sydney Dance Company

Below is an enlarged version of my review of Twofold published online by Canberra’s CityNews on 19 September 2024. The CityNews review is at this link.

18 September 2024. Roslyn Packer Theatre, Sydney

Sydney Dance Company’s Twofold began by giving the audience a second look at Rafael Bonachela’s work, Impermanence. Bonachela, artistic director of Sydney Dance Company for more than 15 years, created this work, in conjunction with American composer Bryce Dessner, in the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic. It was first seen onstage in 2021 when I masked up and braved the situation and went to see it. My review of that occasion is at this link.

Then followed the thrill of a brand-new work, Love Lock, from Melanie Lane who works across the world as an independent choreographer. Love Lock is Lane’s second major work for Sydney Dance Company, following on from the much-admired WOOF, which premiered in its mainstage iteration in 2019. See this link for my review of that work.

Lane spent her early life in Canberra and received her dance training at the National Capital Ballet School under the direction of Janet Karin. She has maintained her Canberra connections and has worked closely in recent years with QL2 Dance, Canberra’s youth dance organisation, and has also created works in Canberra in a number of independent situations.

The titles of the two works in Twofold, Impermanence and Love Lock, both raise interesting questions in the mind of those watching, but neither really explains unquestionably the nature of the works as we see them. But then it has always been Bonachela’s belief that it is the members of the audience, not the choreographer, who decide on the meaning of any dance work.

Impermanence was extremely engaging and was performed to Dessner’s score played live onstage by the Australian String Quartet. Its choreography showed Bonachela at his most intense and relentless giving rise to the dancers being able to display their outstanding ability to bend and twist the body into remarkable positions while maintaining a lyricism and a strong connection with others onstage. They worked with each other in duets, trios, quartets and often as a whole group in unison. But I was surprised by the number of times five dancers formed a group, which made me think back to Bonachela’s Cinco, a work that referred to the five decades of dance from Sydney Dance Company.

The work was lit by Damien Cooper and often the dancers and musicians were shadowy. At other times they were dark figures in brighter surroundings. Always the lighting influenced how we perceived the dancing, which came to an end with a striking solo danced to a song from singer and songwriter Anohni.

Scene from *Impermanence*. Sydney Dance Company, 2021. Photo: © Pedro Greig

As for Love Lock, given Lane’s Canberra connections it was more than tempting to think back to the strange role love locks have had in Canberra. In 2015 a growing collection of love locks, that is padlocks that represent everlasting love that are sometimes attached to a bridge before having their keys thrown into the water never to be retrieved, were forcibly removed by the National Capital Authority from the bridge leading to Queen Elizabeth II Island on which is housed Canberra’s carillon.

But Love Lock was a reflection on folk or community dancing, which Lane said she sees as celebrating what it means ‘to connect with each other through our bodies and essentially what it means to be human.’ In the early moments of the work the choreography was characterised by lines of dancers, dressed in shiny black, largely unadorned outfits, filling the performance space and working in a somewhat geometric fashion. Slowly, however, this structured format gave way to movement that was more eccentric, thus losing to a certain extent its folkloric appearance. As the work progressed dancers began appearing in remarkable and individualistic costumes from designer Akira Isogawa. The costumes were of various colours, often made with softly draped material, and often quite sharply and unexpectedly protruding beyond the line of the body.

Sydney Dance Company in a moment from *Love Lock*, 2024. Photo: © Pedro Greig

Love Lock was also lit by Damien Cooper and was performed to a driving score commissioned from [Chris] Clark. The movement continued to appear intense and individualistic with changing physical connections between dancers until the closing moments when a calm descended over the group.

Love Lock is a work for this century. It is brash at times but always demanding of our thoughts about humanity and how connections may change over time. A triumph for its choreographer and her collaborators.

Akira Isogawa and Melanie Lane, 2024. Photo: © Pedro Greig

Michelle Potter, 20 September 2024

Featured image: (l-r) Dean Elliott, Emily Seymour, Sophie Jones and Mia Thompson in Melanie Lane’s Love Lock. Sydney Dance Company, 2024. Photo: © Pedro Greig

Silence & Rapture. Australian Chamber Orchestra and Sydney Dance Company

17 August 2024. Llewellyn Hall, Canberra

Below is a slightly enlarged version of my review of Silence & Rapture published online by Canberra’s CityNews on 18 August 2024. The CityNews review is at this link.

The Australian Chamber Orchestra (ACO) has an admirable history of staging productions with dance companies in which both musicians and dancers perform onstage, with artists of each genre reflecting the work of the other in some way. My first recollection of this kind of collaborative endeavour goes back to 1998 when the ACO joined with a small contingent of dancers from the Australian Ballet, then under the direction of Ross Stretton, to present the Stravinsky/Balanchine ballet, Apollo. Since then there have been several collaborations between the ACO and Sydney Dance Company. Silence & Rapture is their most recent joint initiative.*

Directed by Richard Tognetti, Silence & Rapture presented a series of compositions by two composers—J. S. Bach and Arvo Pärt—whose works are years apart but were so expertly curated on the program that they fell together seamlessly. Program notes explained the narrative that was behind the selection. It followed ‘the path of a Lutheran metaphor … the world as a pendulum swinging downward, from the natural world of Hope and Temptation (Garden of Eden), down to Tragedy and Passion (Garden of Gethsemane), then upward again to Resurrection and Redemption (Garden of Heaven).’ The ACO musicians were joined by countertenor Iestyn Davies and two Sydney Dance Company artists, Emily Seymour and Liam Green, who performed the choreography of Rafael Bonachela.

Every aspect of the show was superbly executed by every single artist, with a standout performance of the Prelude from Bach’s Suite for Solo Cello in C Major from ACO’s principal cellist Timo-Veikko Valve. Apart from an impeccable transmission of the sound of the music, Valve the man could scarcely be separated from his instrument so involved was he, in a bodily sense, in transmitting the notes across the stage space and into the auditorium. While Valve’s involvement in this way was unforgettable, most of the ACO musicians also showed their intense commitment with a similar physical connection with their instrument during performance.

The dancers also stood out for their performance of Bonachela’s highly complex movement. Bonachela needed to restrain his choreography to an extent, given the small space in which the dancers could perform. But he showed his skill and, in addition to a focus on complexity, which often reflected the complexity of the music, he had the dancers at times performing solos on two small tables on the edges of the stage space. There were brief moments too of unison dancing involving Seymour and Green and I am always impressed by the way Bonachela turns to unison work, and how his dancers respond so beautifully.

Emily Seymour and Richard Tognetti in a moment from *Silence & Rapture*. Photo: © Daniel Boud

But the truly outstanding feature of Silence & Rapture was the theatricality that permeated the evening, especially in the use of the stage space. Apart from the two cellists and Chad Kelly, who played organ and harpsichord, all the musicians stood for the entire performance (how did they do it?) and formed a semi-circle onstage. They provided a focused performing area for the dancers and countertenor, who constantly interacted with each other, with the countertenor occasionally joining the dancers in performing Bonachela’s choreography.

Then there was the input from well-known lighting designer Damien Cooper. His design added colour to the production, and darkness sometimes when the musicians were practically hidden but still playing. His design also highlighted certain moments, including the cello solo by Valve, and a moment towards the end when the two dancers mounted a rise at the centre back of the stage to present the ‘upward swing’ to ‘Resurrection and Redemption’.

When I look back at the Apollo collaborative event of 1998 (and re-read my less than positive review of that performance) I wonder whether the success of Silence & Rapture reflects the fact that in this case the dance was made for the music, which had been specifically selected and put together. The show thus had an originality, a presentation that had not existed previously, an originality that was not present in what was put together in 1998? Whatever the reason, in its one-night-only performance in Canberra, Silence & Rapture was a five-star show.

Michelle Potter, 18 August 2024

* It is of course not uncommon for dance companies and composers to work together—even working onstage together is relatively common. This review simply concerns the collaborative efforts of the ACO, while not dismissing other such efforts.

Featured image: Sydney Dance Company’s Emily Seymour and Liam Green (centre) with musicians of the Australian Chamber Orchestra in Silence & Rapture. Photo: © Daniel Boud

Momenta. Sydney Dance Company

21 June 2024. The Playhouse, Canberra Theatre Centre

Below is a slightly enlarged version of my review of momenta, originally published online by Dance Australia on 24 June 2024. A link to the Dance Australia version is at this link.

The word momenta is the plural form of momentum, a word that means ‘the product of the mass and velocity of an object’. Momenta is also the title of the latest work from Rafael Bonachela, current artistic director of Sydney Dance Company, and there have been several explanations of why Bonachela titled the work as he did. Some are quite complex and don’t help much with understanding what Bonachela was considering as he created the work. But no matter how we might discuss the word, Bonachela’s work momenta was certainly filled with mass and velocity with the ‘objects’ being the extraordinary dancers who make up the current composition of Sydney Dance Company.

The work began with some remarkable unison dancing and this is an aspect of Bonachela’s choreography that I have admired over several decades. He has a gift for grouping dancers in constantly changing arrangements, and for giving those dancers such a varied selection of movement, poses and uses of space within a unison component. The opening section of momenta often had the dancers working on the floor and using their lifted legs as a focus, which initially seemed somewhat unusual as a component of Bonachela’s approach to unison work. But no matter how or where the dancers were positioned, they responded with an input that took the breath away.

Those opening moments set the scene for what followed and as momenta progressed the large groupings broke down into solos, duets, trios and other arrangements of performers until we reached the end sections when the unison work began again. Momenta was very much an abstract work for me, but it was compositionally varied within that overall abstraction and as such the choreography never lost its engrossing quality.

An absolute highlight was a duet between Naiara de Matos and Piran Scott, while the work of Emily Seymour also stood out. But it is quite astonishing to watch the flexibility, the fluidity, the energy and the absolute attention to the tiniest choreographic detail from every single dancer in the current company, many of whom are relatively new performers of Bonachela’s work.

Naiara de Matos and Piran Scott in a duet from *momenta*. Sydney Dance Company, 2024. Photo: © Pedro Greig

In terms of collaborative input, the highlight was the lighting from Damien Cooper. It was mostly relatively dark, although the colour of that darkness was not always the black we might have expected. As the work progressed, there were hints of dark green, sudden flashes of red, a burst of white cloud, at times a sudden brightness, and at others a mysterious hazy quality (especially, although not exclusively, when that white cloud began to dissipate). The lighting design was enhanced by the constant presence of a circular rig of 19 spotlights that moved up, down and around in the performing space and limited, at times, where the dancers could gather. The movement of the rig was beautifully controlled so that it appeared to be an essential part of the choreography.

The soundscape came from Nick Wales whose original, commissioned composition incorporated Distant Light by Latvian composer Pēteris Vasks. Costumes and set were by Elizabeth Gadsby with assistance from Emma White. The costumes were varied (a little) in style and colour but there was a minimalist quality to them in keeping with the overall abstract quality of the work. Their simplicity gave the dancers every opportunity to show that the focus of momenta was the body in motion.

The cast of *momenta*. Sydney Dance Company, 2024. Photo: © Pedro Greig

The work closed with showers of small pieces of sparkling cellophane falling onto the stage and out into the auditorium. I’m not sure why this happened and it was perhaps the one aspect of momenta that seemed entirely unnecessary. But momenta was such an absorbing production that this odd addition could just be pushed aside and basically forgotten.

The work is a huge credit to the underlying approach to contemporary dance that we have come to expect from Bonachela in his leadership of Sydney Dance Company.

Michelle Potter, 25 June 2024

Featured image: A solo section from momenta. Sydney Dance Company, 2024. Photo: © Pedro Greig

Postscript: There were some great production shots from momenta but they were not captioned with the names of dancers. Why? As a result I have limited myself to just three shots, one of which I was able to caption (hopefully correctly).

Ascent. Sydney Dance Company

My review of the premiere of Ascent, the latest triple bill program from Sydney Dance Company, has been posted on Dance Australia. See this link.

Two of the three items in the program were world premieres. The third, Antony Hamilton’s Forever & Ever, was first staged by Sydney Dance Company in 2018. One of the most interesting features of Ascent was in fact seeing Forever & Ever once more. When I reviewed it earlier on this website—see this link—it was the extraordinary costuming that stood out for me. Seeing the work again I was prepared for the costumes, and the way they changed and changed over the course of the work. So this time there were other things to look into, in particular the pounding score by Julian Hamilton, and the remarkable choreography, especially that for the closing scene and how well it reflected that score (and vice versa).

Below are images from Rafael Bonachela’s I Am-ness, which opened the program, and from Marina Mascarell’s The Shell, a Ghost, the Host and a Lyrebird, which was the middle work. They complement the images available on the Dance Australia page.

Scene from Rafael Bonachela’s *I Am-Ness*. Sydney Dance Company, 2023. Photo: © Pedro Greig

Scene from Marina Mascarell’s *The Shell, a Ghost, the Host and a Lyrebird*. Sydney Dance Company, 2023. Photo: © Pedro Greig

Michelle Potter, 13 March 2023

Featured image: Jesse Scales meets a fellow dancer in Antony Hamilton’s Forever & Ever. Sydney Dance Company, 2023. Photo: © Pedro Greig

Dance diary. November 2022

Sydney Dance Company in 2023

2023 marks Rafael Bonachela’s fifteenth year as artistic director of Sydney Dance Company and he has announced that he will continue in the role for another five years. The 2023 season will open with a triple bill called Ascent co-commissioned by the Canberra Theatre Centre. As such it will have its opening performances in Canberra followed by a season at the Sydney Opera House as part of the 50th anniversary celebrations of the House.

Ascent will feature a brand-new work by Bonachela, the return of Forever and Ever by Antony Hamilton, first shown in 2018, and a world premiere by Spanish choreographer Marina Mascarell. Of the program Bonachela says, ‘After the challenges of the past few years, I am so pleased to again be commissioning an international artist whose works have garnered critical acclaim around the world, alongside showcasing the work of a brilliant Australian choreographer.’

Scene from 'Forever & Ever', Sydney Dance Company 2018. Photo: © Pedro Greig — Scene from Antony Hamilton’s *Forever and ever*. Sydney Dance Company, 2018. Photo: © Pedro Greig

And I am so pleased that Canberra will be the city hosting the premiere of Ascent. Sydney Dance Company has been touring to Canberra pretty much annually (last year, 2021, is the only exception that stands out in my mind) since the 1970s. It is great to see this initiative, for which we must acknowledge the Canberra Theatre Trust for its co-commission.

Further information on the 2023 season is available on the Sydney Dance Company website. It includes information on the company’s regional tour, and its season of Up Close, a new venture to bring the company and audiences closer together and which will include a new work from Bonachela called Somos (meaning ‘we are’ in Spanish).

Launch of Glimpses of Graeme

Hobart, more specifically the Battery Point Community Hall, was the site for the launch of my latest book, Glimpses of Graeme. Reflections on the work of Graeme Murphy. The event was beautifully hosted by the Hobart Bookshop and it was a full house for the conversation between Graeme and me, which was moderated by Lucinda Sharp. Also featured were two short excerpts from works created for MADE by Murphy and danced by Sue Pickard and Laura Della-Pasqua, the official launch by Shirley Gibson from MADE, and a book signing.

In the image below, taken at the end of the event, see (l-r) Lucinda Sharp, dancer Susan Pickard, Michelle Potter, Graeme Murphy, Bronwyn Chalke (owner of Hobart Bookshop), dancer Laura Della-Pasqua (at rear), Shirley Gibson from MADE who did the official launch, and Janet Vernon.

Copies of Glimpses of Graeme are available from FortySouth online book store at this link.

Eileen Kramer turns 108

Early in November Eileen Kramer, once a dancer with Gertrud Bodenwieser, celebrated her 108th birthday. These days she works closely with film maker Sue Healey and a group of close friends in Sydney, where she currently lives.

See this tag for posts about Kramer on this site. My favourite is a link to a film made by Healey in 2017, which won an Australian Dance Award. Happy returns to Eileen Kramer.

Eileen Kramer, 2021. Photo: © Sue Healey

News from James Batchelor

James Batchelor’s Shortcuts to familiar places premiered in Berlin in October and was toured to Bangkok in November. Batchelor has recently shared two comments on the work, including one from Australian dance artist Alice Heyward. Heyward’s essay is beautifully and thoughtfully written and constructed and so worth reading. Here is the link.

Michelle Potter, 30 November 2022

Featured image: Publicity shot for Sydney Dance Company’s 2023 season. Photo: © David Boon

ab [intra]. Sydney Dance Company (2022 season)

2 June 2022. Roslyn Packer Theatre, Sydney

It has been Rafael Bonachela’s long-term ambition to have return seasons of his 2018 work ab [intra]. He achieved that ambition this year with a well-received season in France and, more recently, with a Sydney season that opened on 2 June at Roslyn Packer Theatre, Walsh Bay. Return seasons for contemporary works are unusual, but then ab [intra] is an unusual work and definitely worthy of more than one season.

Seeing ab [intra] this time was a rather different experience from that of 2018. The cast was quite different for a start, and I was also sitting much closer to the stage, which gave me quite a new take on the work. Although the work is meant to be quite abstract in the sense that Bonachela says that the work is ‘a representation of energy’, sitting close to the stage gave me a strong feeling of there being an expressive, human element, one of personal feelings between people. This was probably most apparent in a duet between Chloe Leong and Davide Di Giovanni where an element of pleasure in the company of another seemed to pervade. This was made stronger by the music (Nick Wales), which seemed quite romantic at this point.

Chloe Leong and Davide Di Giovanni in *ab [intra]*. Sydney Dance Company, 2022. Photo: © Pedro Greig

Being closer also gave me a new feeling about the lighting (Damien Cooper). The darkness that enveloped those dancers who occasionally moved to the front of the stage and turned their backs to the audience achieved a strong contrast with dancers further upstage, a contrast that I didn’t notice to the same extent in 2018.

But as is characteristic of Bonachela’s work, the overriding element throughout the evening was the exceptional physicality of the dancers. They never cease to amaze with their ability to perform Bonachela’s demanding choreography with the utmost skill and dynamism. The first duet between Jacopo Grabar and Emily Seymour was virtuosic in the extreme and I was incredibly moved by Jesse Scales who performed (amongst other sections) the closing solo. And I always admire the way Bonachela uses groups, sometimes working in unison, sometimes breaking out from those moments only to return to a unified group again.

Jacopo Grabar and Emily Seymour in *ab [intra].* Sydney Dance Company 2022. Photo: © Pedro Greig

It was a real pleasure to see ab [intra] again and to have the opportunity to see some sections and aspects of the production differently. In my review of the work in 2018 I remarked that I thought it was probably one of those ‘giving’ works. It clearly was so for me in 2022. The opening night performance was given a long and rowdy standing ovation.

Michelle Potter, 5 June 2022

Featured image: Jesse Scales in the closing section to ab [intra]. Sydney Dance Company, 2022. Photo: © Pedro Greig

Daniel Riley. Australian Dance Theatre’s incoming artistic director

The dance world is agog with the news that Daniel Riley is to take over the directorship of Australia’s longest standing contemporary dance company, Australian Dance Theatre, when Garry Stewart retires from the role at the end of 2021. Riley traces his bloodline to the Wiradjuri clan of Western New South Wales, particularly around Wellington and Dubbo. As such he is the first Indigenous director of Australian Dance Theatre (ADT).

But, as Riley told a Dubbo-based journalist in 2014, he did not grow up ‘on country’ but in Canberra. He went to Telopea Park High School and Canberra College and he began dance classes with Jacqui Hallahan at the then Canberra Dance Development Centre.

A fact barely mentioned in the stories that have so far surrounded Riley’s appointment is that he is in fact an alumnus of QL2 Dance, Canberra’s youth dance organisation—a place were the nurturing of future dance artists is of prime importance. One of QL2’s current patrons is the artistic director of Sydney Dance Company, Rafael Bonachela, and he recognised QL2’s impact on dance in Australia when, following his acceptance of the role of patron, he said:

I have worked with many artists that have passed through [QL2’s] doors and commend them all on their professionalism, technique and creativity. The training and performance platform that QL2 offer[s] to youth dancers and emerging artists in Australia is of the highest standard.

Riley joined QL2 in 1999. It happened as the result of a suggestion from Elizabeth Dalman, artistic director of ADT from 1965-1975, and her colleague Vivienne Rogis, both of whom had worked on a project with Riley’s father in the 1990s. In 1999 QL2 had just started up and Riley performed in the very early productions, Rough Cuts and On the Shoulders of Giants. He then danced in every QL2 project from 1999 to 2003 before taking up a degree course at QUT in 2004. While undertaking his degree he returned whenever possible to Canberra and worked as a choreographer for various QL2 projects, which he has continued to do throughout his professional career to date.

Daniel Riley rehearsing QL2 dancers for the *Hit the Floor Together* program, 2013.

His commissioned work Where we gather, made in 2013 for the QL2 program Hit the Floor Together, explored the idea of young people from Indigenous and non-Indigenous backgrounds working together. In performance it showed Riley’s exceptional use of organic and rhythmic movement patterns, and his remarkable feel for shape, line, and the space of the stage. It was remounted in 2018 as part of QL2’s 20th anniversary, Two Zero.

Most recently Riley was back at QL2 in January 2021 on a residency where he continued work on an independent project still in the planning stage.

Daniel Riley during a QL2 residency, Gorman Arts Centre, Canberra, 2021. Photo: © Lorna Sim

But of course his work as a professional dancer and choreographer with Bangarra Dance Theatre, which he joined 2007 after graduating from QUT, as well as his his work with Leigh Warren and Dancers, Sydney Dance Company, Chunky Move, and companies overseas, including Michael Keegan-Dolan’s Fabulous Beast (now Teac Damsa), have opened up new horizons.

I have strong memories of the first work he choreographed for Bangarra in 2010. Called Riley, it was a celebration of the photography of a cousin, Michael Riley. What was especially impressive was the way in which Riley’s choreography looked quite abstract and yet also managed to link back to the photographs, which were projected during the work. Then, I cannot forget the strength of his performance as Governor Macquarie in Jasmin Sheppard’s Macq, and also his role as Governor Philip in Stephen Page’s Bennelong, both productions for Bangarra.

Beau Dean Riley Smith and Daniel Riley in a scene from 'Macq'. Bangarra Dance Theatre, 2016 — Daniel Riley (on the table) as Governor Macquarie with Beau Dean Riley Smith in *Macq*. Bangarra Dance Theatre, 2016. Photo: © Greg Barrett

I also was interested in Reign, a work he made for Sydney Dance Company’s New Breed season in 2015.

The four New Breed 2015 choreographers . Photo: Peter Greig — Daniel Riley (front right) with Fiona Jopp, Kristina Chan, and Bernhard Knauer in a media image for Sydney Dance Company’s *New Breed*, 2015. Photo: © Peter Greig

Reign examined the idea of women in power and the forces that often end their reign. Choreographically it seemed to have strong Indigenous overtones. It began with Janessa Dufty covering her limbs with sand from a pile in a downstage corner of the performing space. It recalled an early section of Bangarra’s production of Ochres when a dancer uses yellow ochre in a similar fashion. Much of the movement, which was organic in look and usually quite grounded, also seemed Bangarra-inspired. And yet the theme seemed quite Western to me and I struggled to reconcile the movement with the theme. Later I began to wonder whether it mattered what vocabulary was used for what theme and was impressed and moved by the strength and very clear structure of the work.

So what will Riley bring to Australian Dance Theatre? Looking at the way he has worked over the years with QL2, he will bring I am sure the same integrity and respect for his colleagues that has brought him back over and over again to the organisation that developed his skills, gave him an understanding of a collaborative manner of working, and that realised that a future in dance lay before him. Thinking of the way he dances, always inhabiting a role with strength and understanding, I suspect he will be an excellent coach for the dancers in the company. And considering, on the one hand, the themes he has chosen for his choreographed works, which so often examine the diverse social and cultural roles of the people around him, and, on the other hand, the way his choreographed works have all been so clearly and strongly structured, I feel he will bring a huge strength of purpose to ADT.

But no one could put it better than Elizabeth Dalman, founding artistic director of ADT. She has said:

He is a wonderful performer, a talented choreographer and already has a great vision for the company. ADT has a long tradition as a revolutionary company pushing boundaries and presenting innovative and exciting works. Daniel plans to champion diversity and develop the company’s cross- and inter-cultural potentials. From the very beginning we set out to be a company exploring our Australian identity, our Australian artistic expression and cultural diversity, so I feel this is a strong continuation of the original aims of the company.

Michelle Potter, 10 June 2021

Featured image: Promotional image for Australian Dance Theatre’s appointment of Daniel Riley as artistic director.

Impermanence. Sydney Dance Company

17 February 2021. Roslyn Packer Theatre, Walsh Bay

A year ago Sydney Dance Company was just days away from its first program for 2020, which was to include a new work, Impermanence, by Rafael Bonachela as part of a mixed bill program. But the pandemic struck and the program was cancelled. Impermanence was being created to a score co-commissioned by Sydney Dance Company and the Australian String Quartet from Bryce Dessner, an American composer based in Paris. The work was initially inspired by the fire that almost destroyed Notre Dame Cathedral in Paris in 2019, and by the Australian bush fires that began in late 2019. After the program was cancelled Bonachela and Dessner decided to continue their collaboration and develop the work into a full length one. This is the show that opened on 17 February 2021.

Dancers of Sydney Dance company with the Australian String Quartet in 'Impermanence', 2021. Photo: © Pedro Greig — Dancers of Sydney Dance Company with the Australian String Quartet in *Impermanence*, 2021. Photo: © Pedro Greig

Publicity tells us that the work is about transience and fragility, but Dessner’s powerful, driving score, played onstage by the Australian String Quartet seated in an upstage corner, felt to me more like determination to overcome. Similarly, for the most part Bonachela’s choreography was fast-paced, dramatic and powerful and with Damien Cooper’s moody lighting design, with constantly changing colour effects strongly apparent, I found it hard to see the impermanence of it all.

But this is not to say that the work was not engaging. It was. I love watching Bonachela’s amazing ability to show us the unexpected in movement. I love those moments when he has the whole company onstage when we can see unison. Sometimes he has the entire company dancing as one, at other times two groups show us two separate, but still compelling instances of choreographic unison. And having live music played onstage is always something to look forward to, and something on which Bonachela seems to thrive.

As ever, all the dancers performed with their usual and incredible technical skills. But two stood out for me. I couldn’t stop looking at Emily Seymour whose strong balletic background was so clear. Her turns were spectacular and were, although in contemporary mode, perfectly placed and finished. Her truly beautiful rounded arms and smooth line through the body were just breathtaking. Then Jesse Scales looked as though they were so thrilled to be back on stage. Even when standing at the side of stage waiting for their next move their body glowed with pleasure. And Scales used every part of their body to give shape and meaning to the choreography.

Jesse Scales (above), Luke Hayward and Liam Green in *Impermanence*. Sydney Dance Company, 2021. Photo: © Pedro Greig

The Roslyn Packer Theatre had its COVID plan in place for Impermanence. We checked in with our phones and QR code, there was no mingling in the foyer, we were distanced (slightly) from other audience members, and we were masked-up for the entire show. But what a thrill it was to be back in a live environment watching the kind of spectacular performance we have come to expect from Sydney Dance Company. Jesse Scales said it all with their exceptionally detailed movement and their obvious pleasure in performing for an audience again.

Michelle Potter, 22 February 2021

Featured image: Emily Seymour, Jacopo Grabar, and Rhys Kosakowski in Impermanence. Sydney Dance Company and the Australian String Quartet, 2021. Photo: © Pedro Greig

NOTE: The personal pronouns used in this review are those given for use by Sydney Dance Company.

Charmene Yap in a still from Cuatro 1. Sydney Dance Company, 2020

Cuatro. Sydney Dance Company Digital Season 2020

Rafael Bonachela is fond of giving his works Spanish names (he is after all a Spaniard by birth). Cuatro is Spanish for ‘four’ and Bonachela’s work entitled Cuatro consisted of four short solos for four artists of Sydney Dance Company. Each separate dance was accompanied by music played by a solo musician from the Sydney Symphony Orchestra. Much of the creative development was conducted online with the final four outcomes filmed in isolation at the Sydney Dance Company studios in Ultimo.

Each dance was performed in a different space, beautifully designed and lit by Pedro Greig. Greig was also the film-maker. Each dancer wore a variation on a soft, flowing costume designed by Bianca Spender. The fabric colours ranged from very light grey through soft blue to golden yellow and each had some variation on a rolled and twisted design element, usually a part of the costume that crossed the shoulder.

Cuatro 1 was danced by Charmene Yap to an oboe accompaniment played by Diana Doherty. It took place in a confined space of three white walls.

Cuatro 2 featured Davide Di Giovanni performing to a violin accompaniment played by Andrew Haveron. The background this time was less confined with a draped back wall giving a softer look.

Cuatro 3 showed us Juliette Barton dancing to an accompaniment from Umberto Clerici on cello. Barton and Clerici performed in a black performing space that had three panels, made of what looked like small tiles, on each side of the space. The panels were lit with an exquisite golden glow, and often we saw dancer and cellist in shadow.

Juliette Barton in a still from *Cuatro* 3. Sydney Dance Company, 2020

Cuatro 4 was performed by Chloe Leong with Emma Sholl playing flute. By the time we reached this fourth dance all walls had disappeared and Leong danced in a fine white mist that spread itself widely.

Choreography for all four solos was by Bonachela and each dancer showed his or her astonishing command of Bonachela’s movement style. This time I felt his choreography was slower and more liquid than usual and its qualities of introspection were deeply moving.

I began thinking of, and watching this series of solos as individual works. Each was released separately with a week between each. Eventually, I stopped watching this way and decided to wait until all four had been screened so I could watch the four in one viewing. I’m glad I did this because I’m not sure I would have had the same reaction had I just watched each a week apart.

I did have a favourite solo—that of Barton accompanied by Clerici. The filming was exceptional with its shadows and close-up shots. Barton was technically brilliant and I loved the way Clerici played his cello with his whole body and seemed completely lost in the sound. But what was wonderful about watching the four dances as if they were one work was that, for me anyway, an emotional underpinning emerged. The work began in that enclosed space with Yap sometimes touching the walls as if to highlight an inability to extract herself from the space. It moved to the possibility of emerging with the softer backcloth against which Di Giovanni performed. By Cuatro 3 the blackness of despair was there but the glorious lighting promised hope. By Cuatro 4 we had reached freedom.

Bonachela has always said his works can mean whatever we want them to mean. I love that. Beautiful work from the whole team

Michelle Potter, 20 August 2020

Featured image: Charmene Yap in a still from Cuatro 1. Sydney Dance Company, 2020

Charmene Yap in a still from ‘Cuatro’ no. 1

Sheree da Costa in Us 50, Sydney Dance Company 2019. Photo: ©Pedro Greig

Bonachela/Obarzanek. Sydney Dance Company

2 November 2019, Roslyn Packer Theatre, Sydney

Sydney Dance Company’s second program for 2019, the fiftieth year of existence, began with a short film. Excerpts from the SDC repertoire during the years it was led by Graeme Murphy and Janet Vernon reminded us of the versatility of the productions during those years when strong narrative works alternated with beautifully abstract productions. These film excerpts, put together by Philippe Charluet, were followed by clips, from the work of Pedro Greig, focusing on the ten years from 2009 during which the company has been led by Rafael Bonachela. Bonachela’s works have never been narrative in nature, but have focused largely on ideas that evoke emotional responses in the audience. But in both eras the choreography has been remarkable and the dancers have been exceptional. Those of us who have been privileged to have watched both eras have been unbelievably lucky.

The live part of the program opened with a revival of Bonachela’s 6 Breaths, first seen in 2010. This collaboration with Italian composer Ezio Bosso begins and ends with some breathtaking videography from Tim Richardson. In the beginning flecks of white swirl through the air before morphing into one and then two human figures, while at the end of the work the reverse happens—first breath and last breath. In between, a series of movements (six in all) introduce us to various human emotions. At times I felt my hands clenching, at other times I relaxed. A duet between two men had my emotions wavering, the moments of unison had me dancing along (in my mind that is). Such is Bonachela’s ability to use dance to evoke an emotional response. And of course I continue to be surprised at the extraordinary choreographic framework that he uses to create these feelings.

Riley Fitzgerald and Dimitri Kleioris in *6 Breaths*. Sydney Dance Company, 2019. Photo: © Don Arnold

6 Breaths, Sydney Dance Company 2019. Photo: © Don Arnold

After interval came Gideon Obarzanek’s Us 50. In this work, which involved SDC alumni from the Murphy/Vernon era and a number of audience members, Obarzanek examined concepts about dance creation, especially how movement is passed on from body to body. There was plenty of interaction between the three groups of performers and, remarkably, the audience members, who wore headphones and had no rehearsal prior to coming on stage from the auditorium, were directed from the wings by Charmene Yap as assistant choreographer.

Wakako Asano with Chloe Leong and Janessa Duffty in Us 50. Sydney Dance Company 2019. Photo: © Pedro Greig — SDC alumna Wakako Asano (centre) with Chloe Leong (right) and Janessa Dufty (left) in *Us 50*. Performers from the audience in the background. Sydney Dance Company 2019. Photo: © Pedro Greig

SDC alumni Kip Gamblin (centre) Wakako Asano (left) and Bradley Chatfield (right) with current SDC dancers in *Us 50*. Sydney Dance Company, 2019. Photo: © Pedro Greig

By the end the three groups had become as one and, while the closing movements and groupings were of necessity quite simple, perhaps over-simplified, the point was made. Across 50 years of dance making, a strong legacy, a proud heritage, and the memories of audiences (represented by the audience members taking part in Us 50) are an essential part of the remarkable organisation that is Sydney Dance Company.

And, as before with the film footage, how privileged were we, who had watched the repertoire of the Murphy/Vernon period, to see the alumni from that time return to show us what amazing artists they still are. Sheree da Costa, glowing with beauty and still with that incredible ability to embrace any movement she is given, opened Us 50 with a short solo. As for other alumni, I wrote about Wakako Asano in 2005 after seeing Grand, ‘Wakako Asano is now such a mature artist gliding from movement to movement and opening and closing the work with mysterious grace.’ It’s still there that mysterious quality. Then, writing about New Blood in 1999, I said of Bradley Chatfield, ‘…his sense of presence on stage … rivals that of any dancer in Australia.’ That presence is also still there. And so with all the other alumni who appeared in Us 50—Kathryn Dunn, Linda Ridgeway, Lea Francis, Stefan Karlsson, Bill Pengelly, Nina Veretennikova, with Simon Turner as stage manager. What a treat.

Michelle Potter, 4 November 2019