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Dancers mark a moving decade
New work from a noted choreographer and local talent merge in the next installment of DecaDance, a yearlong celebration of a local dance powerhouse.
By MARTY CLEAR
Published January 25, 2007
We've come to rely upon Moving Current Dance Collective to bring us the work of the best local choreographers. This weekend, Moving Current also brings us the work of one the most respected choreographers on the national dance scene. Seattle-based Stephanie Skura, whom the New York Times has called "one of the wits of contemporary dance," has been in Tampa working with six Moving Current dancers to create a new dance improvisation piece. "She's a heavy hitter in improvisational dance," said Erin Cardinal, one of Moving Current's two artistic directors. "The whole piece is very tightly structured, and each segment has very specific movement motivations, but the movements themselves are improvised." Skura's piece is one of seven scheduled for Moving Current's three performances, part of the DecaDance concert series that celebrates the company's 10th year. Cardinal and Cynthia Hennessy, the other Moving Current artistic director, both have works on the program, as does Michael Foley, a University of South Florida dance professor and a frequent Moving Current collaborator. But the concert also features two new works by guest choreographers. Local dance fans may remember Jody Kuehner, a Tampa native, USF grad and former moving Current dancer. She is based in Seattle now, where she founded a company called Left Field Dance. She's back with a piece called Ferocious My Grit. Moving Current introduced us to Augusto Soledade's work last May in its annual New Grounds concert, which presents emerging choreographers. "We liked that piece so much we commissioned him to do another," Cardinal said. Soledade, a native of Brazil who now teaches dance at Florida International University, has created a new work called All Things Revealed. Hennessy's two pieces are reworkings of dances Moving Current presented in years past. Reach is a comic multimedia work about people who try to interpret modern dance. It features a film and narration written and performed by two local actors who function as color commentators. Wing Catchers is a more contemplative work about behavioral patterns that people fall into when they are in various relationships. Foley's Devotion is new to local audiences, but he created it years ago for his own dance company in New York. He's tweaking it a bit for this performance, in which it will be danced by four women instead of four men. The only completely new work by a local choreographer is Cardinal's Theory of Duality, set to music by Arvo Part. "It's kind of an abstract vision of the two sides of a man," Cardinal said. "There's the strong, supportive man-on-the-go side, and then there's the vulnerable side that has all the insecurities that he never lets anyone see." Marty Clear can be reached at mclear@tampabay.rr.com Preview Moving Current's DecaDance 8 p.m. Friday; 2 and 8 p.m. Saturday at Theater I on the Tampa campus of the University of South Florida. $15 general, $10 for students and seniors. 813 974-2323.
[Last modified January 24, 2007, 11:53:53]
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