Shine Lady Review
By: Natalie Clark
Shine Lady is the most recent work of New Zealand’s cutest choreographer, Ann Dewey. Ann is like your grandma but without the funny smells and hunch back: a smiley little lady with an English accent and plenty of character. Not surprisingly her dance work is often quirky and light-hearted, with a unique aesthetic that often references dogs (what did I tell you, “cute”).
When I take my seat I am immediately intrigued by the set at the back of the stage: a series of boxes perched precariously on top of long rickety table legs. It reminds me of the houses the Whos live in, in Dr. Seuss stories. There is also a chair on which Liana Yew sits, back to the audience.
Liz Kirk enters and performs a series of arm movements. Her clarity is striking. Every gesture has incredible precision, full of direction and intent. There is an abundance of interesting shapes and images (which the programme tells me are derived from the flora and fauna of Leigh, where Ann lives). Unfortunately, repetition of similar images neglects the bottom half of the body and at times it feels like watching sign language rather than dance.
Liz exits and returns dragging a blue silk cloth. There is a body inside. The lump stirs and Julie van Renen emerges, a glorious, red-hooded, cat-like (dog-like?) creature. She captures my attention for the majority of the performance, dancing with so much fluidity you might easily mistake her to be made of silk, too.
The hour-long work is made of 16 parts, each set to a different musical track. Most are piano or neo-classical pieces; a few are angsty girl-power garage pop metal. Not even kidding. Some of the music choices were tedious or superfluous and detracted from the movement. The music seemed to pre-determine the length of each part and so some ideas went on for longer than necessary. Although the show has shape, I would have liked the energy to fluctuate more.
There are two notable moments I would like to mention. The first is three spinning (shameless advertising plug?) Ken dolls descending from the roof on strings. One of them is missing an arm, a perhaps unintentional detail which I really liked. The other is Kirk and van Renen crawling around Yew’s red silk-cocooned body, performing quick, pricking paw actions. So satisfying to watch.
I leave the theatre with a warm feeling and a desire to pretend I am a cute wee puppy. Oh, and I want to be Julie van Renen. With a bit of luck, Spinning Sun will be touring Shine Lady in the near future – so keep an eye out for it.