Stephen Petronio Company。

The strength came through dancers were surprisingly powerful and tense.
Just like the choreographer spoke loud and hard.

Repertory:
Lareigne (1995)
Bud Suite (2006)
Bloom (2006)

From these repertories, I could see the choreographer has some special preferences of compositions. Laregne is full of power, from music to movement. Frankly, I would say it was a bit like a normal dance piece, though could see how amazing the dancers are well trained both in body build and techniques. And I don’t know the meaning of the title of the repertory, maybe that is the reason that I don’t really get what is this all about. The Bud Suite was more interesting to me, still quite strong movements and compositions which started from two male dancers. I saw how relationship goes between lovers through the entire piece. Simple but expressive start, brought me into the next level apart from the pure joy of the beginning of love by four female dancers. Then, came to song with lyrics, which sang about “love affairs”, the compositions emphasized on the feelings of relationships’ affairs: dilemma, struggle, decisions… The composition became messier and messier. For me, the dancers from beginning had roles or characters, but they all turned to describe an abstract status in mind when we are facing different situations in relationships. The late one of the performance was Bloom. It had a live choir, which collaborated with South Bank Centre and created with pupils and teachers from Forest Hill and Sydenham Schools from South London. But the music, compared to the dance, was less interesting to me. In this piece, somehow, I did see a kind of “bloom”, and the atmosphere built up quite nice as well.

Two things I found during the performance or I would say from this company. One is the body texture of the dancers are very much different from the dancers in UK or Europe, according to the performance I have seen. But it did remind me some texture of some dancers in Taiwan, especially from my university. So I am wondering is the different techniques training make that much gap? Or just the way that the choreographer used to affect more than the trainings? I will discover this part more afterwards. Another thing is the costumes from all repertories were very stylish and quite strong and ambitious. And they were all from different designers, so obviously, it was a strong idea from the choreographer. They brought some elements and details of fashion into costumes. For me the Bloom is the best combination in it. Very beautiful shapes and interesting cutting not only just showed of the garment but pretty much related to the theme “bloom”. Also the use of colours was very understated and low-pitched, but represented perfectly without bothering and interrupting the entire piece.

I would not say the performance was great, but I quite enjoyed it and learnt and discovered many things from that. Many inspirations not only from choreographer and also the costumes, and very much from those dancers who have amazing bodies and skills at the same time.