The title Sunset Affair evokes images of a soirée; a gathering of old friends swathed in luxurious fabrics, draped on the balcony of a beachside mansion, with Tequila Sunrises in hand. There is an air of melancholy though, a subtle sadness, a quiet contemplation. Sunset Affair is in mood pretty close to my imagination, presenting the dance works of Georgie Goater, Zara Killeen-Chance and Tallulah Holly-Massey.
It is an abundant month of dance in Auckland. We have seen early career artists testing ideas, two New Zealand dance companies presenting home-made works and an international bigshot. But one might ask what has become of the mid career dance artists in New Zealand not employed by a dance company? Where do they go? Although the sustainability of a choreographic/performance career in New Zealand beyond the age of 25 currently provides certain dilemmas, and the challenges of being a freelance artist can be personally difficult to navigate, Sunset Affair is evidence that the freelance dance community is artistically thriving despite the challenges.
In Subject Matter Object Pink, Georgie Goater’s programme notes state that her work is about presence. She knows how to bring it, and I could watch her for hours. It is only an experienced artist like this who can do little yet be completely fascinating. She is a pink astronaut slowly circling, eternally drawing iridescent pink taffeta back across the space. It is mesmerising and magical and I hope it goes on and on. Joined by Alisha McLennan, we witness two hauntingly articulate perspectives on a shared movement vocabulary. The relationship between the two performers is perhaps underdeveloped though, and I struggle to connect their two opposing worlds. I attempt to make sense by inventing a metaphor of bound bodies but don’t quite get there.
Building her choreographic oeuvre by presenting Love Me Do Zara, Killen-Chance is a lonesome and forlorn rollerblader waiting for the ‘one’ to arrive. Through a comic rendition of our imagination’s alter-world, the banality of waiting has never been so interesting. Echoing the (mostly) deadpan focus of her previous work Go Go Do, she moves hysterically through a series of movements en pointe, on Lady Gaga hooves: casual slut drops and a brilliantly terrible attempt at too-cool-for-school whacking. It is clever and makes my heart glad her ‘one’ never arrives.
To complete the evening Tallulah Holly-Massey provides It’s a Soft Suggestion. Exploring social ideas of space, the piece hints at awkward encounters, three in a bed (will that ever work out well?) and unraveling relationships. An inflated airbed rotates, revealing dancers through a doorway. It is like a way cooler and grungier version of the massive revolving wall we saw at Netherlands Dance Theatre last week. Performer Solomon Holly-Massey is a beautifully ambivalent boyfriend testing proximity with the other two dancers. Lisa Greenfield lolls around behind her hair and can’t make up her mind. Adam McNaughton appears as the voyeuristic flatmate who knows he’ll get the girl in the end. In spite of his somewhat creepy character, McNaughton is divine to watch; extraordinarily skilled and yet super-chilled about it all. The piece is like a festival film about a teenager’s coming of age and I don’t want it to end.
Sightlines in the Basement Studio space are problematic and unfortunately for this show leave most of the floor work completely masked by the heads in front of me, also craning to see the action. It is a prevalent and extremely frustrating situation for both the makers working in tricky spaces and contemporary dance audiences. I ponder how our experience is diluted by eventually giving up and waiting patiently (or not so patiently) for the dancers to stand up. Perhaps more forethought might happen in the future to address movement vocabularies, spatial arrangements and staging.
Don’t let this deter you though, it’s your last time to see Georgie Goater in action before she leaves for Helsinki. Just fight for a seat at the front. And yes you can make it to Atamira straight afterwards at 8 at Q Theatre.
Sunset Affair is on 6-8th July, 6.30pm, tickets from the Basement Theatre.
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