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Dance given another meaning
One of the actors performs during the event. Courtesy photo
What you need to know:
New Style. Revellers were treated to a different dance style as the Dance Revolution East Africa came into force at the National Theatre recently.
Have you ever seen an art piece that hangs over walls in acrylics on canvas? Well, imagine that art piece dancing. Imagine it hanging mid-air off the rails of a balcony at the Uganda National Cultural Centre (formerly National Theatre), as though bound to fall yet firmly held by sisal ropes. That was among the highlights of dance choreography between Desire Kenneth Tereka of Yutta Konvictz and Footsteps Arts’ Roger Masaba.
Kick-starting the night with a special appearance from Hatra Hardy, who took part in Tereka’s Alternative Dance form, the audience was taken down a road of dance therapy. Hatra’s excellent usage of body movement and facial emotion gets you lost in the essence of her message - a lady suffering from her own demons of rejection, confusion and pain. As though she were possessed and fighting to break free for healing, Tereka would explain her state and wand his cane as she twisted and beat herself to the ground in amazing contemporary dance.
What the merger of four dance companies created was branded Dance Revolution East Africa. Their invention is a dance form like none performed before. To add to Footsteps and Yutta Konvictz is Brovin Kato’s Labaila Clinic, Oscar Senonga’s Mambya Dance Company and Robert Sempija of Guerilla Arts. The dance choreography was a master piece encompassing gymnastic yoga routines fused effortlessly into contemporary dance forms.
“Take a deep breath and exhale...hands to the heel, head to the back, hold your breath...” a vigilant Masaba in a staged class tutorial took the other four in strenuous technical dance exercise that requires ease managing one’s weight and physique. It seemed no easy task as the boys sweated through their black vests that glitter of sweat upon their strained but chiseled arm muscles flickered through the stage lights.
Brovin and Sempijja angled their bodies to nearly impossible lengths, head facing knees in V-form, with hands and feet to the ground.
“They are really professional and have mastered the art of dance,” a guest said after the show. “I have never seen anything like it and it shows just how far art can go in creating impossibilities when you put several minds together. They gave us diversity,” retorted Kenyan born actress SinoVela.
When Desire rolled himself up in ropes and gradually released them in agony motion, slowly dropping to low, one would think he just might drop. A few sighs of adrenalin went through the audience before they teamed up for a joint performance, working together in a beautiful piece. Their usage of spaces was well plotted, playing between the stairs at CCIP, the balcony over them, the large sound speaker and the space between.
The lighting would have been better had it not been manually operated. But all together, the piece was a spectacle in its own ranking.
Training
Dance Revolution East Africa is organising free workshop training by Megan Yankee from USA, between September 14 and 18.
