Battery Dance
presents
A Virtual Performance
of

The 39th Annual Battery Dance Festival

Night Seven: NORTH AMERICA

August 20, 2020

https://batterydance.org/battery-dance-festival/

This evening showcases dances from Canada, Mexico, and the U.S. It begins al fresco near Toronto, Ontario, land of the Huron, Wyandot, and other tribes. KAEJA D’DANCE takes us through the tall grass, trees, and shrubs while 20 dancers improvise brief solos popping up from the greenery on the shore of Lake Ontario. Freedom, breezes, leaves rustling, the whisper of the water. And finally, in the distance, the Toronto skyline, so near, yet a world away.

Next, indoors in the U.S. with the CORNFIELD DANCE company. A ballet in a spacious room bright with windows, “Portal” is a dance in silence. The performers’ interactions and detachments are human orbits, moving through vast emptiness to find peace, inspiration, noise, agitation, or a quiet suspension in the eye of a spiritual storm.

DELFOS DANZA from Mexico presents “Telempathies”, a modern dance hybrid making maximum use of Zoom and today’s elusive borders between together and apart, freedom and restriction. Six dancers, six peep-holes, one eye looking out from each. An intricate mix of video effects portray people inside people, splashes of red color, all against the narrative of a U.S. space mission. The film strikes to the heart of today’s surrealistic “reality”.

Staying in the modern genre, PONY BOX DANCE THEATRE, an all-male company based in New York City, gives us “The Vision”. Drone video exposes a dirt-covered figure emerging from dry earth. He shows amazement at his surroundings, arches his back to feel the sun on his face. He has been born!

DANCING WHEELS, also U.S., is recognized as the first and foremost professional dance company that integrates dancers both with and without disabilities. Their exceptional “Imagine, If You Will…” must be seen to be appreciated. It is delightful beyond description, emanating power and absolute fearlessness.

“Gratitude” provides a glorious finale to the evening from the NATIONAL BALLET OF CANADA. Each dancer choreographed their own homage to the audience and to all essential workers during the COVID pandemic. Beautiful dancing with a beautiful thought behind it.

-Karen D’Onofrio-