Modern dance is not necessarily contemporary dance. On the surface, this statement seems a bit of a conundrum. If it's not modern, then it must be ballet, or at least dance-theatre. This gap in dance has been widening for the past decade, and a good example of how contemporary dance is different was on Thursday when Jess Curtis/Gravity opened their two-week season at CounterPULSE. Curtis is a contemporary dance practitioner who lives both in Berlin (one of the European capitals for contemporary dance) and San Francisco. He was a fixture in Contraband, a postmodern tribe of dance outlaws in the 1980s, and eventually left San Francisco to study the circus arts in Europe. Each year, Curtis returns to San Francisco with new ideas challenging the status quo, frequently citing French philosopher Jacques Derrida, and struggling with the Bay Area's sometimes provincial dance community. His concerts are refreshing in their ways of looking at dance, and at times challenging for the audience. This is no place for a passive viewer. Everyone is engaged, no one more so than Curtis.
This year's season was a mixed batch that had varying degrees of success. Opening with a work from 2004, "Performance Research Experiment #1: Virtuosity and Engagement," Curtis presented a series of micro-pieces with dance collaborator Jorg Muller. Curtis and Muller played "Performance Researchers" in white lab-coats, creating a choreographic structure dependent on the attention span of the audience members. Literally, the audience told the performers when they were bored, and the performers would move onto the next micro-piece. The vignettes included contact improvisation, balancing props and a dose of homoerotic imagery, including Muller's "world-renowned" anal broom-balancing (yes, you read correctly, anal). While the novelty of the audience participation as a choreographic device wore thin at points, Curtis deftly pointed out the short attention span of modern audiences, and questioned the role of the artist as an entertainer. "Performance Research Experiment #1" was a bit didactic, but the humor saved it from devolving into rhetoric.
"Just Dancing... (with music)" was a premiere, featuring a quintet of young dancers and live music from local composer Peter Whitehead. Curtis' intention was to explore "the intersections of improvisational choice and compositional commitment," meaning the dancers spontaneously created movement based on a series of choreographed ideas designed by Curtis. Improvisational pieces are dependent on the performance skills of the dancers and the wisdom of the director. If the performers don't measure up, no degree of choreographic talent can save the piece. Unfortunately, this group of dancers didn't appear to have the maturity to carry off such a daunting task, and the piece had a bit of a "workshop" feeling to it. While all of them were talented dancers, they required more direction from Curtis in the areas of choreographic choices, focus and engagement. Perhaps the piece will become more interesting as the group becomes more comfortable with the choreographic structure and working each other.
"Les tubes (mobile)" featured Muller juggling suspended metal tubes that flew through the air and created sounds. Performed in the round (the audience stood onstage with Muller), this is circus at its stripped-down best. Muller's focus and precision were mesmerizing.
Split level
The final piece for the evening was a US premiere titled "Levels of Perception" which had true moments of beauty, maturity and sophistication. Designed as a duet, the piece featured a sound score by Derek Nisbit that was intended to "make the work accessible to people with visual impairments." The performers were Claire Cunningham (dancing with crutches) and Jami Quarrell, and the piece was developed in collaboration with Curtis. The piece began with Cunningham walking on Quarrell, while he executed movement on the floor. Cunningham used her crutches to help navigate the corporal terrain, creating visual imagery that transcended the ideas of "disabled" dancers vs. able-bodied. Later in the piece, both dancers were suspended in the air with fabric that swung, swathed and cradled them as they performed a series of circus-like sequences that almost became distracting. The strength of the piece was in the deceptively complex choreography by Curtis, and the performative and virtuosic skills of the dancers.
Jess Curtis/Gravity at CounterPULSE, 1310 Mission St., SF. Plays Thurs.-Sun., March 23-26, at 8:30 p.m. Tickets ($15-$20, no one turned away for lack of funds): (415) 435 7549, www.jesscurtisgravity.org.