"Dance Porn": Is It an American Curse?
I’ve been thinking about Roslyn Sulcas’ term “dance porn” that she used to describe Rasta Thomas’ “Rock the Ballet” in yesterday’s New York Times (click here). I didn’t see the show, but I know what she means. I know how easily really good dancers like Rasta can fall into cute or sexy posing, kicking legs high, and letting tricks reign. I see these kinds of crowd-pleasing tactics in large doses on So You Think You Can Dance, and I see it in small doses in concert dance—even with great choreographers like Paul Taylor and George Balanchine. A little sprinkle of coyness here or there can be nice. But if it’s wall-to-wall coyness and look-at-me-ness, it’s demoralizing.
I just spent a week at the International Exposure in Tel Aviv, and all the dance I saw there was blessedly free of cute and sexy. No coy posing, winking at the audience, or kicking a leg sky-high just for the sake of showing your facility. The emphasis was more on struggle, on awkwardness, on dreamlike images shifting into other images. Maybe this goes back to the early influences in Israel being 1) folk dance, which emphasizes community, and 2) Martha Graham, who set up the Batsheva Dance Company many years ago. Now the big influence is Ohad Naharin, who has been leading Batsheva for almost 20 years. Never do you see virtuosity for its own sake in his work. Or maybe it’s due to living in a country where potential violence is everpresent.
In the U.S. we have excellent choreographers like Alonzo King and Karole Armitage who sprinkle their work with what Sulcas might call “dance porn”—split kicking followed by an undulation (in King’s case) or split kicking followed by combative partnering (in Armitage’s case). It’s not done coyly; it’s just part of their vocabulary. At this point, I am able to see beyond their acrobatics to the more satisfying aspects of their choreography.
In Europe, perhaps the examples of Jirí Kylián, Pina Bausch, and Mats Ek serve as a restraint to the mere display of facility. I don’t know. What do you think?
