Fred Astaire’s feather-light grapevines and Gene Kelly’s powerhouse barrel rolls translated marvelously to the big screen, but film and contemporary dance share a somewhat more tenuous relationship; the abstraction, immediacy and internalized subject matter explored by many current choreographers can become flattened and remote when committed to celluloid. The success of dance is dictated by so many temporal factors—audience energy, focus of the performer, relative slipperiness or stickiness of the stage—that the constraints and permanency of the camera can act as the enemy of the form. Choreographer, filmmaker and photographer Nadia Oussenko and filmmaker Daniel Kullman seek out the intersection of dance and cinematography with an exploration of anxiety and surrender in “On Falling…”, screening at the Music Box this Wednesday. Oussenko and Kullman wish to directly address the peculiar voyeurism of the camera and how the shifting vantage point of film affects the viewer’s visceral experience. “On Falling…” will be screened alongside Jan Bartoszek’s dance film “Arch of Repose.” (Sharon Hoyer)
At the Music Box Theatre, 3733 N. Southport. Wednesday, November 11 at 7:30pm. $15.
Fred Astaire’s feather-light grapevines and Gene Kelly’s powerhouse barrel rolls translated marvelously to the big screen, but film and contemporary dance share a somewhat more tenuous relationship; the abstraction, immediacy and internalized subject matter explored by many current choreographers can become flattened and remote when committed to celluloid. The success of dance is dictated by so many temporal factors—audience energy, focus of the performer, relative slipperiness or stickiness of the stage—that the constraints and permanency of the camera can act as the enemy of the form. Choreographer, filmmaker and photographer Nadia Oussenko and filmmaker Daniel Kullman seek out the intersection of dance and cinematography with an exploration of anxiety and surrender in “On Falling…”, screening at the Music Box this Wednesday. Oussenko and Kullman wish to directly address the peculiar voyeurism of the camera and how the shifting vantage point of film affects the viewer’s visceral experience. “On Falling…” will be screened alongside Jan Bartoszek’s dance film “Arch of Repose.” (Sharon Hoyer)
