Most artists dream of a partnership like that of Alice Klock and Florian Lochner. The choreographic team met as fellow company members of Hubbard Street Dance Chicago. Play in the studio and opportunities to make dances for the company evolved into an independent project under the name of FLOCK—an elision of their names as evocative and effortless as their ongoing collaboration. Five years later, the duo still describe an enviably frictionless creative process. “We played in the studio together at Hubbard Street and we thought, ‘what would it feel like if we did this every day, working with your best friend, laughing and having fun and seeing it as a joy?’” Lochner says. “I feel like we never had to work at it. It was interesting to see how you can have the same thought but different pathways to it.”
After its formation, FLOCK migrated from Chicago, working between the United States and Lochner’s native Germany. They return this weekend, stopping at the Dance Center of Columbia College with their first touring show, “Somewhere Between.” The one-hour piece employs four other dancers—including Kevin Shannon, another extraordinary skillful Hubbard Street alum—and FLOCK’s distinctly fluid, one-brain-two-bodies partnering technique, an approach that Klock says transcends traditionally gendered pas de deux. “We’re very conscious of choreographing in a way that any pair of dancers could do the movement. It isn’t binary in a classical way; the movement is about a balance between two people.”
“Somewhere Between” draws from the personal stories of the dancers—memories of moments that shaped their lives, particularly those that felt mythical or liminal. “We always imagine where we will be,” Lochner says. “I never imagined I would be making work with Alice; I figured I’d retire at Hubbard Street. I feel like we make these ideas, but there’s this in-between that brings you to another path, opens another door.”
“Somewhere Between” at the Dance Center of Columbia College, 1306 South Michigan. Thursday-Saturday, March 23-25 at 7:30pm. $30. Tickets here.
