Choreographer Rebecca French creates lots of things for the FrenetiCore Dance Company. She creates movements, sounds, video, costumes and sets. And for , she also created terminology. Promotional materials tout the program as an evening of “Streaming bodies. Athletic intelligence. A visual feast of choreographic surprises.” The visual feast and choreographic surprises we’re used to (French is one of the most talented and innovative dancemakers in town); it’s the streaming bodies and athletic intelligence that trip us up a bit.
“I was thinking of artificial intelligence, but instead of machines I thought of [our bodies],” she tells us while on a break from assembling costumes. “That’s not artificial, but it is intelligence. It’s like we’ve gone to school to train our muscles to do all these athletic, physical things the same way that we went to school to learn how to read. I was also thinking of the highly evolved machines that dancers are.” She pauses, then adds, “Plus, I just thought it sounded cool.”
At one point there’s a dancer wearing a camera; French says that’s where the term “streaming bodies” comes in. “The audience is able to see what she sees projected on the wall behind her on a live feed. The audience sees her and sees what she sees as well.” At another point, video is projected onto the dancer onstage, their costumes becoming screens for the images. “The dancers become the canvas as well as the artwork.”
Guest performers include circus and dance troupe Cirque La Vie, which will be dancing inside a giant metal wheel and jhon stronks artistic director of there…in the sunlight will be incorporating directives from his Facebook followers via a live feed.
As is French’s tendency, there’s no narrative to the works. “There’s no story; it’s actually one of our more abstract shows. We’re just happy robots dancing onstage.”
8 p.m. March 28, 29 and 31 and April 3, 4 and 5. Frenetic Theater, 5102 Navigation. For information, call 832-387-7440 or visit freneticore.net. Pay-what-you-can to $25.
March 28-29, 8 p.m.; Mon., March 31, 8 p.m.; April 3-5, 8 p.m., 2014
This article appears in Mar 27 – Apr 2, 2014.