Armitage's Split Sensibilities
The works of Karole Armitage can, at times, exhibit a militant austerity, as Ms. Armitage strips dance down to a series of cool figures, impersonal as an alphabet. "Ligeti Essays," which had its world premiere at the Joyce on Tuesday night, is a piece in this mood. As its men and women in streamlined black dance across a white floor, they seem distant, as though hermetically sealed behind a wall of glass.
"Ligeti Essays" is an apt title for Ms. Armitage's series of interconnected episodes. The work's solos, duets, trios, and ensemble sections have the feeling of intellectual musings and the chilly emotional temperature of the silver matte tree planted upstage, its naked branches poking out like thorns.
"Ligeti Essays" treats the 10 bodies in black velvet leotards mainly as objects to be arranged in space. The exercise is analytical, not dramatic. Watching these dialogues between bodies and György Ligeti's shrill, discordant music is a little bit like watching Ms. Armitage draw elaborate shapes on a piece of paper.
Those shapes can be strikingly elegant and creative. (And possibly we see them the more clearly because the performers are so cool.) Curiously slinky undulations of the upper body contrast with straight, sharp legs. Innovative, oddly shaped lifts and hints of folk dancing add piquant touches to a diet of leg extensions, unfurling arms, and circular steps.
Ms. Armitage's work here bears much superficial resemblance to Balanchine: the belted leotards, the dissonant music. But in the choreography — deconstructed ballet vocabulary blended with modern steps — she has her own distinct voice. She takes ballet's soft knees and irreproachable posture, but rejects its emphasis on verisimilitude among the bodies. (Her company contains an eyepopping range of ethnicities, heights, and body types.)
And in "Ligeti Essays," Ms. Armitage is more interested in the way the bodies travel than in where they end up: She concentrates on the phrase rather than the punctuation. This sets up a rhythm that contradicts built-in expectations, since the dance emphasizes the stretches between the music's turning points.
There were quibbles, to be sure. Ms. Armitage's use of highly intricate partnering made for some long and uncomfortable preparation onstage. The appearances of a pregnant dancer (Megumi Eda) and a bunch of lanterns felt like ideas not fully realized.
The main difficulty was one of pacing. Moonlit and cerebral, "Ligeti Essays" is a fitful dance (it has 23 sections), and a slow one. It may deliberately avoid dramatic impact, but it pays the price for achieving that goal. The piece feels strangely flat and unexciting, despite being well-danced amidst a strikingly designed set (by David Salle).
In contrast, the revival of the recent "Time Is an Echo of an Axe Within a Wood" that closed the program held the audience rapt. Its building blocks were similar — a silvery beaded curtain, leotards, a Bartók score, Ms. Armitage's ballet-based vocabulary. But here the elements cohered in a sustained experience that savored of crisp night air.
The program opened with an odd, stand-alone divertissement called "Pig." Matthew Branham's legs were visible beneath the frame of a giant inflatable pig (by Jeff Koons), creating the effect of a guy sneaking off with a Macy's Thanksgiving Day parade float. Eventually the pig shimmied and moon-walked, but not before a pregnant ballerina (Ms. Eda) came out and used him as a partner.
"Pig" was a reminder of Ms. Armitage's oddball sense of humor, after a few seasons of earnest pieces on a grand scale, of which "Ligeti Essays" is the most inaccessible and least potent. At the moment, it seems, Ms. Armitage's serious art and her humor are kept in separate compartments. It would be interesting to see the dance that combines them.
Until February 11 (175 Eighth Ave. at 19th Street, 212-691-9740).
