NEW YORK, NY.- When you hear the words, “Snaps: Go!” you know that Milka Djordjevich’s “Corps” has begun. On Thursday at New York Live Arts, five women descended the stairs through the audience in a single-file line, walking and snapping in time. As they advanced across the stage, a second call — “‘No’-head: Go!” — sounded from the group. To their unison steps and snaps, they added heads turning from side to side.
For the first half of this 75-minute work, which had its New York premiere on Thursday (after two pandemic postponements), the structure is something like that: Almost no movement or directional shift happens without an introductory command, and everyone sticks together, or tries. As they cycle through steps with names like high kick and pony — all cataloged in an accompanying “Drill Glossary” pamphlet — the dancers mostly adhere to grid and line formations, though occasionally that line curves through space, unannounced. (In a post-show conversation, Djordjevich described this snaking as “a cheat in the system.”)
Djordjevich, who lives and works in Los Angeles, set out several years ago to investigate what she calls “regimented movement” across disciplines. A military corps, a marching band, a cheer squad, a corps de ballet: How different are they, really? While in residence at Florida State University, she and her dancers, as part of their research, studied close-order drill with a local Junior Reserve Officers’ Training Corps.
But while interested in precision and uniformity, “Corps” seems more invested in the effort to achieve them than in perfection as an end in itself. You sense that these engaging and highly trained dancers — Martita Abril, Dorothy Dubrule, Ayano Elson, Allie Hankins and Tiara Jackson — could sync up even more exactingly, yet have chosen not to. What would happen if they did? What’s maintained when they don’t? As much as they operate as one cohesive unit, five distinct people come into relief, each with room to make mistakes; if they fall off track, they can just come back. (A sixth dancer, DaEun Jung, was missing for COVID-related reasons, and her absence was felt.)
From its straightforward opening, “Corps” grows both more joyous and more unsettling, nudged along by Celia Hollander’s stealthy electronic score. At one point, when the series of commands has led to prolonged, breathless jumping, Dubrule calls out, “If only we could be put out of our misery!” Or at least that’s what I heard over the noise of stomping sneakers. What seems like an off-handed comment ignites questions about collective behavior: In the absence of a leader, to what extent are the members of this group in control of themselves? Who or what is keeping them in line, in time?
A costume change — from muted green-gray shorts to brilliant red-gold sequins — signals a shift into a looser, more visceral second half, a kind of unraveling. As the dancers find their way to the ground, rolling and contorting, Madeline Best’s rich low lighting, in purple and orange hues, casts glistening reflections on the floor. Fragments of casual conversation repeat and interlock as the group, having sprawled way out, inches back into a unified chorus. Standing together once more, retreating into the darkness, they could be plotting a communal escape.
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‘Corps’
New York Live Arts; newyorklivearts.org
This article originally appeared in
The New York Times.
