Submitted by Northrop | 04/24/10
Have your eyes recovered from Saburo Teshigawara's visual sensation, MIROKU? What did you think of the blue box effect? Did you find yourself travelling to the mind's eye, as Teshigawara implied? Let us know your thoughts!
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Best of the year
Just to show we are all different If found Miroku the most refreshing and challenging work of the year. Brilliant lighting. Loved the blue box and yes it did travel to the minds eye.
Miroku
I feel sad that people did not like this. It was one of my favorite performances of the season. I know tastes vary, but I found it refreshing after some of the really lame, boring ballets (I am NOT referring to Balanchine, mind you), to see someone pushing the boundaries and daring to make us a bit uncomfortable. I would be interested to know the age demographic for those who did not enjoy this, because as a young person I felt this performance expressed so much that I could relate to, and it was ultimately a cathartic experience for me. I left feeling recharged, peaceful and inspired. Sometimes I am suprised that people come to the Walker and are suprised when they see things like this, and also shocked at how rude people are. As art, AND as a dance performance, I found this to be a very exciting performance and I felt privileged to get to see this work. Saburo's control over his body was incredible. Thank you for including this and please do not present us only with easy-to-digest performances next year.
Loved it!
I really enjoyed this performance. It was one of those dances that left me thinking at the end. I saw the dancer going through a spiritual transformation, letting go of fear and letting in light.
Fantastic!!
Miroku
First time to share in this manner. The performance was AWESOME. Great venue, lighting and staging. Wonderful artistry, dance and movement interpretation. I was the person standing Sat. night after the performance and I wasn't dragged away^^^
We look forward to the many great events brought to the Twin Cities and YES - we will hopefully embrace all the new renovations to NORTHROP. We always walk away from an event with something positive. Yes, we do enjoy full dance troupes more.
A funny sidenote: We loved Pilobulus this year, but WHAT WE REALLY LOVED WAS WHEN THEY CAME OUT AFTER THE PERFORMANCE AND THEY WERE GENUINELY SMILING AND HAVING FUN WITH THE AUDIENCE - THERE WERE NO PAINTED EXPRESSIONS!!
Have a fun summer^^^^^^^^^^^^^^^
Part of season subscription...really?? really??
I fully support collaboration between the fine arts organizations here in the TC ( I am a "Friend of Northrop Dance"), but I really struggle with the inclusion of this as part of Northrop's Dance season subscription program.
I appreciate "out of the box" programming, but I found what very little "dance" (or even "movement" for that matter) that was there disappointing, and certainly not what I would expect as part of Northrop's program package.
If programming like this is part of Northrop's future, perhaps it could be offered as a 'special discount opportunity" for Northrop subscribers, but not included in the package. I will seriously look at next year's program before choosing the "all events" option for my season subscription based on this performance
Saburo Techigawara's Performance
The first section was compelling and I was thinking I'd never seen anyone move like this before. It reminded me of Merce Cunningham's solo with catlike movement, and similarities to hip hop with transfer of movement through his body. I wanted to see his movement move through space, and use more dancers to expand this wonderful vocabulary. This lack of spatial movemnet was almost mime like. I liked the creative use of light and its movement. I did find that my attention began to wane as these themes didn't use space or other dancers to develop.
The Flim Flam Dance Man
My first time to sit in the "new" McGuire Theatre, the sight line problems from the side are for another discussion, but should have been the first indicator that things were gonna go wrong, shortly.
I don't understand how this grifter was able to convince anyone in the hierarchy of the art/dance community that this was art. And worse, they in turn have the "balls" to charge for it.
I've seen better art/dance at hip hop dance competitions than what was here.
For years my wife and I had the distinction of using The Dayton Dance companies mid nineties performance as the mark for uninspiring repetitious performance. (Anyone out there remember the running between the chairs set on both sides of the stage for the entire evening?) No longer. Now we have the Flim Flam Man Dance to use as the base for worst dance event ever.
My wife and I left after about 20 minutes of tedium. From the sounds of other posts it appears others saw through the Flim Flam as well.
Karas performance
he other bloggers said it for me. this was hard to stay for the full performance. The first 30 minutes i could tolerate and then I found it tedious. The lightening was interesting.
the worst I have seen and
the worst I have seen and wouldn't have gone had I not had season tickets at Northrup; I had seen a similar performance art (called "contemporary dance") the night before and so was familiar with the spasms and frenetic movements. The harsh light and it's placement on his body were impossible to watch.
I wonder if I would have
I wonder if I would have liked the dance had I not had two glasses of wine beforehand. As a season membership holder for 10 years now, this was at the bottom of performances I've seen. For about 5, tops 10 minutes, I found it interesting.
IF THIS WAS DANCE, I DON'T
IF THIS WAS DANCE, I DON'T APPRECIATE THE STYLE. THE FRENZIED PART LOOKED TOO MUCH LIKE TAKING THE PROBLEM OF SPASTICITY, AND CALLING IT DANCE, THE STROBE LIGHTS WERE ANNOYING, AND THE INDIVIDUAL LIGHT THE GENTLEMAN USED IN THE MIDDLE OF THE DANCE WAS PAINFUL, REQUIRING ME TO KEEP MY EYES CLOSED, WHICH MEANS I CANNOT COMMENT ON THE MOVEMENT AT THAT TIME AT ALL.
IT WAS, FOR US, A TOTAL WASTE OF TIME AND MONEY.