ANT KATZ

Israeli-SA dance collaboration

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Now, a brand new film goes behind the scenes with the SA and Israeli performers and choreographers to learn about the incredible creativity and hard work that brought this critically acclaimed production to the stage. Israeli and South African choreographers, The collaborative effort was funded by the Israeli Embassy in South Africa, deputy-ambassador Michael Freeman told Jewish Report this week.

RIGHT: Collaboration between SA and Israel is growing swiftly, in a range of fields including arts, trade, agriculture and tourism

Rachel Erdos and Sonnyboy Motau, choreographed one half of the first-ever double-bill for the Dance Umbrella festival:

•  “The Architecture of Tears” was choreographed by Ananda Fuchs and company and performed by the Figure of Eight Dance Collective; while
• “fight, flight, feathers, f***ers” was choreographed by Sunnyboy Motau and Rachel Erdos and performed by Muzi Shili, Teboho Letele, Oscar Buthelezi and Eugene Mashiane, with lighting design by Wilhelm Disbergen, costumes by Kyle Roussouw and music compilation by Teboho Letele.

Rachel Erdos was originally brought to SA for a month by the embassy of Israel as a service to the wider SA community to work on the production with Sunnyboy Motau.

After its debut performances attracted packed houses, with critics loving the dancing, the company has already been invited to a number of other festivals. One critic published the following comment: “Truly a privilege to witness!”

Performing again this week

Tickets are still available for the company’s performance at the Johannesburg Arts Festival this week.

Ananda Fuchs’s “The Architecture of Tears” is a piece nearly two years in the making which aims to meld a series of microscopic photographs of tears by Rose-Lynn Fisher with some extraordinary dance work, music and social commentary. It is successfully performed by Grant van Ster and Shaun Oelf, who dance opposite Thabisa Dinga in choreography that is satisfying on the senses.

There is immense beauty in the piece, but the abstraction may sometimes cause the audience to lose some of the meaning or clear narrative.

LEFT: Grant van Ster (left) and Shaun Oelf opposite Thabiso Dinga in The Architecture of Tears. Photograph by Dex Goodman

On-screen photographic images are fascinating but the audience has no engagement with them.

Not since a very young Athena Mazarakis choreographed an astonishing fight scene in a version of A Clockwork Orange have we seen such “fight, flight, feathers, f***ers”.

The fight choreography created by Sunnyboy Motau and Rachel Erdos’ collaboration with Moving Into Dance Mophatong performers in “fight, flight, feathers, f***ers” – the second half of the double bill – is indeed both articulate and mesmerising.

An essay on the conflicting and contradictory challenges of masculinity in a contemporary world, the work ably brings together a sophisticated reflection on what is foe, what is friend, and what is ambiguously neither and both.

The curious and ingenious use of masks is used to evoke Anubis, the Egyptian wolf-god of the dead, as they lend an effulgent sense of darkness to the works. Feathers are not only a metaphor, but spin from clichéd softness into an aggressive taunt which their audiences struggle to pull your eyes from.

While fight and flight choreography lend the piece its fire, there are elements that reflex a complex intertwining of bodies that is completely enthralling to behold and make one think of local traditions of wood sculpture – in which one piece of wood is worked in such a way that many intertwined bodies are evoked.

The four performers: Muzi Shili, Oscar Buthelezi, Teboho Letele and Eugene Mashiane – demonstrate a level of give and take and call and response that is truly a privilege to witness.

The double bill comprised ‘The Architecture of Tears’ and ‘fight, flight, feathers, f***ers’:

• “The Architecture of Tears” was choreographed by Ananda Fuchs and company and performed by the Figure of Eight Dance Collective. It was performed by Grant van Ster, Shaun Oelf and Thabisa Dinga with costumes by Jen Stretch, lighting design by Ananda Fuchs and music by Max Richter, Vivaldi, Rachael Boyed, Jona Kvarnstrm and Danny Cudd/Markus Johansson.
• “fight, flight, feathers, f***ers” was choreographed by Sunnyboy Motau and Rachel Erdos and performed by Muzi Shili, Teboho Letele, Oscar Buthelezi and Eugene Mashiane, with lighting design by Wilhelm Disbergen, costumes by Kyle Roussouw and music compilation by Teboho Letele.