The Terpsichorean Delight of ‘Sensoria’

Reviewed by John Herbert Cunningham

Sensoria, performed at Gas Station Theatre by Gearshifting Performance Works, choreographed by Jolene Bailie, Thursday, April 21, 2010

Winnipeggers over the last few years have been treated to appearances by several of Canada’s top modern dance groups – Vancouver’s Edam Dance, Toronto Dance Theatre, Fortier Danse-Création, Santee Smith’s Kaha:wi Dance Theatre– as well as top Canadian choreographers such as Serge Bennathan, Julia Sasso, Sasha Ivanochko. This has served to give Winnipeg’s dance aficionados an opportunity to see what is happening in the rest of the country. It has also given them a point of comparison, demonstrating that Jolene Bailie is in Canada’s top echelon of choreographers. This night was no exception. In fact, it surpassed many others. It was one of those WOW moments that rarely come along and, when they do, you just gotta be there.

Photo of Jolene Bailie by Hugh Conacher

I had heard that Bailie was pursuing her MFA and wondered, considering she was already one of the best, why she was doing that now. Her response demonstrated her true professionalism and dedication to her art: “The faculty is world-class, I have the opportunity to network and be immersed in the world of The American Dance Festival (which is the largest modern dance festival in the world) for three summers, with my peers and established senior artists, the faculty to student ratio is very low with there being only nine students in my class, I have access to incredible mentors and it is entrance into a circle that would have previously been closed off to me. It is a really amazing program that has opened me up in ways that I did not even know existed. I am also committed to life-long learning.”

Sensoria consists of three pieces involving five female dancers. Knowing that Bailie had employed male dancers in the past, I was curious as to why there were none this time around. She cited two main reasons – the first artistic, the second practical: “First off, the idea of replication, clones, androids and the Hybrid Human all lend themselves to being as similar as possible. There are also simply more females in dance in general and currently there are not any male dancers who have completed their professional modern dance training and who are available for project work residing in Winnipeg.” I’d heard this complaint before from Natasha Torres-Garner. I had to wonder where such dancers as Ian Mikita and Ian Modzden were.

Although very different pieces, the three comprising Sensoria had a commonality which gave the evening a cohesiveness seldom encountered in the dance world unless only one piece is performed.

The evening began with ‘A Glimpse into Sensory Life, Infinite World’. I had seen the premier of this last year at the CanWest Centre for Performing Arts. At that time, it was a full-length production, Bailie’s first, and involved five female and two male dancers. I had also seen excerpts from this at various locations. This performance was definitely not my recollection of that piece. As Bailie says: “The work performed in Sensoria was based on some of the material from Sensory Life, Infinite World. It is simply another glimpse into that ecosystem. It is not a re-mount or an excerpt. It is derived from the work created from the 2010 production. Calling it a new piece would feel dishonest.” This rendition was performed in exquisite fashion by Bronwyn Bundon, Claire Marshall, Krista Nicholson, Christie Peters and Tiffany Thomas. There was some tremendous interplay between the dancers as they adhered into different formations. One of the highlights was how Krista Nicholson, who has not completed her professional training, fit into this production.

The second piece was a solo performed by a noticeably pregnant Jolene Bailie (she’s due in July). A friend who had accompanied me to the performance asked her if she could feel the foetus kicking during her performance, to which she answered in the affirmative. Knowing Bailie, she had probably choreographed even these moves. She began writing this choreography prior to being pregnant. As she commented “I began Gloria’s Sensoria in August, 2010. I have been plugging away at it all the time since then. When I discovered that I was pregnant, I simply continued to work. Albeit a different experience altogether, the piece would also work equally well for a non-pregnant performer. I suspect that I will not be pregnant every time it is performed. It is a work in progress with costumes, media and sound still to be designed.” Bailie is known for her incredibly athletic performances during which she sometimes strikes yoga asanas. She had to tone this down considerably for this performance. However, her movements remained striking and, accompanied as they were by the recitation of a text exploring existential themes from Kierkegaard through Nietzsche to Sartre, the piece as a whole generated considerable interest. I’d be remiss were I not to mention that the text was a collaboration between Bailie and Jem Rolls of Fringe Festival fame.

The concluding piece was an excerpt from the recent collaboration between Bailie, Wanda Koop, Hugh Conacher and Susan Chafe that took place this past fall at the Winnipeg Art Gallery and then went on the road across Canada. I had missed the full-length piece. After seeing this excerpt, I winced and wondered just how high I could kick my ass. Returning to the stage were the five female dancers who exhibited that wow factor. Susan Chafe’s music was incredibly apt, combining electronic and acoustic music in seamless fashion, reminiscent of that incredible Toronto group, Syrinx, who composed the theme music to ‘This Hour has Seven Days’. Conacher ably demonstrated why he is considered one of the best Canadian lighting designers.

The piece itself showed how a rather banal movement in most choreographies, dancers running around the stage, could be turned into a movement integral to the overall artistry. More often than not, the movement is used as a segue to another unrelated part of the design when the choreographer doesn’t know exactly how to accomplish that transition. The running in this case did not last long and had a definite aim.

The show was over far too quickly. I was mesmerized by this terpsichorean delight. Jolene Bailie cemented herself as one of the best of Canadian choreographers.