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Also this issue: Equal Movement Rights Razzle Dazzle Faith in Freedom Lights, Camera, Inaction |
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![](\"../images/teal.gif\") |
April 18-24, 2002
dance
![\"\"](\"dance2-1.jpg\") |
ARCHIVES .
April 18-24, 2002 dance Ghost World
Bill T. Jones April 11-13, The Kimmel Center The Bill T. Jones who performed at Kimmel’s Perelman Theater last weekend is at a somewhat different place as a dancer-choreographer, and as a human being, than where we’ve met him locally in times past. We’ve seen him funny, frantic, athletic, poetic and angry, taking his subject matter from the world itself. The Breathing Show, his evening-length solo dance mediation, is filled with shadows (he calls them “ghosts”) of time past and lost friends, including Arnie Zane, his longtime dance partner who died of AIDS complications, and of his own shadows (at age 50 he lives openly as an HIV-positive gay African-American). Always as much an intellectual as a performer, on this visit Jones’ subject was the interior life -- his and, by extension, ours. Jones lamented at first that the Perelman might be too new to have any ghosts of its own. Nevertheless, he managed to find quite a few. His mood was one of solemn introspection conducted within a rigorously minimalist stage setting -- bare stage, subtle shifts of neutral-toned drops, occasional introduction of an assemblage construction -- plus a violinist wandering through playing Schubert and an enigmatic gentleman wearing dark glasses strolling along with balloons. Surreal. Spare. Very elegant. We are led into quiet reflections on life, death, art, gardens and old shoes. At one point Jones even teaches the audience a Zen meditation exercise. Jones talks -- and dances -- throughout. Some of this is monologue, some aimed directly into the audience. And he keeps dancing. He's still a luscious mover, his large body extending effortlessly in any direction, and seamlessly segueing between modern and ballet and whatever. It's a little embarrassing when the invisible wall between performer and audience member is removed and everyone realizes that it's not just about how they feel about the performer, but about how the performer feels about them. We were a sad-sack crew the night I was there; no one shot back at Jones the electricity his performance deserved. I wondered what it all looked like when the audience was more engaged -- or whether these were subjects the average audience member would always just as soon keep at arm's length. The Breathing Show doesn't lend itself to capsule assessments. It lingers in the mind. Hopefully, he can keep catching ghosts to share with us, and now and then drop by to remind us that the body and mind are not two separate worlds. 
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