Dance review | Brooding momentum and meditative calmness in Bastard Amber

****

Bastard Amber is a colour of a lighting gel used in theatre lights. Originally a salmon amber gel gone wrong, it was discovered that the mistake in production had created a new colour that was excellent for skin tones. In Liz Roche’s dance on the Abbey stage, amber shades dictate mood and movement, creating a world where visual translucence mirrors metaphoric uncertainties around memory and mortality.

A quote from Yeats's The Dreaming of the Bones is projected on to the back wall as the audience members take their seats. "The stage is any bare place in a room close to a wall" not only sets up the action, but, by placing the words on the wall, separates the bare stage from the surrounding building. Yeats may have established the Abbey, but tonight Roche has ownership of the stage. From the very first moments of the dance, she puts the body at the forefront: Hélène Cathala walks in straight lines, tapping her hip, each tap loudly punctuated by a drum, so that it appears that the body is solid, resilient and resonant. Later, the sounds of breathing replace music as bodies are racked with gasps and spasmodic gestures, depicting frustration and struggle.

Central to Bastard Amber are two septets that are pushed along by Ray Harman's music in three-four time. Here Roche's choreographic dexterity is at its height. The second is particularly satisfyingly, as asymmetric groups of dancers merge and disperse like a kaleidoscope. A brooding momentum develops with the introduction of white light and electric guitars, coinciding with the dancers carving out more straight-lined movement.

These contrast with moments of meditative calmness when individuals coalesce into community. As the amber lights begin to turn red, the dancers clump together and place palms on each other's bodies in a gesture of empathy and support. Combined with Zoë Conway singing the last lines of Sailing to Byzantium, these final moments suggest that life can be commemorated by what it leaves behind, rather than by seeking immortality through art. Ends May 27th