Cool Dancing in Warm Spaces: Jane Gotch and Myra Bazell at the Iron Factory

Excerpted from thINKingDANCE.

Jane Gotch's Let It Fall, a duet for Leo Gayden and Juliet Remmers. Photo by Mike Strong.
Jane Gotch’s Let It Fall, a duet for Leo Gayden and Juliet Remmers. Photo by Mike Strong.

Myra Bazell, a much-loved teacher of dance, and Jane Gotch first met fifteen years ago when Gotch had to scratch together enough change to take Bazell’s popular modern class. The good-vibe feeling between these two choreographers was evident as Bazell explained to the audience of about thirty on a (thankfully) not-too-hot June evening that the Iron Factory was a positive venue for this reunion.

During Bazell’s ISEEISAW, featuring the fine dancing of Eleanor Goudie-Averill, Grace Stern and Elizabeth Weinstein, I wondered whether these three were representing one or two characters at different life stages. The piece opened with Stern, sitting on a bench placed upstage, and Goudie-Averill and Weinstein on opposite sides of the space. A scratchy recording of a 30’s-era song created an air of nostalgia. Goudie-Averill and Weinstein traced large running circles in the space until they collided with a jarring S*M*A*C*K!!!–their bodies connecting with the attraction of two magnets. Moving in unison, they then mirrored one another as the lone dancer on the bench gazed off in the distance as though reminiscing about the very scene being danced….

[The Iron Factory, 118 Fontain Street] June 13-14, 2014, theironfactory.org.

Read the full article on thINKingDANCE.org.

 

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