The primoridal in motion

By Sara G. Levin

“... We do not stand on the beach and inquire of the ocean what was its movement of the past and what will be its movement of the future. We realize that the movement peculiar to its nature is eternal to its nature...”
—Isadora Duncan, 1903.

“Shizen” is one Pilobolus’s most beautiful dances being performed this season at the Joyce. Choreographed in 1978, the duet is like a mating dance of amoebas. Leaving behind any sense of story or character, the dancers morph in and out of each other, like organisms that have existed since before our time.

The man and woman are basically naked, wearing only tan colored underwear, and each shift of weight strikes an ephemeral shape, like the gliding shards of a kaleidoscope. Unfortunately, by comparison, the company’s new duet, “Persistence of Memory,” feels like it’s missing something.

There are impressive moments. In one imaginative lift, Manelich Minniefee sustains Annika Sheaff above him by making his body a plank, held up by only his push-up positioned arms. In another she holds him up as if by sheer determination.

But there is still that unnamable thing that makes “Shizen” float out of time, and Persistence of Memory just “pretty.”

The disparity might have something to do with Pilobolus’ namesake — a phototropic zygomycete less than 1 cm tall that can hurtle spores six feet into the air. Like it, the company’s dancers find incredible strength in simplicity — no costumes, no plot, just energy and momentum. By being so elemental and basic, their style also taps into what has defined so much American modern dance.

After Isadora Duncan declared ballet “deforming” in 1903 and threw away her toe shoes, she developed what she dubbed “natural movement.” Her rebellious spirit of distilling dance to some essential form continued to inspire dancers well into the ’60s when they threw away almost everything from traditional dance theater — story, music, the proscenium... In essence, modern dance has always found innovation by devolving.

There was a digression from ballet, with hyper-beautiful humans that leapt into heaven, to slightly imitating real people on stage — the hurtling dangerous bodies of “Esplanade” by Paul Taylor and the pedestrians on stage with Yvonne Rainer. Then came Pilobolus, rewinding dance past humans, past animals, to single-celled amoebas.

“Shizen” distills the very epitome of modern dance, which, ironically, evokes something that is very old. There is something profound in its extreme simplicity that makes “Persistence of Memory” disappointing, even though the work is pleasing to watch. “Persistence” weakly hints at relationships, and the story of a love maybe lost. The unclear inferences to plot and character seem more forced than real, and it loses the powerful moments that make other Pilobolus pieces awesome.

Of course, Pilobolus wears many hats, and has created other pieces that are as great as they are unique.

Take “Walklyndon” (1971), also being performed at the Joyce in this run. Featuring yellow leotards and physical gags, the piece is hysterical, and injects weird characters into the mix. “Day Two” (1980) is also fun, harkening back to the primitive with the whole group topless, and hurtling themselves through the air.

But there is something so primordial and wondrous about “Shizen” that it seems to have taken modern dance full circle. Like Duncan’s self-declared “dances of the future,” which harkened back to barefoot, ancient Greek performances, “Shizen” is so modern it evokes a simplicity that predates our time.