by Heidi Strauss
A Danceworks Presentation
at the Premiere Dance Theatre
April 24-26, 2008

    Heidi Strauss’s German roots align her to “exalted nature” because her name derives from “Adelheid” which can be translated as “the shape of noble conviction” and “noble intent.” Her two solos, Das Martyrium (2002) and Ohne (2008), have a noble purpose: to investigate the development of movement and how to be real on the dance stage. Das Martyrium, which has been worked a number of times before its present form, expresses Strauss’ shift from choreography to internalizing a path into a character or the self. In the background are the figures of Joan of Arc (obsession) and an autistic schoolgirl, Emma, whom Strauss knew (compulsion). So, the past is very much a reference, but more as a touchstone of glory or madness than as simply historical propaganda. The saint and the “mad” genius conflate in Strauss’ hectic spasms of movement and set to Jan Komarek’s soundscape of creaking gates, bells, and fragments of spoken word. Strauss is costumed like a doll, and her movements are often mechanical, even to the repeated staccato of head and hands as if in self-flagellation—that speaks, of course, to the saint’s self-mortification as well as to the autistic child’s uncontrolled behaviour. Komarek’s lighting becomes an indivisible part of the performance for not only does it set the geometry of space, it also creates a mood of dark mystery. Strauss is confined in a sense by the lighting because her body is often illuminated only in segments—with a small curtain dividing her visible legs from her invisible upper body and face at times—and her choreography is rigidly restricted by the amount of narrow space it is allowed in what is primarily a black empty box. She becomes a conflicted creature, sometimes a marionette, sometimes a piece of human sculpture, sometimes rapturous or martial, and sometimes passive and vulnerable. This solo has a driven quality, though its repetitions don’t necessarily expand or clarify its impulses.

   Ohne, which means “without” in German, gives memory and obsession a more autobiographical basis because here Strauss attempts to relate her dancer’s choreography to the reality of an audience’s expectations and readings of her movement. Now dressed in a stylish contemporary pantsuit and high heels, she sets the stage, removing the clothesline and curtain of Das Martyrium, pacing agitatedly back and forth the floor, glancing at the audience, uncertain as to what she wants to do next. So, she is literally without props and left to her own imagination and reality as a dancer. German music plays on either a radio or phonograph and her pacing comes to an abrupt halt in a flash of light. She tries stamping her toes on the back foot and kicking high, but she totters and falls. She repeatedly loses her balance while running or stamping or high-kicking. Much of the beat comes from her tapping feet, and though the tossed and broken movements seem formless, they signal her abandonment or surrender to herself or to what she is doing with her body as a means to exploring experience, identity, reality. The dance seems to falter, then recover, and then relapse. It goes to extremes of both fluency and impediment. Because the entire stage is used and is flooded with light in contrast to the darkness of Das Martyrium, the dance seems less confined. It is defined by spins, tumbles, spirals, leaps, et cetera, but I found it dry and abstract, more of an aesthetic exercise than a truly invigorating, expansive exploration. I felt more than a little detached from the dancer’s self-involvement.

photos: Jeremy Mimnagh


Go Back to: Dance Reviews