★★★★✰ It's impossible to make coherent sense of a Bausch piece, whatever the source of her inspiration.
Tag - Peter Pabst
★★★✰✰ Like all Pina Bausch’s pieces based on her company’s residencies in different cities, this one (which translates as ‘like moss on a stone’), inspired by Chile, is tantalising in its references.
Expecting the unexpected comes with the territory of any production by Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch and so even unplanned events can seem to be part of the show.
The cast’s collective maturity serves the work well since the central theme of many of the 50 or so episodes concerns the passage of life; concentrating especially on memories of childhood and youth contrasting with images of old age.
Working backwards from the title song that ends Two Cigarettes in the Dark, it’s possible to discern a theme in Pina Bausch’s 1985 piece...
Sometimes Água’s moving images are dizzyingly beautiful, undulating palm fronds echoing the women’s waving tresses; sometimes they seem reminders that civilisation is only skin deep; or that the untamed jungle is indifferent to human concerns.
Ten Chi is like a musical composition mostly in a minor key – an accumulation of moments and motifs without a strong sense of purpose. In fact, much of the recorded music seems half-heard in sleep. There’s a pervasive feeling of melancholy, of a culture beyond comprehension except in crass tourist terms.
I have had some of the best dreams ever while wide awake and watching Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch. The company conjures imagery that no conscious mind seems capable of assembling.