Goode
performers delve into human issues
By Monica Levette Clark
On-line Forty-Niner
What
does the body know? Can it sense promiscuity,
loneliness, despair or sorrow? And when
it senses these things, does it then react
negatively, causing its organ systems and
functions to shut down completely?
Choreographer Joe Goode seems to think so
by exploring the intuition of the body in
one of his 30-minute work titled “What the
Body Knows.” On April 12, the performances
featured the Joe Goode Performance Group
at the Carpenter Performing Arts Center.
The six-dancer group — three men and three
women, put their bodies through an experience
full of leaps, flips, falls and recoveries
based on responses to human issues.
The opening scene featured dancers Felipe
Barrueto Cabello and Elizabeth Burritt downstage
right, with a yellow spotlight over them
as they sat around a makeshift breakfast
table, with cereal and a bowl to boot. For
five minutes, the two dancers erupted into
a ball of intertwining blue flame, the color
of Burritt’s costume and bob-cut wig.
Burritt was tossed around like a human rag
doll — with her body over Cabello’s shoulders,
on top of his back, sliding down his thigh,
and pivoting around his hips and pelvis.
This visceral experience epitomized pain
and passion through raw movement. When it
was all over; they remained in the position
they started in, and finished by sitting
at a breakfast table.
Goode’s aesthetic incorporated the use of
vocal accompaniment and acting into his
works. In this piece, there were songs sung
by a dancer about having exzema, reciting
monologues about sexual addiction and diseases.
One scene stood out as the focal point from
all sections of the dance sprung. With a
dark stage, Burritt sat at a table, equipped
with a video camera and desk lamp, and spoke
to the audience.
The facial expressions were projected on
a large screen for everyone to view while
the audience laughed at her. She became
a psychiatrist of sorts, letting us know
that what goes on with our bodies resemble
a reflection of what’s going on in our lives.
“Mythic Montana,” another of Goode’s works
was also presented in the evening’s concert,
after a 20-minute intermission. Inspired
by Greek mythology, Goode said in the program’s
liner notes that he “was stuck by how human
and fallible the gods were.
It occurred to [him] that none of us know
what fate holds for us and that goodness
may go un-rewarded.” He contemplates this
issue once again, but this time it is told
under the precepts of love, and whether
or not we are fated to have it.
The dance was set in a small hick town called
Mythic, “with small people who live small,
insignificant lives, but their passions
and deep inner stereo is turned up very
loud,” said a line from one of the songs.
With these dances, Goode once again did
what he does best, melding music, song,
movement and drama together to create theatrical
masterpieces that housed thematic messages
for every living mortal.
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