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The Guardian
09-02-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Vibes, viscerality and the odd boo: inaugural Rose International prize is a curious snapshot of dance right now
The winner of the inaugural Rose International prize was announced on Saturday night. The new biennial competition with a £40,000 bounty for the victor is initially guaranteed to run for 10 editions, by which time it hopes to be on a par with the Booker or Turner prizes, boosting dance's profile accordingly. It was Greek choreographer Christos Papadopoulos who took home the honour (and a cool Es Devlin-designed trophy) for his piece Larsen C, chosen by an eclectic judging panel, with Christopher Bannerman and Arlene Phillips from the dance world, musician PJ Harvey and poet Karthika Naïr. (There was also £15,000 awarded to an early-career choreographer in the Bloom prize, won by Stav Struz Boutrous.) Papadopoulos is pretty much unknown in the UK, but a darling of the Greek dance scene who's toured widely in Europe. Larsen C may have been the most divisive piece in the contest. The title refers to an Antarctic ice shelf, and the dance does indeed move at glacial pace, with small, repetitive movements that drove some viewers to distraction (it's rare to hear a 'boo' in a polite dance theatre). It was inspired, the choreographer has said, by how your perception of something can completely alter when the smallest element is changed. There's an element of illusion that can't help call to mind Papadopoulos's compatriot Dimitris Papaioannou, as bodies disappear into the blackness of the stage and flashes of flesh appear, looking like truncated arms or extra limbs – the dancers' feet in shadow making them seem as if they're gliding soundlessly. There's beautiful movement here, boneless limbs like drifting tentacles, as mysterious as the creatures in the depths of the Mariana Trench. As the music grows from fuzzy white noise to insistent rhythm, rumbling subwoofer to thick drone, the dancers gather into a moving mass with the repetition inviting a sort of trance state. It grows towards a coup de theatre made of copious haze and a piercing light – when a hand penetrates its beam it looks like an arm from the heavens coming to grab a lost soul, a divine intervention perhaps. It's an impressive effect. But after that the piece doesn't know what to do with itself and loses its way. The three other works on the strong shortlist, presented across two weeks at Sadler's Wells, were American choreographer Kyle Abraham's An Untitled Love, previously seen in the UK at Edinburgh International festival, Carcaça by Portuguese choreographer Marco da Silva Ferreira and Brazilian Lia Rodrigues's Encantado. Trying to judge art may seem a futile exercise to some, but it's an intriguing snapshot of dance right now. The pieces on show aren't attached to traditional formal techniques and structures, more driven by vibes or viscerality. Three of the works, Larsen C, Carcaça and Encantado are built on long slow crescendos; An Untitled Love, set to the music of D'Angelo, is episodic in nature, as if dropping into lives that are already in full swing. Abraham's genius is in smooshing together different dance styles – classical, contemporary, social and street – with laid-back ease, presenting a picture of extended family life with dance at its heart. Da Silva Ferreira is also concerned with dance as a social activity, drawing on club, street and folk in a distinctive but unpindownable language. It is part sexy, part military, part silly, strictly rhythmic, not in phrases of steps strung together but cells or riffs, one thing repeated many times, then moving on to the next. It's very 2020s with its mildly intimidating, androgynous cast, the catwalk and duck walks taken from club culture, but it's also deeply primal, building to hypnotic effect, which may daze, energise or enervate, depending on the viewer (personally, this could be my favourite piece of the four). It then takes an unexpected swerve into politics, calling out the bourgeoisie in forceful voice, turning this into the people's dance, harnessing the power of bodies coming together, in escape, in ecstasy and in protest. Lia Rodrigues has long acted on her politics, Encantado was created in the favelas of Rio in the midst of the pandemic. The veteran of this group, at 68, is also the most avant garde. Confident enough in her practice to, for example, start her piece with an empty, silent stage, and to keep that silence for a length of time that some in the audience clearly found uncomfortable (the sound of stifled giggles and shifting in seats). Then have her dancers walk on naked and burrow underneath huge sheets of fabric laid across the stage, mountainous lumps covered in loudly clashing colours, florals and animal prints. But when the dancers slowly start to move, and drape and twist and tie those fabrics around their bodies, they are transformed into innumerable vibrant characters, turbans and robes make gurus and kings, young ladies sunning themselves at the beach or old ones gossiping at the market, animals and raggy monsters; all of life suddenly, vividly appearing out of nothing. Rodrigues became a grandmother during the making of the piece, and here is the magic of life materialising, with joy and effervescence. An ode to the infinite possibilities of some bodies and a stage.
The Guardian
09-02-2025
- Entertainment
- The Guardian
Infinite possibilities: the Rose International Dance prize
Raquel Alexandre and Daline Ribeiro in Encantado by Lia Rodrigues. David Abreu in Encantado by Lia Rodrigues. Valentina Fittipaldi, centre, in Encantado by Lia Rodrigues. A scene from Encantado by Lia Rodrigues. A scene from Larsen C by Christos Papadopoulos. Adonis Vais and Maria Bregianni in Larsen C by Christos Papadopoulos. André Speedy Garcia, far right, in Carcaça by Marco da Silva Ferreira. A scene from Carcaça by Marco da Silva Ferreira. Roderick Phifer and Keerati Jinakunwiphat in An Untitled Love by Kyle Abraham. Martell Ruffin and Catherine Kirk in An Untitled Love by Kyle Abraham. Gianna Theodore, left and Jae Neal, right, in An Untitled Love by Kyle Abraham. A scene from Carcaça by Marco da Silva Ferreira. A scene from An Untitled Love by Kyle Abraham. A scene from Carcaça by Marco da Silva Ferreira. A scene from Larsen C by Christos Papadopoulos. Georgios Kotsifakis, Maria Bregianni, Sotiria Koutsopetrou and Ioanna Paraskevopoulou in Larsen C by Christos Papadopoulos. A scene from An Untitled Love by Kyle Abraham.
The Independent
30-01-2025
- Entertainment
- The Independent
An Untitled Love review: Romance takes centre stage in Kyle Abraham's celebration of African American life
Kyle Abraham's An Untitled Love kicks off the new Rose International Dance Prize on a note of community, joy, and sheer beauty. To an R&B soundtrack by D'Angelo, 10 dancers meet, pair off, gossip, and hang out. As individual stories weave in and out, Abraham builds a bigger picture of a culture. It's the finest work I've yet seen from Abraham, and it makes a strong start for the Rose Prize. Designed to give dance its own equivalent of the Booker or the Turner, the award has strands for emerging artists as well as established names like Abraham. After 10 days of prize performances, the winners will chosen by a jury including PJ Harvey and Arlene Philips. Danced by his own company, AIM by Kyle Abraham, An Untitled Love sets a high bar. The choreography draws on social dancing, contemporary, hip hop, and everyday gesture. It adds up to a luscious quality of movement, an easy virtuosity. A shared glance turns into a dance, or puts someone on their dignity. In one gorgeous scene, four women sit on a sofa, reacting in unison to the world about them: shrugging one shoulder, clasping hands over a crossed knee, a turn of the head. The timing is deft and witty, those rippling shoulders and fluid torsos make the dance glow. Dan Scully's simple set evokes places people meet: a sofa and houseplants, different lamps for club or living room. The soundtrack throws in snatches of conversation: Catherine Kirk has an entire offstage monologue as she gets ready for a date she's not sure about, zipping up dress after dress as she questions her own commitment. Some of these lovers have an easier time of it. One couple lock eyes early, awareness of each other colouring how they move. A group of men give a friend well-meant dating advice; another man pursues a woman, having failed to notice that she already has a girlfriend. While the focus is romance, the sense of love feels much broader. Abraham touches on racism, but refuses to centre it: there's an element of defiance in the happiness of this work. Celebrating the Black American community he grew up in, he's both sharp-eyed and fond. Characters can be petty or insecure, without losing depth. An Untitled Love feels deeply humane: its worldview is as generous as its lovely, flowing moves.
