Girl with a Movie Camera
Choreographed by Jennifer Nikolai
Video and stage direction by Andrew Denton
Performed by dancers from the AUT Dance Company
Walter Kerr, reviewing John Van Druten’s I am a Camera in 1951, summed up his experience in three memorable words: ‘Me no Leica.’ I am a Camera went on to become Cabaret and a great hit. Reviewers are not always right. I like to think that, had Kerr experienced Girl with a Movie Camera he would have, as I did, Leica’d it a lot!
Let’s be perfectly clear. Art should be liberating and, since Girl with a Movie Camera is most certainly art and I was most certainly liberated by it, I must say that I am a fan of Jennifer Nikolai the person, the teacher, the philosopher, the coffee-drinking buddy. Of Jennifer Nikolai, in fact, I am inordinately fond. We work together, have the same employer and have been known, on occasion, she adds blushing, to share a bottle of wine ~ in the company of our wonderful partners, of course. This needed to be said as partners also come into this reflection and we leave them out at our peril. Just as Vertov’s wife Elizaveta Svilova edited his work, so Nikolai’s husband Andrew Denton is integral to Girl with a Movie Camera, but more of that later …
So there, now you know.
Not that knowing someone and respecting them should be reason to misunderstand, under-estimate, or over-value their work. Nor should it mean, in a country the size of New Zealand where the arts are universally undervalued and quality practitioners are sparse, that we should not review each other’s work where appropriate and be seen to be objective about it. It’s a fact of life and we should get used to it. It’s better, surely, to have an informed and detailed critique than unrestrained praise from the illiterate and uninformed. Reviews are, after all, not just fodder for the artist or quotes for the marketing team but should also provide an educated source of critical comment, knowledge and information for the general public and, dare it be said, an historical record as well .
As reviewers we should also get used to the fact that some artists feel they have the right to lambast reviewers for their opinions and do so with alacrity. I have, on occasion, done so myself and felt much better for it. ‘There, that’ll show him’ I have thought whilst at the same time realising that, apart from dissipating pique, I have achieved nothing.
Back in the day my work was often reviewed by Paul Bushnell, not always favourably, but I grew to view with satisfaction the knowledge that he would review what I had created. I didn’t always agree with him but I did grow to respect that he would always be honest and, when necessary, ruthlessly so. Through Paul’s informed and intelligent observations my work grew. He had that happy knack of sensing when I was cheating and had the courage to say so. Bravo Paul, thank you for your integrity, particularly as I am aware that others were less enamoured of your candour and certainly felt free to say so.
I endeavour, always, to emulate your integrity.
Girl with a Movie Camera is listed as ‘a multi-media dance/theatre piece with live and video performance, choreographed by Jennifer Nikolai and dancers, with video direction by Andrew Denton and performed by dancers from the AUT Dance Company’, and so it was.
It should be noted that, among the dancers of the AUT Dance Company, was Nikolai herself. She was unheralded, un-named, indistinguishable (though not undistinguished, oh, dear no!) a hoofer just like everyone else and this was oh so appropriate, particularly as this work followed the line of it antecedent and might have been cast, anonymously, from the Moscow telephone directory.
Performed in the main theatre space at TAPAC where the cavernous nature of the deep stage provides a great starting point for any dance work, Girl with a Movie Camera also benefited from the height as the staging consisted of two rectangular white fabric ‘drops’ which served as both projection monitors and, when back lit, perfect display screens for a range of beautifully executed live cinematic silhouettes. These silhouettes, it must be noted, had been rehearsed with exquisite care and the placement of light sources was such that a surreal power relationship between dancer and a single-minded camera tripod was able to be vibrantly explored in three dimensions with no loss of clarity.
While a mere 40 minutes long Girl with a Movie Camera, through its use of a wide range of contemporary recording and projection devices interfaced with rich physical imagery and pulsating movement was proof that it is the quality rather than the length of a piece that is important and that shortish and complete can be as satisfying as anything else. If you’re talking value for money this was certainly it!
Never one to take the easy route, Nikolai and her team set themselves a supremely serious task, namely ‘to build on Dziga Vertov’s application of film montage, his theories on ‘kino-pravda’ and his seminal film Man with a Movie Camera into a platform for dancers to develop themes into performance, in a live and recorded format. Video images and performances contrast or complement each other in an exchange of media and mediums. It is a conversation between ideas, images, and performance in search of new meaning.’
So says the press release and, quite surprisingly, this is what actually occurred. Surprisingly because press releases are often simply opportunities to advertise in ways that, while giving a sincere indication of intent, seldom deliver what is promised. Girl with a Movie Camera delivered what was promised.
Kino-pravda or ‘film-truth’ was developed by Vertov in the 1920’s as a tool for filming the everyday and the mundane and, through this, reaching a deeper truth. His style is functional and economic and he filmed in markets, bars, public places and mostly without permission. As his documentary series evolved he was more and more frequently called an ‘idiot’ and told he was ‘insane’. History recalls Vertov differently and credits him with first use of techniques such as fast and slow motion, freeze frames, split screens, tracking shots, scenes shown backwards and odd things with animation. Many of these techniques are evident in both Nikolai’s choreography and in Denton’s moving imagery almost all of which was shot in Auckland. Particularly evocative were a fast filmed day in Auckland and a fine robotic sequence performed by the company. Worthy of note here ~ since robotic dance has been around forever ~ was the freshness of ideas and the rhetoric of the physical vocabulary used in this set.
In fact the dance vocabulary throughout had a freshness and spontaneity that only comes from a freedom to discover and a delight in recreating the spontaneity of those discoveries. Not that the rehearsal machinery showed at all, quite the opposite.
Also impressive was the confidence ~ and the assurance ~ of the dancers. This was quality work danced unemotively, but not without emotion, by dancers who clearly knew they were riding a winner and who were pretty damned happy to be there. These performers were right on top of their game!
Often contemporary dance dissolves into a mishmash of previously learned (and seen) vocabulary and this is most often evident when the work lacks structure. This isn’t limited to non-linear works and it’s fair to say that, because of the nature of Vertov’s original, Nikolai’s work is less than linear. In fact, at times it seems almost intentionally episodic and expressionistic but, while so being, it never lacks metaphoric and impressionistic linkages that enable the viewer to make important reflective connections that are unique to them. Rather like ‘my random impression’ versus ‘your expressionistic reflection’, which is clever because the viewer can only ever be right about what they are consuming. Smart art, that is!
Andrew Denton’s moving images are sublime. Using some of Vertov’s repertoire of trickery Denton makes the world his own and we are constantly gob-smacked by what he achieves. He quite literally takes our breath away and when the dancers interact choreographically with the imagery, gems of memory are there for the taking. I’ve long thought that the exit moment of any work of art, that moment when you emotionally depart, is the most critical because when engagement leaves off memory begins and the reality of the encounter immediately becomes something else. Real art doesn’t just exist in the experiential flash but also in the subsequent moments of refection and memory both of which can be exclusive and dissimilar. Denton and Nikolai provide ample exit moments within the composition and we are constantly put in the vein of reflecting and remembering even before the whole opus is done and dusted.
Perhaps the most exciting aspect of Girl with a Movie Camera is that it’s not just some ‘this happened and then this happened next’ narrative. This is multi-media performance art at its finest, doubly exciting in that it’s reminiscent of nobody else, yet remains firmly locked in its contemporary dance oeuvre all the same. I tried to find reference points – Cunningham, Balanchine, Wright, Parmenter – but none would fit. This was Nikolai/Denton, pure and simple.
Yet, having said all the above and labeled this ‘art’, it must also be said that Girl With a Movie Camera wasn’t all po-faced and serious. It was also funny, witty, charming, idiosyncratic and oft-times just plain odd. It was also raw, intelligent, profound and passionate. It was all about us. About Auckland. And them. Yes, us and them. And accessible, always, always accessible.
Whilst Nikolai has choreographed and staged extensively in Vancouver this is her first choreographic outing in New Zealand and we would like to see many more. Like a seed planted and tenderly nurtured Girl With a Movie Camera has blossomed as expected, spoken as was intended and will now remain tucked away in the memory along with those two words we are hot-wired to exclaim when our humanity is laid bare: ‘bravo’ and ‘more’.
I’m adding this text of a piece by Laurie Anderson which always, for me, encapsulates the essence of contemporary dance but is apropos of nothing really. It’s here simply because I like it:
Walking and Falling
Laurie Anderson
I wanted you.
And I was looking for you.
But I couldn’t find you.
I wanted you.
And I was looking for you all day.
But I couldn’t find you.
I couldn’t find you.
You’re walking.
And you don’t always realize it, but you’re always falling.
With each step you fall forward slightly.
And then catch yourself from falling.
Over and over, you’re falling.
And then catching yourself from falling.
And this is how you can be walking and falling at the same time.
dykiegirl 