“Beautiful Me”
Gregory Maqoma/Vuyani Dance Theatre
Forum, Yerba Buena Center for the Arts
San Francisco, CA
November 5, 2009
by Rita Felciano
In its American premiere South African Gregory Maqoma’s mesmerizing meditation on finding his own voice in the pool of contemporary and traditional African dance glittered and flitted like a trout in a sun-speckled dream. Though ragged at its edges, “Beautiful Me” was held together by the sheer force of Maqoma’s thrilling performance and the astounding collaborative input of four exceptional musicians: Poorvi Bhana (sitar), Bongani Kunene (cello), Isaac Moleleka (violin) and Mandienkosi Nhlapo (percussion). Feeding the restless energy of this remarkable dancer’s own imagination were choreographic contributions from colleagues Akram Khan, Faustin Linyekula and Vincent Mantsoe. The result was intimacy that spilled beyond the borders of the personal into something akin to the global.
Initially trained in South Africa, then in Vienna, at P.A.R.T.S in Brussels and with Kahn, Maqoma is a truly global dancer thinker. He brings to his work the multiple influences from his early street dance and traditional African dance experiences, a highly stylized sense of theatrical space, and the theatrical savvy of someone who has seen a lot and absorbed more.
Maqoma divided “Beautiful” into three sections through which he entered into conversation with his fellow artists, starting with the focused intensity of Khan’s approach to Kathak, followed by the drama of Linyekula’s political engagement and concluding with fellow Sowetian Mantsoe’s Afro-Fusion evocations of life in the townships.
He balanced these high intensity encounters with the recurring image of a long-legged bird that strutted and roamed the landscape, its wings at bay or grandly flapping, its darting head taking everything in. While the avian provided continuity in an at times too loosely structured work, it also connected Maqoma to nature. It looked like the piece’s most consistent traditional African element. Maqoma used it first at the beginning when he verbally addressed his father in a poem (reprinted in English in the program) “Baba I am a peacock.”
It’s in the Kathak section that Maqoma was at his most spectacularly expressive, topping his heel and flat-footed beats with butterfly Flamenco wrists, scooping and slicing arms that disappeared in a blur of motion like accelerating propellers. More than once his body simply became another musical instrument. At one point the vibration of his footwork created a bass rumble beneath soaring string melodies. You watched the energy soar in his torso, and the ground started to respond. The way he traveled downstage in a narrow beam of light only to intersperse the close to the body movements with simple strides and running patterns spoke of freedom and discipline all combined in one human being.
For part two, Michael Mannion’s throughout excellent lighting design created a wide-open space in which an arm swinging Maqoma traveled, accompanied by a lone cello. But gradually the tension built as he moved and crouched down around a projected compass, calling up historical periods and the dictators that came with it. It was a ritualistic evocation of a time and place that—with the name of Mobutu —clearly has not yet come to the end. Maqoma seemed to call up ancestral spirits—his father among them—in dancing that became increasingly agitated, twirling, spiraling and kicking. In an odd image, he violently beat his own bottom, trying to egg himself on or mutilate his body? The piece moved towards a kind of ecstatic rant that can happen when musicians and dancers step beyond technique into the realm of intuition. For a split second you could see where jazz had come from.
The third “change is possible” part, proved to be the most problematic since it involved a lot of spoken, not always comprehensible text. Here Maqoma spoke about his (and presumably Mantsoe’s) experiences as the “good kid.” He gibed at the Pope, President Bush and the Queen; he recalled the poverty which meant a sharing band uniform and the conflict with his father (“I wouldn’t play football”) who made him incessantly practice his “R”s.
The index finger became a central motive, pulling Maqoma into space but also exploring his own body. A lot of the dancing became hard edged with dropped poses, stiff-legged spins, Voguing and a furiously propelled run on his knees. But he also returned, one more time, to some of the movement material from the opening Kathak material, here to the purity of Bhana’s voice and sitar.
Two final observations. The contribution by the playing, clucking and clapping musicians, cannot be overstated. Their sensitivity and tuning into the dancer was extraordinary. Percussionist Nhlapo, in particular, often became a direct extension of Maqoma’s body. No wonder the dancer often looked as if he wanted to melt into the band.
The most problematic decision—one that rarely succeeds—was Maqoma’s stepping outside his persona in trying to bridge the space that naturally separates the performer from the audience. It started when he blew little breaths at us, and ended with us being asked to help him repeat his “R’s” so he could claim his first name. Of course, everyone, myself included, obliged. The sincerity was captivating, but also sounded a little false because a performance is a performance is a performance.
