OFA Brings Collaborative ‘Viewpointe’

There aren’t many ballet performances that incorporate aerial dance, snowfall, and a shopping cart into a single production, but the Harvard Dance Department knows no boundaries. Last Saturday in the New College Theatre, the Office for the Arts at Harvard held its final showing of “Dancers’ Viewpointe 11,” an eclectic and highly creative program that incorporated both professional and student choreography.

The show opened with an air of spontaneity: most of the dancers were positioned in the audience before the show, leaping through the rows of seats and skipping through aisles to reach the stage. A lighthearted improvisation followed, during which dancers moved to their own interpretation of a spoken word track composed of a succession of vignettes and anecdotes.

The highlight of the evening was the program’s second piece “RE +,” a multi-part collaboration between Keith A. Thompson—a professional dancer from the Liz Lerman Dance Exchange—and Harvard dancers who participated in the dance performance intensive during the January Optional Winter Activities Week. The first movement of “RE +” resembled a slowed-down martial arts routine, which expertly showcased the physicality and agility of male dancers Christian A. Rivera ’13 and Tabare A. Gowon ’11. “Red” was the theme of the next movement: bathed in red light, the dancers moved with and around red objects, including a giant red ball, a red book, and a red shopping cart, while one of the dancers repeated a short monologue into a red microphone. During the final movement, dozens of red microphones were lowered from the ceiling while the dancers performed from the floor, using only arms and legs to convey a searching motion. Capturing the eclectic nature of the show as a whole, “RE +” was a successful embodiment of the skillful collaborative effort between choreographer and dancers in the January intensive.

“Gamble Away,” choreographed only by students, featured the most experienced dancers in the program: Natalie A. Cameron '11, Whitney R. Fitts '12, Merritt A. Moore '10-'11, Kevin Shee ’11, and Elizabeth C. Walker '11. The piece was an elegant presentation of talent that was undoubtedly at a professional level. Though it was much more traditional than the other pieces—meticulous in form and technique, and free of props—“Gamble Away” was an admirable achievement for the dancers, as they succeeded in physically express their own vision onstage.

Exemplary technique and flawless execution characterized Brenda Divelbliss’ “Two and One,” the third piece of the show. Whitney R. Fitts ’12 and Kevin Shee ’11 completed one effortless lift after another in their impeccable performance. With sad, sweeping arm movements perfectly mirroring the grim piano melody, Fitts and Shee displayed both a beautiful chemistry and a technical prowess that established the stylistic versatility of Harvard’s performers.

With somber, church-like music set to solemn, heavy choreography, the appropriately titled “Elegy,” by Jessica Berson and the dancers was another outstanding work in the evening’s program. A tower of white silk was the only reprieve from a stage immersed in darkness. The aerial dancing from this white silk, set to a fascinating track of vocals, was certainly one of the most captivating moments of the production. Like “Re +,” “Elegy” was also the product of student-choreographer collaboration between Jessica Berson—Acting Dance Director of the Harvard Dance Department—and the dancers.

The show ended on a cheery, though perhaps overly simplistic note, with choreographer Peter Pucci’s dance of changing seasons, “sprangsprungspring.” Though a few exemplary solos raised the caliber of the piece, “sprangsprungspring” seemed elementary compared to the preceding works: it began with dancers bundled in winter coats under artificial snowfall on the stage and ended with dancers sweeping across the stage under bright lighting in beachwear. Though it ended on a somewhat of weak note, “Dancers’ Viewpointe 11” was, overall, a masterfully produced production that achieved its goal: to display the work of student collaboration that contributes to Harvard’s thriving college dance scene.