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In the wake of the successful tour of the Primavera Modern Dance Company of Prague, Parisians will get a chance to discover yet another major Eastern European dance group this spring with the Leipzig Tanztheater's production of "Flamma," which will be presented at the Théâtre de Ménilmontant May 14 and 15. Invited for the first time to France by the pioneer performance space Danse Théâtre et Musique as part of it's 20th anniversary celebrations, the Leipzig Tanztheater, founded in 1967, gained acclaim in the former German Democratic Republic as one of the rare avant-garde dance-theater troupes (besides the Berliner Ensemble) allowed to exist. Like Primavera, the company managed to weather and survive all the upheavals that led to the fall of the Wall and continues to be a forum for young creators to express through the dance medium their discontent, their hopes and stance on society and the world. Starting in the roaring '20s with Brecht in Germany and Meyerhold in Russia, and revived in the '70s with innovators like Yuri Liubimov and Tadeusz Kantor, whose work has been highly appreciated in France, the Eastern European tradition of dance-theater has flourished throughout the century. "Flamma" is a perfect example of this unique genre set apart from what's developed in the rest of Europe, with its neo-expressionist movement vocabulary, its blend of music, dance, text, scenography, burlesque humor and the inevitable underlying strata of messages. There's always something unmistakably cabaretish and delightfully dated that can be compared somewhat to the American musical comedy. But whereas musicals aim at lightweight emotion-packed entertainment, a tanztheater must is the heavy-duty philosophy and social commentary hiding behind the absurd. Choreographed by the prolific 29-year-old dancemaker Karen Schönemann, with original music combining diverse styles by Nicholas Lenz, and texts by Herman Portocarero, "Flamma" is a work for 20 dancers (casts of thousands is another characteristic of tanztheater) that deals with individualism and alienation in today's urban jungles. It's about the constant quest of a group of people for their life partners. The object of desire always slips away because of the selfishness and mistrust that gets in the way. Disillusion destroys the dream time after time, but what keeps them going on is a positive waiting-for-Godot attitude and the flame of hope that doesn't die. For those weary of the anything-goes ultra-nihilistic French contemporary dance scene, the Tanztheater Leipzig will provide a refreshing blast from the past and will give Pina Bausch fans a chance to discover the prototype dance-theater style that became the key to her success... "Flamma," Leipzig Tanztheater, May 14 at 8:30pm; May 15 at 5pm, Théâtre de Ménilmontant, 15, rue du Retrait, 20e, METRO: Gambetta, tel: 01.47.00.19.60. |
