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Austin360 blogs > Austin Arts: Seeing Things > Archives > 2007 > March > 08 > Entry
‘Gyre’ spins a complex tale
Andrea Ariel and her collaborators take on a tough topic with ‘Gyre,’ a multimedia dance theater work. How to give human shape to the North Pacific Gyre, the confluence of oceanic currents at the center of which is a Texas-sized floating island of trash?
Ariel and company did it with aplomb. And that’s largely because it’s a group effort. Multiple creative minds are always better than one.
Composers Peter Stopschinski and Graham Reynolds delivered a score that vascillated deftly between action movie fury and poignant melodies.
Nick Keene, Leilah Stewart, Colin Lowry and Natalie George created a moody atmosphere, littering the stage with plastic bags and lighting it with an almost tense glow. A video segment at the beginning sets up the story of four lost individuals nicely. And the shimmering seascape video backdrop rippled through its own course of emotions.
Cyndi Williams’ minimalist, absurdist text stepped in to give shape to the story in between the danced segments and deepen the central characters, all of whom have landed on the trash island after personal tragedies.
Ariel and Steve Ochoa demonstrated some capitivating partner sequences full of unusally crafted lifts and almost pretzel-like couplings that followed captivatingly together. (Ochoa’s polished atheleticism is a welcome addition to Austin’s indie dance scene.)
If there was one weakness, it was the ensemble choreography: uninterestng standard modern dance moves that didn’t seem to add much to the emotionally or narratively.
In the end, though, ‘Gyre’ spun a complex tale that touched on both the personal and the global, and wove it nicely together with a collaboration of creative talents.
‘Gyre’ continues at 8 p.m. today through Saturday at the Off Center.
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