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id sheep
Nash explained that “by jumping between the two stories their meanings overlap” and that a major connection for her was the “meaning of scale in our lives — of very small and very large, of warm and cold, of awe and wonder.”
The elucidation and associations provided by the discussion had an effect on the second performance of “20 Words for Snow.” The performances by Stapp-Harris, Keller, Doyle and Avenius were more relaxed as both dancers and audience engaged more deeply in the piece’s evocative choreography and expressive power.
Hugging herself with restless hands and gazing up at imaginary distant stars, Stapp-Harris introduces the main theme of the piece right at the outset — how hard is our search for our place and our sense of scale in an alien world. In the blizzard segments she portrays the awe and wonder Nash experienced being alone and cold, while the other dancers dramatize the forces of nature that are within and without her.
Keller initiates the closing action of the piece as she “huffs” out a breath into the imaginary cold air — the breath of life, of transformation, of saying “I am.”
At the end of the piece, the four dancers are huddled together like sheep, eyes on the cold imagined stars overhead, as they shuffle forward uncertainly — lost in a blizzard or in a test tube.
Dance performances, of course, are not ultimately about words, or parallel stories, or even underlying meanings; rather dance is about the range of a dancer’s expressive power and the effect of that power on an audience. Nash’s Last-Minute Wood Company dance/theater productions take us out of ourselves and offer us a glimpse of the true scale of life — infinite and shimmering and unexplainable.
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