Photo by Diana Corr, Image courtesy of the artist.
Apparently That’s What Happened
Meat Market, North Melbourne
25th and 28th June 2008
I have seen a number of Jo Lloyd choreographed pieces over the past 4 years. Not as Others for the 2006 Next Wave Festival, her contribution to Nat Cursio‘s curated work With a Bullet and High Maintenance which was performed with Luke George and Tim Harvey. All of these works had very different reasons for being made, so trying to see a pattern forming has not been helpful for me as an audience member in trying to grasp just who Jo Lloyd is as a choreographer. It was for this reason that I was very excited to see Apparently That’s What Happened.
This work for me had the feeling of a swirling darkness, an unknown undefinable quality that pulled you in and did not let you up for air until a sunlit snowfall broke the spell within five minutes of the ending. As i tried to bring my senses and also my mind to bear on what Jo was trying to do, the work kept eluding me in such a slippery and challenging way. I loved this, i loved not being served a dish I already knew. Which is why I had to go back a second time to truly understand what was happening.
The work began with a short mesmerising spinning solo from Jo Lloyd which for me referenced that this was the end and also the beginning of a particular cycle in the work, as Luke George and Tim Harvey lay in a position on the ground that was returned to in a later section of the piece.
There was a strong rhythmic pulse carried through the early sections, the choreography was tough and at times ugly through not extending the movement to its full extent. Moments of strong group rhythmic work were combined with a simultaneous de-aesthetising of the movement. This created a strong feeling of discomfort in the viewer – there was a building tension but an unsurety of why this was occurring. But the focus of the performers and the clear understanding that they were in a very specific state of being, meant I was drawn in to the world.
In Luke George’s solo there was a palpable darkness, as he fluxed between animated party-like dance movements and drunken staggering/fighting. This epilepsy continued until a final death scene in a single light that was so pathetic, so pitiful (the hovering flies in the sound helped this too) it reminded of an animal in the drought trying to get up, or (dare I say it) Artax stuck in the swamp in Neverending Story. An awful scene, but powerfully performed.
The aftermath of the death was a Japanese Story-esque moving of the dead body around the space. Absolutely harrowing, something I hope I never have to go through in my lifetime. Luke and Tim were then left in the same prone position as the start, in some ways the circle was complete and everything from now onwards was a new story.
With their new ‘doona suits’ the three began another rhythmic trio, this time they were connected, together and the movement was beautiful and settled, almost as though they had created a buffer around themselves with the suits – their coping mechanisms were greater now. They all were able to deal with the chaos that was occurring around them.
Choreographically, there was great detail through this section as three in unison broke down and reformed in new patterns and increasing speed. When the climax to the music came, the dancers kept moving through it, the lighting following them. Jo Lloyd seemed to not want to take us to an explosive ending, but instead an implosive slow-burn transcendence. With a shuffling, shifting physical score and the introduction of a searing guitar riff she lifted us out of the chaos and into the light.
David Franzke and Duane Morrison’s sound was a highlight – warping, scratching and pulsing its way around, into and underneath the movement. At times dominating entirely, then at other times levelling out to follow behind the dance. The intrusions of real life sounds into the score (dogs barking, recorded human voice, birds tweeting and sprinkler sounds) brought a domesticity to what was an other worldly experience. We were brought to not only a real world time and place but also into a remembrance of someone else’s experience in that real world. The final crescendo of sound (with the addition of the guitar) teetered on the brink of filmic over-emotion, but hung in there just enough to not destroy the feeling.
As the work was in the round, and I saw it twice, I did view Apparently That’s What Happened from different perspectives, and the show was a new experience both times. But for me the work spoke of deeper things than purely he said/she said stuff.
There was an emotional undertone centred around death and the aftermath of it, the process of coping and moving though it. And in contrast to this (or perhaps as a response to it) there was a vehemency, a battling to keep moving and keep moving quickly, almost to prove that you are still alive and you are vibrant. And in the final scene – a togetherness, a bonded love of friendship, still moving but now settled.
Jo Lloyd is still an unknown to me, I can’t box her, but I kinda like that.
