Structure and Sadness

I went to a show tonight at the Walker Art Center. I just crawled in bed and decided that I needed to write a blog...now. I can't get it off my mind, it was wonderful!

Basically, the story is about the bridge in West Gate that collapsed in 1970. I didn't know this before the show, which I'm pretty glad about because it slowly came together throughout the show. For the record, it's  choreographed by Lucy Guerin, so snaps for Lucy!...excuse my Legally Blonde reference.

When thStructure and Sadnesse show started, the first thing I thought was, "oh great, I bet it's going to be as sucky as that last show"...not that i'm going to name names or anything, that'd be plain cruel. The whole show started with a man who danced with a piece of ply wood basically... it sounds as dumb as it was, excuse my criticizing. BUT in the shows defense, it got much better and is definitely top of my list.

After the man did a cool trick and left, the show began. bum bum buuum....picture this: three guys, three girls, surrounded my piles of different sized ply wood. Choreographically they are grabbing stacks and setting them up to stand like dominoes sort of. It took me a while to figure out what they were doing, but it was truly amazing. They were doing this for a good 15 minutes, but my mind never wandered. Emotional music was play (can I get some Pathos please?), and in pairs, the dancers would come out and do a contemporary phrase.

At this point, I still had no idea what this piece was really about, and the set up was getting so high on one side that they brought in a15 ft ladder to keep on stacking. Everything was choreographed so beautifully!  Then the story started to come together. A long metal board and a small object holding the middle were assembled as the dancers teeter-tottered on either side. Four of them were on it, and at one point a guy goes under it and it collapses.

Let me quickly recap the rest: They tipped on bored over, the smallest which was like a half a foot big, while the largest was like 4 feet big. Then they just crashed down. It was breathtaking. Next there's a woman who sets up a table with the ply wood and is singing along to a new, upbeat music. In the background the two girls are on another bridge made of the metal and two small latters, Then a news  report goes over the speakers about the bridge collapse. They do a little dance, they make it as the guys are "ghosts", and the ending left me speechless.

All of the dancers were laying on the ground in a straight line and a metal board is placed over them, and the woman who was singing before, walks across it as the lights go out. This portrays the death of these people by the bridge, and the lights go out before we see if the woman made it across the "bridge".

Or at least that's what I thought about. Sorry for the never ending post, but I recommend this show, it's wonderful and makes you think. You get to see the emotions one may feel when they come across a situation like this. People's husbands and brothers die, but no one can ever know the deep pain endless you were put in the position of someone who lost a loved one. This piece makes you think about these things with a new mind, by not only hearing, but seeing the emotions that are connected to these words.

Think about it for a while.

P.S. if this link works, it's not the same people I saw, and it's much better in person.  www.youtube.com