While at a party at The Meyerhoff Symphony Hall we ran into recent Baker Artist Award Winner Shodekeh who, in turn, introduced us to choreographer Vincent E. Thomas, winner of a Baker Artist Award the year before. During our initial meeting, Vincent asked if we covered dance to which we replied, “We do now.” As it turns out, Vincent’s production company, VT Dance, was putting on two shows at The Theatre Project, the first of which we would miss due to our impromptu trip to Austin.
VT Dance took over The Theatre Project for two weekends and showcased The Grandmother Project and Witness, two original works by Vincent E. Thomas. It was our privilege to be invited to the dress rehearsal for Witness, where we could pretend that we were at a private show for this provocative modern dance program originally commissioned by the Kennedy Center. In the big picture above, Vincent E. Thomas.
Witness included performances by dancers Amanda Fair, Marissa Guerrero, Lacey Marousek, Lauren Withhart, Jenny Berkowitz, Catherine Fienup, Leonce Wilkins, Michelle Mitchenor and musicians Jason Baker and Nathan Bell.
The institution of conformity in modern society was a recurring theme in Witness. Here we see the line of dancers begin to collapse illustrating the peril that inevitably follows blind obedience.
Witness uses images as well as historical documents to illustrate a broad scope of human behaviors and social pathologies. This multimedia experience included dance, spoken word, live and recorded music as well as projected images.
Instead of trying to describe this experience further, we think it’s best to just let the pictures speak. While we are incapable of bringing you Witness as we experienced it, we can give you moments that are beautiful unto themselves. We can also encourage those of you who have yet to experience a VT Dance production to go and see one immediately.
