Zvidance's Debke

Fall 2013 Ball et Review

From the Fall 2013 issue of Ballet Review

ZviDance’s Debke

On the cover: ABT’s Polina Semionova and Marcelo Gomes in Alexei Ratmansky’s Symphony  . 4 New York – Harris Green 6 Brooklyn – George Jackson 7 St. Petersburg – Kevin Ng 8 New York – Harris Green 9 Stuttgart – Gary Smith 11 New York – Sandra Genter 12 Stuttgart – Gary Smith 13 London – David Mead 15 Chicago – Joseph Houseal 16 Toronto – Gary Smith 17 New York – Harris Green 18 Rome – Joseph Houseal 26 David Vaughan 20 On Your Toes Jay Rogoff Ballet Review 41.3 26 Summer Varieties Fall 2013 Karen Greenspan Editor and Designer: 37 Personal Territory Marvin Hoshino Gerhard Brunner Managing Editor: 41 Sag Harbor Roberta Hellman 56 Senior Editor: Joseph Houseal Don Daniels 44 The Khmer Dance Project Associate Editor: Jeffrey Gantz Joel Lobenthal 46 Momentum Associate Editor: Larry Kaplan Joel Lobenthal 56 A Conversation with Betty Nichols Copy Editors: Barbara Palfy Julia Ritter Naomi Mindlin 61 Claudia Gitelman (1936-201 2) Photographers: 46 Lisa Traiger Tom Brazil Costas 62 Northern Exposure Associates: Francis Mason Peter Anastos 67 Bonnie Bird on Graham Robert Greskovic George Jackson Francis Mason Elizabeth Kendall 74 Nina Fonaroff on Graham Paul Parish Nancy Reynolds David Vaughan James SuQon 78 Ashton and Ratmansky at ABT David Vaughan 67 Edward Willinger Darrell Wilkins Sarah C. Woodcock 84 Meta-Sex-Cinema Cover Photograph 89 London Reporter – Clement Crisp by Marty Sohl, ABT: 95 Bennington Redux – Alice Helpern Polina Semionova and 96 Music on Disc – George Dorris Marcelo Gomes in Alexei Ratmansky’s 100 Check It Out Symphony #,. Personal Terri tory between the Palestinian national narrative and the surrounding Arab world. Yes, they are fighting over the appropriation of a dance. Even the comments posted under the YouTube clips are highly politicized. Karen Greenspan The Israeli debkas that Gotheiner and I danced as youngsters were rechoreographed When I recently learned that ZviDance (Zvi fromthelocaldabkes byearlyZionistpioneers Gotheiner’s New York–based dance company) (1930s and 1940s) in Palestine. As part of the was performing a forty-eight-minute work, work of building a nation and a distinct na - Dabke ,atBaruchPerformingArtsCenter,Iwas tional identity, they understood the impor - intrigued. The piece is loosely based on the tance of a national folk culture as a rallying traditional Arabic men’s folk dance called by point, and invested themselves in creating a the same name. new folk dance idiom for the renewed Jewish Zvi Gotheiner grew up in Israel on a kib - people in the state of Israel. butz dancing the Israeli version, the debka, Israelifolkdances(includingthedebka)are at weekly Friday-night sessions. Almost sev - relativelynewforms(aboutseventy-fiveyears en thousand miles away I, too, did the debka old) based on, or borrowed from, previously at weekly dances at my local Jewish Center in existing Jewish as well as non-Jewish ethnic, Dallas, Texas. The infectious driving rhythms religious, and folk dances. There was an es - and exotic Middle Eastern melodies drew me pecially strong push to develop dances from into the dance. The increasing challenge of the existing Semitic communities – Yemenite each variation on the footwork thrilled me. Jews, local Arabs, Druze, and Bedouins – with The postperformance endorphin rush left a the goal of reviving long-lost Jewish cultural warm, connected afterglow from the commu - practices of biblical times as well as shedding nal endeavor as we detached ourselves from the image of the victimized wandering Jew the curved line formation with its character - of eastern Europe. Many of the early Zionist istic hand, belt, or shoulder grip. choreographers were women who nurtured Gotheiner envisioned creating the piece the early folk dance culture and created the when his Israeli partner and a waiter in a new Israeli debkas to conform with modern Lebanese restaurant in Stockholm became Israeliidealsofgenderequality,sothatwomen friendly and began dancing the dabke be- and men joined hands dancing together. tween the dining tables. Inspired by this bit As a result of the 194-48 conflict and the of common ground, Gotheiner and his com - establishment of Israel, there was a large dis - pany started work on the piece by analyzing placement of the Palestinian Arab population online videos of various dabkes. Members and their culture. As they dispersed to Jordan, chose their favorite clips and improvised on Lebanon, Syria, and the West Bank, the pan- them. Arab narrative appropriated the dabke as I decided to try the dabke YouTube exercise an expression of Arab identity, unity, and myself.Thereisawidearrayofmaterial,from anticolonialism, producing popular folklore Palestinian and Lebanese all-male wedding festivals and choreographing performance performances to an updated all-female Israeli spectacles that incorporated many aspects of Arab performing troupe to a co-ed flash mob “Western” dance. of professional dancers in the Beirut Interna - Palestinian nationalism began to replace tional Airport. As I scratched the surface, it pan-Arabism in the 1960s and the dabke was became apparent that this simple dance has revived,reappropriated,andperformedinthe become a new site for the ongoing Palestin - WestBankasasymbolofresistance.ThePales - ian-Israeli conflict as well as the divergence tinians fostered an allegiance to the dance as ©2013KarenGreenspan 3 an embodiment of their attachment to their ZviDance’s rehearsals can feel a bit like a land. Again the dabke became a rallying de - psychotherapy session (or acting class). Got- vice for a new and growing nationalism. heiner asked company members, “Why are This time it was used to establish and de - you stomping?” One dancer replied, “Because fend a unique Palestinian identity as distinct I’m happy. It’s a celebration!” While coach- from the surrounding Arab states and Israel. ing Robert (Buddy) Valdez, Jr. through a solo, Performing the dabke was a means of sup - Gotheiner constantly questioned his dramat - porting armed struggle so that the dance was ic intentions as he performed the movements. transformed into a militant men’s dance per - Gotheinerleanedtowardme,“Thereisnoright formed in military clothing by young, un - answer. I just want the dancers to have a clear married men featuring a masculinized style. intention. Otherwise it will not come across I had never considered that dance could be asauthentic.”Althoughhecontrolsthechore - such a charged political entity. ographic vision, the company members have Some may use this dance as territory for a lot of freedom within the structure. conflict. Gotheiner used it as a landscape for As rehearsal concluded and the dancers brutally honest, revealing exploration. He were leaving, I sat down with Kuan Hui Chew, took the essence of dabke and developed it an intense wisp of a dancer from Singapore. into an examination of the dynamics of its She performs the solo that closes the piece, practice, and then riffed on aspects of the marked by repeated running in circles while greater Middle Eastern experience and cur - frequently falling down, only to rise up again rentissues.TheoriginalmusicalscorebyScott to continue to run. When I asked her what Killian (Gotheiner’s frequent artistic collabo - motivational cues she was given for this sec - rator)mirrorsGotheiner’schoreographicref - tion, she said that the solo made reference to erences to the dabke folk dance by alternat - the Arab Spring, with its hopes, expectations, ingtraditionalstyledabkemusicbyAliElDeek and disappointments. withhisown“new-age”sound,creatingamu - The dramatic scenes within Gotheiner’s sical collage that serves the piece well. choreographic canvas are held together by I sat in on the company’s rehearsal for an characteristic dabke rhythms, steps, manner - upcoming performance in order to get a clos - isms, and formations. Throughout the work er glimpse of that landscape. In the beginning there are references to the dance’s roots and we see a female trying to break into the male typical performance aspects. The dance hails line and learn the closely guarded steps. It is frommanydifferentlocalesintheMiddleEast an unsuccessful attempt. A riveting solo of in - – Palestine, Lebanon, Syria, Jordan – and his - trospection performed by David Norsworthy torically was performed at village festivities shows his internal conflict over whether to such as weddings. It is characterized by foot reveal his fragile interior. As Gotheiner put it, stomping and intensely rhythmic, sometimes itisthissofter,sensualmaleselfthatisatodds virtuosic foot- and legwork that alternates with the Middle Eastern male persona. between stationary timekeeping and propul - Todd Allen delivered a chilling solo that sive movement through space. could be construed as a duet with his shirt, At the head of the line of dancers, the leader which he took off. The shirt became a prayer (called raas meaning head or lawweeh meaning mat, the note on which he scribbled a suicide waver) twirls his handkerchief, short rope, bomber’s message, a stone to hurl, a veil to string of beads, cane, or sometimes a rifle and conceal a woman’s face, a banner of protest, a sets the basic step pattern for the group. He flag of liberation, a cover-up for a loaded gun, periodicallyleavesthelineandmovesforward a dabke dancer’s handkerchief . . . In Gothein - improvising a solo – usually facing the on - er’s imagination a sweaty shirt can be a po - lookers, although sometimes he dances facing tent symbol. his fellow dancers – while the group main - 38 ballet review Zvi Gotheiner’s Dabke . (Photo: Jacqueline Chambord, ZviDance) tains the basic step. Afterward he returns to But Gotheiner attributes his language of his place at the head of the line and rejoins the choreography to the mentoring of his beloved communal step pattern. teacher, Gertrude Kraus, a petite powerhouse The line of dancers defines a community who immigrated to Palestine from Vienna in and the support as well as the constraints it the 1930s and brought the German expres - confers upon its members – like a kibbutz, a sionist influence to the Israeli classical dance tribe, a political movement, a nation, or the scene. Kraus offered to make him “into an entire Middle East. The leader’s solo exhibits artist” after seeing an early piece of his cho - a permissible individuality and freedom of reography. Gotheiner described her composi - expression, always within the safety of the tion technique as amorphous and loose. Kraus accepted structure. The relationship between would conduct her classes in a hodge-podge of the individual and the group is fluid, as im - different languages that were unintelligible plied by Gotheiner’s use and deconstruction to her Israeli students. of the traditional dabke group formations. Perhaps that was the perfect way to impart Gotheiner’s artistic incubation included lessons about a nonverbal art form. These in - training as a serious classical violinist as a fluences help to explain Gotheiner’s themati - teenager and dancing with the major Israeli cally driven choreography drawn with stylis - moderndancecompaniesduringthe190s,in - tically varied movement, musical sensitivity, cluding Batsheva and Bat Dor. At that time and genuine dramatic investigation. both were Graham-trained, well-rounded The richly evocative movement vocabulary repertory dance companies, performing the Gotheiner uses makes me wish he would re - works of the greats – Martha Graham, José frain from reliance on the classic modern Limón, Glen Tetley, Jerome Robbins, Antony dance lexicon in this piece. When I asked him Tudor, Kurt Jooss – to name a few. what prompted him to include modern dance fall 2013 39 vocabulary, he responded that he wanted the as she waited to rejoin the action onstage. expansive movements to contrast with the With his Dabke , Gotheiner takes a charged dabke folk style. I think it speaks to his con - and contentious source of collective identity flict with Middle Eastern political and social and maintains that he is navigating through constraints. the territory without taking sides. I think he ZviDance, a company bubbling over with claims it as his very own for a personal ex - athletic and technical capability, is comprised ploration of issues connected with his Middle ofstylisticallyversatileandemotionallygrip - Easternroots.“WhatisnextforDabke ,“Iasked. ping performers who embody the contagious He admitted that he wanted to see how Ara - spirit of the dabke folk dance. The black-box bic audiences would respond to the piece. dance theater at Baruch Performing Arts Cen - When I asked where that could happen, he teraffordedtheaudienceaviewofthedancers mentioned a couple of dance festivals in Am - astheyawaitedtheirentrancesandmadetheir man and Ramallah that presented possibili - exits. I particularly noted Chelsea Ainsworth, ties.Gotheinermusedoutloud,“Ireallyshould hereyessparklingwithunbridledenthusiasm get to work on that.”

REFERENCES

Ingber, Judith Brin. “Identity Peddlers and the In - rael,” Journal of Folklore Research , vol. 44, no. 1 (200): fluence of Gertrude Kraus,” www.jbriningber. 41-66. com/identity_peddlers_jbi.pdf , 200. Rowe, Nicholas. “Dance and Political Credibili - Kaschl, Elke. Dance and Authenticity in Israel and ty: The Appropriation of Dabkeh by Zionism, Pan- Palestine: Performing the Nation . Leiden, The Nether - Arabism, and Palestinian Nationalism,” Middle East lands: Kononklyke Brill NV, 2003. Journal , vol. 65, no.3 (2011): 363-80. Roginsky, Dina. “Folklore, Folklorism, and Syn - Zvi Gotheiner. Interview by Rena Gluck for Dance chronization: Preserved-Created Folklore in Is - Library of Israel. Videorecording. 2010.

40 ballet review