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IMPRESSIONS: The 92NY Future Dance Festival (Program B)
By Henning Rübsam
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Published on May 15, 2025
Miguel Miranda's "Se Va." Photo: Steven Pisano
Future Dance Festival 2025
92NY Center for Culture & Arts
Harkness Mainstage Series
Buttenwieser Hall at The Arnhold Center
Program B: Saturday April 12 at 2pm
The second program of the 92NY's Future Dance Festival introduces eight young in-person choreographers in an afternoon time slot.
Choreographer Ja’Moon’s solo I Will Be Better Than OK gets the performance off to a meditative start. Performer Quaba Ernest carries a bowl downstage center. Will he toss a salad, or prepare a punch? He places the bowl ceremonially, and slowly undulates away from it. Ernest cuts a handsome figure, shirtless and in white pants, as he breaks up his slow movement with a couple of sudden kicks to the New Age music “Space 8” by Nana Sinephro. Eventually, he returns to the bowl and performs a short washing ritual. Then, he retreats and rolls himself up in some fabric on one side of the space. Is the dance a preparation for the afterlife?
Molly Jane Dunne, Derek Lee, and Dawvyn Winters dance to another New Age score, "Arioso Spirituale” by Alessandro Alessandroni and “Not Yet Remembered” by Brian Eno and Harold Budd. The music accompanies behind us, there may be Fire, by choreographer Ekko Greenbaum, who alternates brief unison sections with passages in which two dancers offset the remaining member of the trio. A diagonal of rolling bodies disappears as quickly as it wasintroduced. The performers negotiate different levels with ease, and make angular gestures. Bent over with their hands on their knees, they seem to rest for a moment before a unison segment returns to the 2/1 formula. The three dancers support each other wheeling offstage.
The Âme Project presents The Coin Collector. Choreographed by Idy Vandepas and performed by Karly Cohen, this solo really is a duet for the dancer and her ceramic piggybank. Dressed in dark sweatpants and a brown turtleneck sweater, Cohen does look like she could use a few extra coins. She sits straddling the pig and throws some coins on the floor. Then, she somersaults over the pig while grabbing it. An all-too-brief staring contest between the pig and the dancer concludes without a definite winner. Yet, the pig gets fed with a coin. Her nimble movements away from the pig are less distinct than moments when she rolls around the pig with a desperation that recalls a painting by Expressionist master Egon Schiele. She finally collapses over her ceramic bank making a last deposit.
After a lengthy clean-up of the many remaining coins, the stage is set for choreographer Yinqi Wang and his dance partner, Maggie Liang in Amor Fati. A score featuring vocals (“Singanushiga” by Joe Hisaishi) accompanies the duet. Wang wears a loose schmatte as his top, and Liang wears a darker one around her waist over her pants. The partnering starts out conversationally, and a couple of minutes into the piece allows for a solo passage by Wang while Liang observes him. When Wang returns to her, he lies on his back and forms a diamond shape with his legs in the air through which Liang leans backward. Wang twirls his petite partner by one hand and foot, - an image I associate with ice-skating pairs. The conversation between the two dancers continues in a fluid manner. The song turns to folksy whistling; and, when that subsides, the pair continues, until he finally scoops her up.
Julian Sanchez performs his Monologue barefoot in black, knee-length shorts and a tank top. Starting in silence he tiptoes and makes a fist, but then abandons the idea and walks to the back of the stage. There, he begins his solo to Saint-Saëns’ “The Swan,” in a recording for piano and what sounds like the theremin. Sanchez displays beautiful lines, but stops his dance phrases with repeated claps, and intersperses casual walks between short snippets of kinetic beauty. He ends in silence walking upstage as the lights fade.
Miguel Miranda’s se Va. Photo: Steven Pisano
Miguel Miranda’s quartet se Va, puts performers Kayla Ferrish, Danielle Gutt, Mizuho Kappa, and Mikaela Morisato in dresses. Two of the garments have spaghetti straps, and one looks like the slip for the other. Is one dancer representing the inner self? I soon let go of that idea, but am moved by the supportive sisterhood I witness. Theatrical and emotional, these women are going through something, and contend with a chair on stage. Even if I cannot figure out what drives them, I appreciate skilled dancing, passionate performing, and most of all the sense of community.
Cardinal Movement and Company shows the first day of hunger by Assaf Salhov, who is joined by Nikki Holck. The two push each other back and forth until — with the start of the music by Ichiko Aoba — Salhov picks up the much shorter Holck. He holds her around her waist, which means she is a couple of feet off the ground. Meanwhile, she drapes her arms around his neck. He slowly turns without a change in their embrace. Eventually she feels ground under her feet again, and the two partner each other with a sense of push and pull and an occasional reference to social dance, until she sits on him as he stretches out on the floor. From just a few steps, I get the sense that the two have known one another a long time, and have worked through ups and downs. The Japanese vocal score creates the feeling of a story being told. It’s a sad one, and the partnership feels cloying, but these dancers do have one another, for better or worse. The work ends with Salhov carrying Holck on his back.
The closing number, Chohui, by the Ah-Molla Dance Collective, features choreographer Dahyun Kim alongside Hiroka Nagai, Maya Lam, and Shizu Higa. It starts with the sound of breathing, before drumming summons the lightly running dancers. Folksy Korean music accompanies this lively, happy dance. Two overlapping solos turn into a quartet, which splits into consecutive duets before the group reassembles. Cartwheels, turns, runs, and jumps don’t amount to groundbreaking insights, but they end this afternoon on a welcome upnote.
