guess you either hate her or love her - We saw Ten Chi performed tonight at UCLA, part of the Dance series this year and one of my must see choreographers - I'm obviously in the second camp. I was surprised that so many people left during intermission, more surprised when people left in the middle of the second act. But those that stayed leapt to their feet and gave an ovation that even the house lights couldn't kill.
I don't know that I can adequately describe the performance, a dance collage of impressions of Japanese culture through European glasses. It was funny, joyful, erotic, and just mesmerizing. A snow of confetti began at the end of the first act and continued through intermission and heck even through the curtain call. The ever present falling of - snow? paper cranes? cherry blossoms? it was perfect for the piece and made the dancers repeated moves through the drifts all the more enjoyable to watch. I love that Pina Bausch uses dancers of so many differing types, ages, sizes, and lets each play out their personalities and characters. Her work is half dance half performance art which is probably why I love it so much. She plays through the weekend, I'd recommend seeing this, except, you might just hate her. But for me, I can't wait to see more.