'The March' dance performance experiments with unity and movement

On Saturday, Carolina Performing Arts hosted “The March,” a two-night dance performance by Big Dance Theater at the CURRENT ArtSpace.

Founded in 1991, the New York City-based dance company gave a multi-sensory experience to the Chapel Hill community, with three pieces choreographed by choreographers Tendayi Kuumba, Donna Uchizono and Annie-B Parson, the artistic director and co-founder for the company.

The 75-minute show encompassed three performance pieces: “Big small feat,” “NYSea” and “The Oath,” each one experimenting with unison movement and the passage of time. All eleven dancers were women.

Each of the choreographers has their own dance collective, but the show served as a collaborative project. The idea for “The March” has been in the works for over 20 years, and Parson invited Uchizono and Kuumba to help bring the show to life.

Parson, who choreographed “The Oath,” gave her insight into putting the performance together.

“When we finally got to the point of actually proposing what the project would be,” Parson said, “I thought, well this will be a lot more interesting if I ask some other people to choreograph too. And it's as much for my own edification of sharing space and ideas with other choreographers as for the audience.”

Uchizono's “Big small feat” was the first piece performed. Donning teal metallic mini dresses, the routine encompassed intricate, sharp movements of dancer's arms, legs and feet in a unified circle.

“I was going to make something, not for unison's sake, but something that was really hard to do in unison,” Uchizono said. “It was like an intergenerational village of women who were coming together doing this very difficult task as a village.”

 “NYSea,” the second piece performed and choreographed by Kuumba, was a way to visually embody one's journey through the unison of bodies and the ripples of life, she said. It started with a solo dancer in the middle of the stage, pretending to scribble something on the floor. The other dancers joined, interacting with rigorous, spacious execution of their upper bodies.

“It's around the idea of just taking your time,” Kuumba said. “It's important to take a moment, take your time to figure out where you fit in this world, where you fit in this life, where you fit in your journey beyond instead of forcing it, and how we can learn from others.”

The Atlanta native also sang the soundtrack “U.F.O.” live to accompany parts of the piece; Kuumba and her partner Greg Parnell are on the album under the name UFlyMothership. 

Shay Stanley, a UNC alumna and working actor, said she greatly enjoyed the performance and that her favorite piece was “Big small feat.”

“I liked that it was a little offbeat,” she said. “Not in musicality, but in this sort of energy. It was a little strange, and [there were] little fun parts of it. There's one part where they're holding their hand up, and then they cock it to the side. The movement was very disjointed in a way that was really interesting.”

The last dance, “The Oath,” left room for the viewer's imagination, with a telling of what Parson described as the history of time. The dancers performed wearing white backpacks and cowboy hats in various sequences.

“It starts at the beginning of time, and it ends in heaven — I would say in the future/heaven, ambiguously,” Parson said. “So, it starts in the primeval forest and it moves through duality. All the different ideas I have around how we create autonomy, individuality, ego, hierarchies, into groups, unison, intimidating techniques.”

Stanley said that after watching “The March,” she was inspired to create more art.

“I think it was a great way to spend a Saturday night,” Stanley said. “And I think it's just fun to get out and see the art that people are making.”

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