What happens when artists of different backgrounds create a dance together? This September, Pam Tanowitz and Brian Reeder tested this idea in “A Two Part Affair,” a Works & Process commission, at the Guggenheim Museum’s Lewis Theater, in New York. In between their related, collaborative ballets, the choreographers discussed their working methods on a panel that also included costume designer Jillian Lewis, of “Project Runway” fame. Ballet champ and critic Robert Greskovic, author of Ballet 101, acted as moderator.
It helped that the two choreographers know and respect each other’s work. “We didn’t want a pointed foot, flexed foot smack-down,” said Tanowitz. These individualists complement each other in what Reeder aptly called, “a quiltwork.” Still, you can identify the elements. When dancer Simone Messmer intentionally falls after completing a series of gorgeous fouettés, Tanowitz’s voice stands out; and when Dylan Crossman waves at the others while exiting, that’s Reeder (or maybe Jerome Robbins or Mark Morris.)
Renaissance Music begins with Messmer dancing an overture to the sound of her audible breath. She’s in a sumptuous, light blue and ecru postmodern tutu with cutouts at her hips. Helen Hansen enters with the first piano notes. Both are on pointe. A memorable Roman Zhurbin wears slippers, but Anne Lentz is barefoot. Her blue leotard is trimmed with a collar of gathered tulle. Zhurbin and slipperless stage mates Crossman and Glen Rumsey wear slightly different pastel tees. Their translucent tights have large opaque areas in well-chosen places.
Hansen flexes and points in a later solo. Zhurbin supports her half-turn in arabesque, and he lifts the other women. Lentz solos upstage, mirroring the other ladies on pointe. She then jetés around them. This superb, versatile dancer looks very comfortable in her barefoot ballet. The dancers often double or mirror each other, trading traditions and proving the similarities. But when Lentz and Messmer stand side-by-side in épaulement, Messmer’s beautiful classical line stands out.
Music from the New Waltz Project Revisited crowns this fruitful collaboration. The costumes are stripped of adornments and tutus. Crossman proposes to the long-legged Lentz, beginning a lovely duet. A musical interlude and crafty lighting by Philip Trevino nicely fragment the second half of this program. Couples waltz in a rose-colored ballroom scene. Finally they edge the empty stage, lurking in clandestine trysts.
Tanowitz’s postmodern dances pay homage to ballet tradition, in quotes. Her mentor was the late Viola Farber, a founding Merce Cunningham dancer. Reeder has performed with American Ballet Theatre, New York City Ballet and Ballett Frankfurt. His choreography is narrative and neo-romantic. The collaboration, said Reeder, “was an opportunity for both of us to step out of the box."
