Circus for adults comes to Melbourne in the form of After Dark Theatre's Society, a
circus-cabaret set to the free-spirited vibe of New Orleans. Suitably taking
place in the Melba Spiegeltent, there are plenty of acts that delight and impress
audiences.
Eight talented artists appear throughout the show and they work extremely
well as an ensemble and in supporting each other. The standout routines include Jacinta
Rohan with her unsettling contortionism, Mathew Brown's skilful straps numbers
and Alyssa Moore impresses the audience with a high-risk performance on the Russian
Bar.
Tully Fedorowjtsch is also a
highlight with his acts, including the fast spinning of two water-filled bowls and barely sending any drops into the crowd, and his balancing/spinning
of a giant cube frame.
Since 2009, Dances with Dogs has been approved by the Australian National Kennel Council as an official sport in Australia. That's right; dog owners perform fully themed, costumed and choreographed dance numbers to music with their canine counterparts. Presented as part of Next Wave, Canine Choreography takes a number of dog owners and their pets and has them recreating award winning Dances with Dogs routines while highlighting the relationships and bonds we share with dogs.
Creator Danielle Reynolds interviews a number of dog owners, including some from the Dances with Dogs community. There is a slight Best In Show mockumentary feel throughout as people gush over their pets and the seriousness in which competitive dog dancing is discussed. These moments prove to be the most entertaining and unfortunately this is where the problem with Canine Choreography lies.
As you enter Jupiter Orbiting, creator and performer Joshua Pether is nervously decorating a table with Lego blocks, coloured paper and animal figurines. It feels like we are watching the preparation of a child's party, however with the rest of the stage empty and dark, there is trepidation in the air.
Using a science fiction narrative, this performative piece explores childhood trauma and grief, which Pether juxtaposes with scenes that are equally representative of innocence and naivety. From a distance, the coloured pieces of paper used at the beginning of the show resemble crushed origami cranes, a symbol of hope.
There's even contradiction in its title, alluding to the 12 years it takes for Jupiter to complete its orbital period. This could easily
be the age that Pether is portraying, one that is full of liveliness
and zest, yet the planet itself is desolate and void of any life.
There aren’t many women in the world who can say they’ve never thought – or been asked
- about having children. Regardless of the answer, it is a question that
ultimately needs to be answered with the ramifications of that choice coming
into effect for the rest of their lives. Kerensa Diball and Yuhui Ng-Rodriguez
are two friends, one is a mother and one is not, and in Baby Cake, they look at what it means to be a woman and a mother,
with a little help along the way.
Ng-Rodriguez has a 2-year-old son, Mori and throughout the show she
discusses the changes in her life, particularly in how she balances this with her
career as an art maker and the compromises she has had to make to continue
working while being a mother. On the other side of the spectrum, Diball has no
children, but she did acquire a parasite called blastocystis hominis after
eating some raw goat’s cheese in Turkey so she has some idea on what’s it like to
be a mother.
Selina Thompson is a 28-year-old black woman who lives in Birmingham. But being a woman
of colour with ancestry from Jamaica and Montserrat, when asked where
she’s from, the UK is often not considered an acceptable answer. To explore her diasporic identity, Thompson bought a ticket on a cargo ship and retraced
one of the routes of the Transatlantic Slave Triangle, going from the UK to
Ghana to Jamaica, and then back.
In salt., Thompson poetically recalls this experience with
the audience while reminding us of the irreparable damage colonialism has had on her ancestors and how this grief will be felt for generations to come. Thompson also ties in her own
personal encounters with racism in all its forms, and we hang off her every word as she goes trough these incidents, reinforcing the fact that despite the passing of time, attitudes have changed very little.
