Staff Writer
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| The Performing Arts Theater played host to a memorable display of choreography and visual effects/ Photo by Will Lofgren |
The “FLEX LEAP” show at AVC appealed to more than just one genre of dance. “Tile,” “Glass,” “Rock,” “Paint,” and “Leap day” were the four dances scheduled for the evening that began at 7 p.m. Normally performing the pieces in the Blackbox on campus (like when FLEX LEAP was performed on Oct. 10, 2010), the Theater Department could not help but try out the new theater for these beautifully projected dances choreographed by Cindy Littlefield.
“FLEX LEAP” is a “Faculty Professional Development” that gives a chance for the staff on campus, who aren’t a large part of the art field, to enjoy themselves in a free night of entertainment with short, colorful stories told through dance. “We hear a lot of 'Whatever inspired you to design that?'” Theater instructor, and part of the production for “FLEX LEAP,” Eugenie Trow said.
Rich Sim is the visual artist who provided images to the dance show by collecting images from art and history museums that were magnified and showcased on the dancers' clothes while performing on stage. His sense of placing images in a perfect sequence of beginning, middle and end through lines and strong designs added to the beauty the performers presented on stage.
“Rock” was the intro dance, which was 12 minutes long, that provided a contrast between a hard surface and how it turns to movement. The second dance, “Tile,” ran for six minutes and projected images from the Metropolitan Museum in New York off of the dancers. The five-minute piece, “Painting,” was infused with a close-up of images of Van Gogh paintings, while “Glass” spanned three and a half minutes of abstract forms. The closing performance was a modern dance titled “Leap day” which featured more breath-taking images by Sim and was accompanied with percussion by Wes Gross.
“It sort of looks like magic; I don't know how else to describe it,” Trow said.
