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Lisa Densem, Manon Parent, Roni Katz: A Matter Of One’s Own. 28.11.2018, Uferstudios, Berlin.

Alice Chauchat posits, in her text “Generative Fictions” from the volume Post-Dance, that dancing is the relationship at work between the dancer and the dance, while in Roni Katz’s piece, what is at work between the dancer and the dance is more concrete: the pain and pleasure of the trade, the conditions in which it happens, and the emotional baggage to be managed through the negotiation. A little girl decides she wants to be a dancer someday, embarking on a lifetime of knowing both absolute bliss and horrible disappointment and shame. Drama.

The dance was heavy, muscular, full of resistance; Roni pulled the bubble wrap backdrop down, rolling herself in it and tumbling down the stairs; Manon asks please for music, music like the music in her head; Lisa spoke an ode to virtuosity (or was it a love letter?), saying “I want to take your head and press it down into the dirt just so you can feel the miracle of being alive.” Hovering above was a delicate sound score, unplugged, where the quiet sound of a roll of tape banged on marley served as percussion, voices feebly rang out, and a violin teased us by stopping and starting a song, showing me how much I was rearing at the gate, “just do the dance!!” – my little-girl heart wanted to see only the payoff of this lifetime commitment, the bliss of dance taking off like a rocket (calm down, sweet one, solace is found in each other, where dance also grows).