Pina's Swan Song

Pina Bausch’s Tanztheater Wuppertal came to BAM in mid-October to perform her final work three years after her passing in 2009. I know her at least three later works by this doyenne of the dance world since 1973, all very memorable: Für die Kinder von gestern, heute, und morgen, 2002 (BAM 2004), Nefés, 2003 (BAM 2006), and Vollmond (Full Moon), 2006 (BAM 2010).  The latest, awkwardly titled “. . .como el musguito en la piedra, ay si, si, si. . . (like moss on a stone)” certainly does not measure up to them.  On 12 June, it had its premiere in Germany, five days after she was diagnosed with cancer, which took her life three weeks later on 30 June. This circumstance may explain the lack of dynamic energy, at times almost fearful, that we find in her major works.  Like her other works, the work is shaped like a vaudeville show, dance pieces alternating with laughter-provoking skits, literally a combination of “Tanz” and “Theater” in the name of the company.  The absence of a narrative arc, without noticeably strong pieces in the middle to engage the audience, necessarily gives the impression that the work is a bit repetitive and flat and too long. But in the often surrealistic skits, like the first scene in which a woman on all fours is lifted stiff like a table by male dancers as she yelps like a dog, and, even more, in the lively choreography, we find Pina’s hallmark, which I enjoyed not just nostalgically but in itself.  Female dancers wore familiar elegant evening dresses of vibrant colors, down to the ankles, and they dashed and leapt, their long luxuriant hair, now flying away every whichever way, now twisted and tangled around with fingers, with such exuberance as no dancers elsewhere ever match in doing, and their ensemble movements dazzle us in speed and complexity.  They are mesmerizing.  The piece ended by repeating some scenes that opened it, as though it ran out of breath as of ideas.  Melancholy pervaded as it closed not with a bang but a whimper.