Dancers emerge on a darkened stage in staggered rows, silently stepping and tumbling forward in the precise and slow motions of a protracted passage of space and time. Light ripples like water under the feet of 14 men and women as they raise their fists one by one. Each traces their lineage aloud in languages including English, French, and Wolof. Lifting a finger for each generation, before abruptly stopping at “the unnamed African slave,” their voices begin to overlap in repetition, until all are joined in a recitation whose words and languages were unintelligibly mixed but whose message was clear.
Simultaneously painful and empowering, this opening scene of “Les Écailles de la Mémoire,” or “Scales of Memory,” both confronted and overcame loss, while introducing the themes of slavery, African Diaspora and identity, spirituality, and gender that were explored throughout the dance performance.
The show, which was performed Feb. 22nd and 23rd in the CFA Theater as part of the “Breaking Ground Dance Series,” is the brainchild of an international collaboration that began in 2005 between the Brooklyn dance troupe Urban Bush Women and Compagnie Jant-Bi, based in Senegal. The groups feature seven female and seven male dancers, respectively.
According to its website’s mission statement, Urban Bush Women, which was founded in 1984 by choreographer Jawole Willa Jo Zollar, “seeks to bring the untold and under-told histories and stories of disenfranchised people to light through dance,” and more specifically, “from a woman-centered perspective, as members of the African Diaspora community, in order to create a more equitable balance of power in the dance world and beyond.”
Compagnie Jant-Bi was formed 10 years ago with dancers from Germaine Acogny’s International Centre for Traditional and Contemporary African Dance, L’Ecole des Sables. Located in Toubab Dialaw, just south of Dakar, the Centre provides professional training in dance and choreography, creating a space for cultural and artistic exchange amongst members of the African Diaspora. “Les Écailles de la Memoire” premiered this January at Florida State University and will continue to tour America, Europe and Africa in the coming months.
Performed in a series of short scenes, the dances alternated between male and female, as well as group and solo. One woman dealt with the questions of identity that arise from Diaspora, contrasting physically reserved stances of the West with the hip-swiveling, shoulder rolling, foot stamping motions and shouts of African dance. She called out to the audience defiantly, “Je suis guadeloupaise, mais mes racines sont africaines! [I am from Guadeloupe, but my roots are African!]”
“The energy was incredible,” said Mel Silverman ’09. “Not only were people doing incredible movements, but you could see it through their expressions how hard they were working to do every move. I really loved the body sounds.”
In another scene, the Jant-Bi dancers came onto a stage projected with light images of leaves and trees. In matching red shirts, they began to run in place, at times exhibiting a warrior-like aggressiveness in their movements, and at other moments displaying the desperation and terror of an implied pursuit. Their shirts were used to depict an imaginary world around them. When the shirts were plucked away from the dancers’ chests, the audience understood heat; when taken off and swung through the air, the dancers evoked the density of a jungle. At one point the performers pulled their shirts back tightly over their faces and heads, dancing low to the ground in formation; later, they took them off completely and carried them in their mouths, gagged. The dancers were masculine, strong, proud, and in artful control of their bodies. However, the images they created were also ones of capture, struggle, loss and anger.
The performance unfurled a vision of African Diaspora, moving forward through time. A return to rippling lighting set the scene for a horrific but graceful dance depicting the sinking of the bodies of those killed during the passage from Africa to Europe and the Americas during the slave trade. Later, the dancers stood bound and on display, bent and still. Sudden music burst forth, its fast beat met with a near ecstasy of motion in which every body part twisted and writhed in the struggle for freedom.
“What stood out to me was how historical it was… you could feel the history,” said Sylvia Ryerson ’09.
The show came to an end with a dance in silhouette, the men and women indistinguishable, their movements energized and jubilant. The dancers then abruptly stopped and then repeated the recitation and movements from the opening scene. This time, however, the audience was left to interpret the repetition of the closing words, “J’accepte, I accept.”
Both in form and content, the dancers communicated the prospect of reunification and transnational communication over a shared history. The performance appropriated feelings of sadness and anger as a base upon which to build strength and community.
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