by Leigh Witchel
Vicky Shick made “next to the sink” so terse and modular it felt as if it could be described with a list.
Shick is a paradox; the most theatrical aspect of her work is her steadfast refusal to be dramatic. “next to the sink” was an hour-long occurrence with the barest structure of a dance, a female quartet with Shick acting as an occasional fifth.
The piece divided the Danspace floor into two areas: the action happened in front of rough cloth strips forming a tattered curtain. Set at the perimeters were potted plants and chairs with Mylar wrapped round them. Behind the cloth, a tree sculpture looked as if it were made of shredded confetti.
Shick began the work unceremoniously, walking forward in the darkness with a sheet of silver Mylar wrapped round her like a skirt.
Things happened. Then other things happened. Jennifer Lafferty leaned on Shick’s shoulder, and wiggled with her back to her. Shick, her hair piled high and spraying in all directions, moved pose to pose, with her hands on the side of her waist. Her Mylar skirt crinkled like an autonomous partner more heard than seen. She rose on her toes and crashed down, bouncing repeatedly.
Pose. Change. Change. The clipped phrasing of the action felt like a flip-book of images that you ruffled through to create a moving image.
Shick set a chair on the floor, curled up and rested under it.
Jodi Bender brought in a chair, did a handstand and took the chair off.
Shick snapped her fingers like castanets, and that brought in Mina Nishimura and Jimena Paz snapping in response.
Shick’s terse vignettes were often as gorgeous as a fragment of Sappho, but many things also served the same purpose. Paz leaned on Nishimura, they arranged the chairs, crinkling the Mylar. Paz reached away, Nishimura pulled her back by the waistband. Paz lay down like an odalisque, Nishimura framed her head in the crook of Paz’s arm. The last of these querulous moments was the best and maybe it was all we needed. But Nishimura snapped her fingers more, leaned her head on Paz’s thigh, and went on. They leaned again, clasped in a coolly desperate embrace from a Bergman film.
The lights went out. Shick arrived with a flashlight, and spread the Mylar like an emergency blanket over Bender. Paz came out and immediately pulled the sheet off and wrapped it around herself.
Jon Kinzel’s soundscape seemed like a parade as it approached and faded.
The women tied themselves together by the waist with twine, gathering, looking up to the side, and then down. In a mass they inched back, letting the thin binding fall. A sad solo to “I Shall Be Released” led to the women in a pile face down, breathing audibly.
They gathered up their pants and skirts, and put them on, but when had they come off? Looking for cause and effect would have been like trying to track the course of a molecule in solution.
Alone on stage, Paz tapped her chest with one hand, then the other as she looked upwards for the non-ending to a non-dance.
Still, as terse and transparent as “next to the sink” was, it wasn’t compelling. It steadfastly refused to go anywhere, and if you weren’t really into it, it never attained the critical mass to pull you in.
Shick might be the distaff – kinder and gentler – of Harold Pinter or Samuel Beckett. Her specialty is the holes between action: the nothing that happens waiting for something to happen.
copyright © 2019 by Leigh Witchel
“next to the sink” – Vicky Shick and Dancers
Danspace Project, New York, NY
February 7, 2019
Cover: Vicky Shick in “next to the sink.” Photo © Ian Douglas.
Got something to say about this? Sound off here
[Don’t miss a thing! We’ll send you a notification of every article we post if you sign up with your email. (The signup is right below, scroll down). We promise you won’t be deluged and we won’t spam you either.]
