This work as part of the 2020 Sydney Festival is very strong and powerful with incredibly fearless , explosively energetic performances by the dancers.

FRONTERA is the latest in a series of socially engaged, cutting edge, large-scale works created by avant garde Canadian choreographer Dana Gingras and her company Animals of Distinction. Gingras and her ten dancers ask: what space remains for the unruly, ungovernable body in this world of constant surveillance, monitoring and artificial borders .What is freedom ? The dancers are at times refugees trying to escape .

The dancers are in styled ‘casual’ street clothes – mostly of black and white but then for one section some wear red – and sports shoes . At times they writhe sculpturally as a group , or form a rocklike mass, at other times there are individual phrases of trapped movement

repeated .Ordinary everyday movements are included ( walks , runs ) as well as hurtling death defying jumps , leaps and turns. At various points there are tentative , robotic like arm movements as if the dancers are trying to communicate but can’t. At on point a woman breaks free , with straight yet sinuous arms – she is both part of the ensemble yet separate .In another section the ensemble try to cross a border and there are unusual lifts , and the team work together , lifting and passing each other along.

Frontera also features live music by Canadian post-rockers Fly Pan Am on guitars, drums and percussion that was painfully loud, the pounding , throbbing sound reverberating at times right through you .Some people sat with hands over their ears for most of the performance . Field recordings by Dave Bryant (of Godspeed You! Black Emperor) were also included .

The lighting by United Visual Artists was also a crucial element of the show. The lighting – a huge bank of spotlights – creates a cell like bar effect that restrains the dancers – can they break through /jump across ? At other times it is like a menacing ,sweeping spotlight that the dancers have to avoid being seen by – the light seeking the huddled ‘dead’ dancers on the floor.

There are some fabulous visual moments, some extraordinary quieter moments and mini solos and duets , all performed brilliantly , but the relentless hammering of the audio and visuals made this work rather oppressive and overwhelming .

Running time roughly 75 minutes

http://www.sydneyfestival.org.au/events/frontera

FRONTERA is playing aa part of the Sydney Festival being tween the 8th and 12th January 2020.