Thursday August 8, 2013 - As part of The Joyce's Ballet V6.0 festival, Dominic Walsh Dance Theater were one of six companies invited to perform; each company were given two evenings and I wish I could have gone to see all of them but due to other commitments I'm only seeing three out of six.
Dominic Walsh, a Houston Ballet principal dancer for over a decade, brought three well-contrasted works to The Joyce. The evening opened with the White Swan pas de deux from Matthew Bourne's 20th-century classic all-male SWAN LAKE. This was superbly danced by Mr. Walsh (the Prince) and Domenico Luciano (the Swan).
Robert Eubanks’ lighting designs greatly enhanced the strikingly sensuous images created in Mr. Walsh's choreographic setting of AFTERNOON OF A FAUN. The action, which for the most part follows closely the original libretto, unfolds beneath a glaring white disc. Juan Gil, his slender physique giving the faun a vulnerable quality, danced the openng solo with entrancing physicality. A second feral faun appears (Max Isaacson) and he and Mr. Gil warily explore their mutual curiosity. It seems we are about to have a 'gay' take on the story, but then the nymphs come striding on with antelope-like grace in their measured steps on pointe. Mr. Isaacson slinks away and Mr. Gil dances a pas de deux with the sinuous Tara Lee. As the nymphs move on, the faun echoes the masturbatory gestures that caused a scandal at the premiere of the original Nijinsky setting of the ballet. But Mr. Gil then rises from the floor to gaze into the dazzling sun as the curtain falls.
After the intermission, a rather murky and over-long narrative work CAMILLE CLAUDEL took the stage. Based on the story of Camille Claudel, Rodin's muse who eventually went insane, Mr. Walsh's 45-minute dance-theater work didn't hold up nearly as well as Boris Eifman's rendering of the Rodin/Claudel relationship which we saw last year at City Center.
The Walsh setting of Camille Claudel's tragic tale opens with Claudel being 'interviewed'; her responses show both her insecurity and wit. Projections flash on a screen stage left, with written words that possibly outline what we are about to see; however they were illegible from my vantage point.
Danielle Brown (Camille) and Dominico Luciano (Rodin) give excellent performances and the choreographed segments of the work are visially pleasing. But a strung-together series of mostly slow-tempo musical 'hits' doesn't really serve the narrative persuasively. Near the end, a woman sings Dido's Lament from the Purcell opera; this might have been a good place to end but instead it is followed by a long, sculptural pas de deux to the Meditation from THAIS. This duet, finely choreographed and expressively danced, turned out to be the high point of what was - ultimately - an incoherent theatrical experience. My feeling was that Claudel's story might be better expressed in an operatic rather than a balletic setting.