PDX Choreographer Revels In the Forbidden
When it comes to women, there are two things American culture doesn\u2019t look so kindly on: age and weight. Tahni Holt\u2019s newest show revels in both.
By the time the audience walks into the theater, the performance has already begun. A heap of dancers writhe across the floor in an undulating mass of brightly patterned skirts, splayed hair, and little flashes of gold lame, like some thrift store reenactment of a Gustav Klimt painting.
A tone slowly builds, and the six dancers eventually break into pairs, rolling, lifting and collapsing into each other.
\u201cA lot of this work features women's bodies on the ground, experiencing or reveling in the weight of their bodies, the heaviness of their bodies, which is something we culturally cannot fathom or talk about,\u201d says Reed College theater professor Kate Bredeson, who worked with Holt as a dramaturge, providing research and a second set of eyes and opinions. \u201cIt moves me regularly to tears because I watch these six women on the ground, and it's not about victimization at all, it's actually this incredible power, but it's mixed with a fatigue.\u201d
Power and fatigue, weight and weightlessness, youth and age \u2014 these are just a few of the themes that Holt plays with in \u201cSensation/Disorientation,\u201d running Jan. 18\u201322 at Reed College\u2019s Diver Studio Theatre as part of White Bird\u2019s Uncaged Series.