JUNK, Dances for Gimmick’s Sake | 1998

Photo: Bill Hebert

Philadelphia Arts Bank

The Philadelphia Inquirer
March 23, 1998
By Merilyn Jackson

Brian Sanders’ works using found “junk” are a hit

In Junk, a program of 16 discrete dance pieces performed Thursday through last night at the Arts Bank, Brian Sanders and his three dancers used detritus that the choreographer found in dumpsters as props. The one-to 10-minute gems evoked hilarity, mystery and phantasmagoria. And from the audience, at least on Saturday, they evoked a standing ovation.

In the show-opening Bird Alone, Sanders employed a bungee-cord hammock, contorting it into a womb, chrysalis, and safety net through dazzling birdlike swoops.

In The Bourne, Renee Jaworski scaled a 10-foot fence, while Sanders fell, and remained hooked to the fence by his heels. The lighting washed from warm amber to harsh chromium, and John Levis’ atmospheric music built suspense as they explored gravity. Jaworski hovered over Sanders like an angel before going limp as a rag doll.

Jaworski deadpanned with a faux leg in Faux Pas, eroticized a pearly ball of light in Lux, and rose powerfully from a velvet tangle in Lorelei. In Puirt a Beul (Gallic for “mouth music”), she and Dawn Cargiulo clogged like vicious field hockey players. To music that seemed more Down Under than Irish, they savaged Riverdance and each other, much to the audience’s immense approval. Earlier, in Tired, Cargiulo jiggled across the stage in a doughnut-tire tutu.

Dancing under a white disk of fabric, Sanders and Mercedes Cadena found drama and mystery in Ganymede as they explored endless possibilities of shape and shadow and drape. With measured swiftness they revealed Chaucer’s Wife of Bath, The Pieta, and a funeral catafalque.

Throughout Junk, Conrad Bender’s lighting was a subtle presence, as important as the program’s well-chosen music, which included George Clinton’s funk for The Cleaner and Dead Can Dance accompaniment for the divine Polymer and Glyceride.

Other accolades:

“Junk represents a giant step forward in the evolution of his work. I look forward eagerly to more.”

• Philadelphia City Paper

“…brilliant and sometimes haunting choreography…”

• Philadelphia City Paper

“Toward the end of the evening… plenty of intriguing questions about what Sanders might do next hang in the air. What about longer works, maybe setting such theatrical vignettes within a frame of pure movement? Let’s see more.”

• Philadelphia Weekly

“Accessible, fun and funny, Junk has all the makings of a pop-culture hit”

• Philadelphia Daily News