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Deep
Tank 5 - December 16th @ Tanks Arts Centre
In
the midst of a hot summer, Deep Tank 5 provided a cool respite with
a night of dance, soundscapes, and visuals. The event at the Tanks
Art Centre was presented by Diverse Dance and featured guest performers
and multi-media artists. The space and performances were themed
upon a celebration of water. That it was staged in a disused oil
storage tank was not lost in the exploration of the theme by artists
who evoked both serene, flowing images of water and those of pollution
and degradation.
The Tanks spaces are open to inspired set designs and for Deep Tank
5 it was given a relaxed intimacy by arrangements of lounge chairs
where the audience could mingle and view performances. Visual stimulation
was provided through video projections by Julie Wilson-Foster, ice
sculpture by Arcocrystallis, and light box displays by Deanna Maich
and Gabrielle Cooney. The performances opened with a soundscaped
movement piece of three women flowing in elegant imitation of seaweed.
Sound and video projection were integral to the ambience of this
and most performances of the evening, uniting the diverse explorations
of the watery theme with a sophisticated multimedia layering.
Members of Diverse Dance performed five dances including the opening
piece. Their second piece, Bags, contained a strong environmental
statement against the use of plastic shopping bags and their effects
on marine life. This social consciousness was maintained in their
study of mass production and consumer conformity entitled Sample
Society. This articulate dance featured the ensemble of ten dancers
utilizing both body and voice in imitation of electronic harmony.
The full ensemble was also present for Teeter in which women await
the return of their men folk from the sea. However by the look of
the tight sailor pants, singlets and jaunty sailor caps sported
by their men they may have been out of luck. Joking aside, it was
a pleasure to see this number of dancers working together and producing
carefully choreographed and intelligent pieces. The last piece by
members of Diverse Dance featured a comic, take-your–leg-off
trio of sharks prowling through the crowd.
Bonemap have repeatedly treated Cairns audiences to sophisticated
multi-media images and performance for over half a decade. For Deep
Tank 5 they projected images onto a 5m high cone of translucent
fabric while a pair of dancers experimented with the interior space.
Projections included live images of the dancers inside, text, and
scenes of water and oil drums. These agitated images played with
notions of containment, leakage, and pollution making clever reference
to the performance space. Of these projections, the most poignant,
providing both relief from the profusion of text and images and
an ornate disquiet, was a video projection of a Siamese fighting
fish lit huge upon the screen.
Three performances which were not so invested with multi-media were
an exquisite percussion performance by Guiseppe Vizzone, a piece
by Zane Saunders and Ian Connolly, and spoken word by Simon Tait.
Saunders and Connolly explored indigenous experience framed by the
banality of a suburban landscape of dust, beer bottles, paving blocks,
and power tools. A place where water is mediated by the garden hose
and the wading pool. An increasing environmental reality as thirsty
Cairns suburbs continue to crawl outwards. Simon Tait was concerned
with our hunger for seafood and the effects of commercial fishing.
His bizarre performance poetry was a comic cross between a bush
poetry reading of Henry Lawson and the rhyming of Dr. Seuss. One
of the final performances of the evening was a beautifully costumed
dance by Sublime Shakti after which the dance floor opened and the
DJ took over. Deep Tank 5 was a tribute to both the talented diversity
of the Cairns art scene and the commitment of those involved.
Kevin Mayo - Arts Nexus Review
45 minute show - 26 meg .wmv file
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