Perhaps the brightest of many stellar things to have happened in dance over the past decade has been the coming of Acosta Danza. The journey of these impressive Cubans has not just been about dance – although, wow, they can do that – but it’s about changing a way of life. These young people generally started off with little and thanks to the holistic venture that Carlos Acosta has inspired and mentored, they have grown into international dance superstars, as evidenced by this truly tremendous quadruple bill that celebrates their decade in motion.
The programme was suitably diverse, ranging from outstanding contemporary dance of indeterminate nationhood to work that juxtaposed the transfer of Andalucían influences from Spain to Cuba and concluding with a piece that was as thoroughly grounded in Havana as the projected backdrop of El Malecón, the stone seawall stretching several kilometres along the city’s seafront.
The show opened in silence with a welcome revival of La Ecuación by George Céspedes, a work previously seen in London when performed by Danza Contemporánea de Cuba, in 2014. The skeleton of a large cube stood alone before each of four dancers, dressed in different pastel shades, strolled purposefully from upstage darkness to perform their own idiosyncratic solo, well lit inside the cube, a stage within a stage.
The heavy rhythmic beating of X Alfonso’s score, maracas and marimba to the fore, gave an insistent emphasis to the dancers’ varying permutations in the cube. They stepped in-and-out of the dark to allow an ever-changing rota of solos, duos, trios rather like a dance tag-team match. Their eclectic, often gestural movement range, stretching every limb to the max, made it also seem like a danced form of semaphore with the performers eagerly supplanting one another to signal from the deck. It was an upbeat and refreshingly pure opener to the programme.
New dance works by Javier De Frutos are regrettably few and far between these days, although he has made some cracking dance films in recent years, and so 98 Días, which premiered at the Venice Biennale in 2023, was a welcome UK premiere. The days of the title were those spent by Federico García Lorca in an idyllic and prolonged sojourn in Cuba in 1930. It was supposed to be a brief stopover on his return to Spain from New York, but Lorca was so seduced by the sensory pleasures of the island that he remained for three months.
Ten dancers wearing something like blue prison overalls, a kind of counter-intuitive nod to the colours in language and landscape that Lorca experienced, portrayed all the sensual temptations of his newfound paradise. The contrast between his poem, Son de Negros en Cuba – read by De Frutos himself – with the oft-repeated line ‘iré a Santiago’ (‘I’ll go to Santiago’) and the several songs of flamenco singer, Estrella Morente, emphasised the dichotomy between Lorca’s Andalucían roots and those Cuban adventures.
The dancers sat in a line behind another stage-within-a-stage marked out by a rectangle of white tape, entering it in combinations or as a whole ensemble, with the number of days in Lorca’s extended holiday being counted from time-to-time. De Frutos is a choreographer who defies any stylistic label and 98 Días is a dance potpourri of luscious, swirling movement that presents a visual metaphor for the irresistible temptations that Lorca found in Cuba. It was fascinating although one felt a need for a Hispanic soul to really appreciate its splendour.
Another UK premiere followed the interval in Goyo Montero’s Llamada, also backed by flamenco music, recordings of Rosalia and Miguel Poveda, and also inspired by Lorca, in particular his Ode to Walt Whitman, poetry that was years ahead of its time in addressing issues of gender fluidity and homophobia. Montero has provided a frank interpretation of these themes with male dancers wearing deconstructed tutus and all exemplifying the grief and rage of those abused for their sexuality. This work for nine dancers was another example of organic, flowing choreography with one dancer sometimes appearing alienated from the group formations or the four pairs in pas de deux.
Two memorable works of thought-provoking power were followed by dance that could not have been more contrasting. The performers first appeared standing on that projected backdrop of El Malecón before De Punta a Cabo (From Top to Bottom) brought the whole ensemble on stage for a free-spirited explosion of what it means to be Cuban. Alexis Fernández (known as Maca), assisted by the dancer, Yaday Ponce, has created dance that fits the company like a glove, exploring both the cultural homogeneity of this outstanding ensemble but also showcasing their individuality, as evidenced by the eclectic costuming of Vladimir Cuence, accentuating each vivacious personality. It ended a splendid programme with a reminder of the roots of these outstanding dancers and their life-changing journeys through dance.
