Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

Brent Harris: The Other Side

Auckland Art Gallery

September 17  

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

“Brent Harris: The Other Side” is the first major survey exhibition of the artist’s work to be held in New Zealand. It includes recent works that reflect the artist’s reconnection with the country as well as paintings and prints drawn from his most important series of works dating from the late 1980s to the present.

The New Zealand born artist moved to Melbourne in 1981 to study at the Victorian College of the Arts where he has lived there since. In 2016, following the death of his father, he felt able to return to his country of birth after an absence of several decades. It was an episode in his life that resulted in an intense period of artistic production.

Over a career of more than four decades, Harris has developed a significant body of work including paintings, prints and drawings. His work combines personal and universal images which deal with issues around self, family, land and the spiritual. These touch on personal elements of  desire, sexuality, guilt, mortality and  identity.

Much of his work shows a stylistic debt to other artists, notably Colin McCahon. One of the first works in the exhibition, “Here I give thanks to Kelly” looks very much like a McCahon of the late 1950’s with its combination of geometry and words. The text itself is a direct reference to  McCahon’s abstract work  “Here I give thanks Mondrian”.

Harris is also referencing the work of the American abstract artist Ellsworth Kelly who often used simple organic shapes.

Another obvious borrowing is seen in his earlier “The Stations” where he  used  the geometric, abstract shapes of American Barnett Newman. These simple rectilinear lines, intersecting shapes and cross forms become a means of addressing issues around religion spirituality. In this regard his work is also similar to McCahons who used simple lines and symbols to depict the final journey of Christ.

A more recent “The Stations” series combines more figurative and landscape elements so the work takes on the sense of a more personal journey.

In both these series of the stations the first image contains a large “O” shape, one which occurs in many of his other works. The “O” shape is like an abstract bullseye where the eye exists as a symbol for the  Biblical all-seeing eye and is  close to the “I” used by McCahon to signify himself and a greater power. This same shape can also be seen as a mirror in which the artist reflects on himself as well as having other figures engaged in self-reflection.

Another borrowing from McCahon is the “The Gate. The Mirror” which combines the symbolism of McCahon’s “Gate” series with their combination of landscape and self-revelation. These elements of McCahon are combined with the minimalist mark making of Jaspar Johns.

Several of the works feature landscapes which are drawn from the landscape of his youth – distant snow-capped mountains like ice cream which are used to  signify an Eden like landscape which also includes an Adam and Eve.

“The Swamp” series feature abstract shapes which resemble wispy  swamp plant forms or creatures which seem to be morphing into humanoid shapes. existing in some sort of dreamworld. This sense of dreamworld is also present in another series titled “The Grotesquerie”,  which have strong psychological aspects, examining his fraught family connections. Here Dali-like stylised  images of his father and mother are observed by the “O” of the artist.

With many of his work notably “The Swamp” and “The Grotesquerie” one can detect a surrealist element which can be seen as the artist using his art as a form of psychoanalysis. It enables him to explore and understand his relationship with family and religion. 

The way the artist has used elements of landscape, family figures and references to other artists is one of the  stimulating aspects of the exhibition, discovering how he has created his own visual language and how he has used it.

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Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

Romeo and Juliet by Serge Prokofiev
Royal New Zealand Ballet in association with Avis
Aotea Centre, Auckland

Until May 13

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

Of all the great full-length ballets Romeo and Juliet is the closest to real life. There are no fairies, no changelings, no wicked witches or wizards. It is a tale of human dimensions in which individuals make decisions based on their emotions. It is a story about romantic love, but also about the destructive consequences of that love when social norms interfere.

The Royal New Zealand Ballet’s latest production of the work is an adventurous take on the Shakespearean tale choreographed by Andrea Schermoly in a reworking of the ballet originally conceived of by Francesco Ventriglia.  

The sets and costumes designed by the Academy Award-winning designer James Acheson are a masterly combination of realism and inventiveness.  Elements of the architecture of Verona and the facade of San Zeno are combined with images derived from Renaissance art – a crucifix by Giotto and a Madonna and child by Cimabue to create old Verona.

The costumes are ravishing – from the elaborate dresses worn at the ball that could have come straight from an image of the Medici court to the gaudy flounced dresses of the local prostitutes and the colour-coordinated wear of the hot Capulets and the cool Montagues. The staging was also very effective notably with the lush ballroom scene and the two sequences of swordplay which were highly choreographed, provided some electrifying action.

The production is one of the most comprehensively designed the company has had and is an indication of the new heights of creativity that have recently been achieved by the Royal New Zealand Ballet

Romeo and Juliet is still a relevant story today, exploring issues of the personal and the familial and how these conflict with the social and political demands of society.

Romeo and his Montague friends and the rival Capulets may be the testosterone-fuelled youth of Verona but they could be of any time or any place. They follow their own rules but there are also the demands of family. These tensions also become something of a metaphor for the present-day conflict in the Ukraine just as they reflected the tensions  within Soviet Russia at the time Prokofiev was composing.

Joshua Guillemot-Rodgerson (Romeo) and Katherine Minor (Juliet) have to create characters with the emotional and physical attributes of young people falling in love. They both gave engaging and expressive performances full of energy and emotion.

In much of their dancing in Act II where Minor was  lifted and carried by Guillemot-Rodgerson she gave an impression of lightness  but when she was confronted by her father over her marriage she danced with a blistering angularity displaying the defiance of youth.

She was particularly effective in the drug taking scene where her facial expressions and body movements displayed her reluctance and then acceptance of drinking the potion.

Minor captured the subtle changes of the transformation from child to young woman with a simplicity tinged with apprehension while Guillemot-Rodgerson’s dancing was assured at all times, mixing his macho qualities with an emerging gentleness.

In much of their dancing they achieved a limpid sensuality and in the final sequence, when Romeo danced with the dead Juliet, the two dancers achieved an almost ethereal quality.

There were some outstanding performances by other cast members, with Sara Garbowski investing Lady Capulet with a fury of volcanic proportions while  Damani Campbell Williams as Lord Capulet danced with a barely controlled anger when confronting his daughter about her relationship.

The other young members of the House of Montague, Mercutio (Kihiro Kusukami), and Benvolio (Shaun James Kelly) gave some robust, athletic dancing with their displays of arrogance and wit.

Branden Reiners as Tybalt was a superb, strutting bully and Laura Gretchen Steimie as Juliet’s nurse was able to combine a touch of comedy with her serious colluding.

The great star of the ballet is Prokofiev and his music, which underpins the drama and the emotion of the ballet. The APO under Hamish McKeich ensured the music really was an integral part of the work.

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Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

A Kind of Shelter Whakaruru-taha

An anthology of new writing for a changed world

Edited by Witi Ihimaera and Michelle Elvy

Massey University Press

RRP $39.99

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

In “A Kind of Shelter Whakaruru-taha” Witi Ihimaera and Michelle Elvy have  brought together sixty-eight writers and eight visual artists, imagining them at a grand discussion group or hui where they share ideas about the future. These local and international artists include fiction and creative non-fiction writers as well as poets.

While the editors aim was to create a political and social framework which would engage with developing ideas about our future, the book is more of an eclectic set of voices who are variously, thoughtful, focussed, uncertain and tentative in their contemplation of the future. The various writings range from the intimate to the didactic, addressing the issues around past, present and future as the explore history, notions of indigeneity, climate change as well as social and political change. They all offer insights and guides to life which entertain, educate and inspire.

Some of the writers take on the serious social matters  of the day like poets Essa Ranapiri and Michelle Rahurahu in their “Ram Raid” where the feelings and aspirations of youth escaping a rules-based society are linked to the actions of Tane in his  separation of Earth and Sky.

One of Lisa Reihana’s  photographs in the book also illustrated the myth of Ranginui and  Papatūānuku with an image of the  creation of  the cosmos and moody brooding skies.

Then there are the joyous sounds of Ian Wedde’s “Tree House” with his description of the inner-city bird life with their human-like qualities while Cilla McQueen’s “Way Up South” with its panoramic description of Rakiora and references to Hone Tuwhare are eloquent explorations of the land and its history.

While many of the works are short pieces of writing some are more substantial as with “Ancestry, kin and shared history”  a discussion with  Dame Anne Salmond, Witi Ihimarea and the Brazilian indigenous, academic activist Apareceida Viaҫa which provides a wide ranging discussion on The Treaty, indigenous culture, as well as  the thought-provoking differences between Māori and the Wari tribe of Brazil and their approaches to the environment , the animal world and their ancestors. According to Viaҫa most Amazonian people have no concept of ancestry.

In “Come and see it all the way from the town” Laura Jean McKay has written about similar themes which she previously developed in her book “The animals in that Country” exploring the natural  world through the eyes and speech of animals and inanimate objects.

Among the  more experimental works is Harry  Ricket’s “Loemis song cycle: Epilogue” which follows the conception, production and performance of a requiem style musical work  with five writers accompanied by an ensemble of musicians which explore a series of unrelated events, evoking ideas around transition, inevitability, optimism and infinity.

Through these writing the authors talk of journeys both physical and psychological, of crises such as Covid 19 along with other encounters and events which have shaped and changed their lives. Some writers dwell on the present, others on past histories and families which also become  reflections on the future.

Wendy Perkins “At the Kauri Museum” where personal history and colonial history are tied to the history of the gun and kauri in shaping the land and society.

Another of the photographers included in the book is Yuki Kihara who represented New Zealand at last year’s Venice Biennale. with her work “Otamahua Quail Island”  In the photographic series “Quarantine Islands” the artist dressed as “Salome”  travelled across time uniting the various histories and forgotten stories of the islands with their connections to the Covid 19.covid pandemic.

Other writers  include Alison Wong, Paula Morris, Tina Makereti, Ben Brown, David Eggleton, Hinemoana Baker, Erik Kennedy, Nina Mingya Powles, Gregory O’Brien, Vincent O’Sullivan, Patricia Grace, Selina Tusitala Marsh and Whiti Hereaka. Guest writers from overseas include Jose-Luis Novo and Ru Freeman.

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Reviewed by Malcolm Calder

Close

A film by Lukas Dhont

In NZ cinemas from May 11

Reviewed by Malcolm Calder

Growing up on a farm in the country, I don’t recall having any one special friend but of having many – albeit some closer than others – and all in a lifestyle largely shaped by my family and my then school friends.

When I was about the same age as Leo and Remi the central figures in Lukas Dhont’s Close, I too moved to a much larger secondary school but have only a semblance of memory about the significant and protracted leap this entailed.  From a childhood built around play and make-believe I was slowly and irrevocably thrust into an adolescent world where choices were broader, responsibilities and aspirations took on a different shape and my own personality became more sharply defined in a context of my peers and by the world around me.  Somewhere and somehow I learned that each of those peers was different.

This step into adolescence is the lynchpin for Lukas Dhont’s remarkable film which illustrates two protagonists approaching this new adolescent world … but differently.  Growing up together the two boys have become inseparable.  They frolic together in Leo’s parents’ flower farm, race each other on their bikes and share each others’ parents, meals and sleepovers.  Their lives and their view of the world has been built around a make-believe they have created together.  It is one of joy.  Of fun.

In their newly-arriving adolescent world, however, intrinsic differences starts to become apparent.  Leo is starting to emerge as more of an extrovert, discovering additional new friends, taking up new sports and developing his own self-confidence.  Whereas the more introverted Remi is growing into a quieter and more sensitive soul who finds joy in more personal and immediate things.  He immerses himself in his art, plays the oboe like an angel and finds the much larger peer group something of a challenge.

But as the film progresses it becomes clear that more is going on here.  The two are slowly growing into two different people only subconsciously aware that they are growing away from each other.  And so too are their emerging differences becoming apparent to others in terms they can neither grasp nor understand. One day a young female classmate puts Leo on the spot by asking whether or not they are ‘together.’  Leo immediately sets the record straight explaining that they are simply best friends. When she persists, he becomes defensive while Remi quietly observes.  But that is not enough and the drama all comes to a head when Remi heatedly confronts Leo about what he perceives as an increased alienation. The discussion soon turns into a full-on schoolyard tussle and the two must eventually be separated by a teacher and an older brother. 

There is pain and confusion for both, all built on an inability to understand, to articulate, to appreciate. For this is what happens during the years of adolescence and puberty when people are at their most vulnerable and when the most innocent comment can be misunderstood, can hurt and shape one’s future.

No spoilers here about where all this leads but the ending is both unexpected and tragic.  At the same time it also points to challenge and promise.

This film is lyrical and beatific with some beautifully-crafted cinematography with very few fades between scenes, being both smooth and polished.  The dialogue (a mixture of French, Dutch and Flemish) is sparse and rudimentary as befits this refreshingly simplistic style of storytelling.

If I have a criticism it is perhaps that the imagery becomes a little over-powering at times: mechanical tractors destroy the remnants of a fragile flower crop; delicate fingers quickly learning to plant anew; Leo is isolated from his friend Emil behind the grill of an ice-hockey mask; the cutting off of a plaster cast from a broken arm signifies a new beginning; the use of repeated frantic cycle-riding indicates the speed with which things happen and, of course, that almost-clichaic a bare and empty room.

This is an astute and delicately crafted film about a crucial period in the life of all adolescents.

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Reviewed by Malcolm Calder

Relatively Speaking

By Alan Ayckbourn

Tadpole Productions

Directed by Janice Finn

With  Benjamin Murray, Michelle Blundell, Louise Wallace, Edwin Wright

Pumphouse Theatre, Takapuna

Until 14 May

Knowing this play is 55 years old, and not having seen it for many, many years, I decided to go back for a quick dip before committing to pen these words.  Long regarded as one of England’s more outstanding playwrights of the twentieth century, Alan Ayckbourn created Relatively Speaking, a near-definitive comedy of manners in 1967, among the earliest of his 80-odd plays and his first big hit.  I’m so glad I did, having forgotten at the marvel that is his structure, language and observations of human idiosyncracy.  So I couldn’t wait to see what Janice Finn and a good, strong cast would do with it for Tadpole Productions.  Well maybe not entirely, as Ayckbourn’s context is itself a bit passe well into the 21st Century and probably adds a bit more piquant layering all by itself,

Timing is everything in comedy and, judging by the sniggers, guffaws and belly laughs on opening night at the Pumphouse, comic-timing in this production is impeccable.  That is largely down to Janice Finn who has pretty much played this the way it was written, supported by a talented cast who also know a thing or two about ironic comedy.

A gangling Benjamin Murray gave us a Greg who my mind suggested bore some kind of resemblance to a very very young Mick Jagger (although my accompanist felt Bowie was more apt) pursuing a Ginny (Michelle Blundell, who I had could have sworn I’d seen on TV only a couple of weeks previously in most of the obituary-clips about a young Mary Quant).

Generationally removed, Edwin Wright’s comic role of Philip manages to become confused, apoplectic and devious – sometimes all at the same time – playing it straight all the way without a shred of hamminess whatsoever.  Sheila (“she costs me thirty quid a week to run and that doesn’t include overheads”) is his world-weary-wife, created with the classic skill, awe and sometimes stunned amazement that audiences have come to expect from Louise Wallace.

The tight stage and only two sets called for some deft and inexpensive design, that included a tiny London flat and a somewhat more spacious garden.

At the Pumphouse Theatre for another couple of weeks, Janice Finn’s production of Relatively Speaking for Tadpole is well worth a nostalgic night out that will leave you chuckling all the way home.  There’s something rather comforting about a play that has been performed to packed houses since 1967, and especially one that can make even a well-chilled social media audience of today roll over with laughter.

Oh yes, what’s it all about ?  Well, as Ayckbourn himself has witten …

“…The characters are not aware of their situation – or at least never for more than a few seconds at a time. Greg never knows what’s going on; Philip does for a few minutes … but by the end of the play he’s as baffled as ever; Ginny starts the ball rolling with the initial lie but … rapidly loses her grip on the situation; the irony of the play is that, at the end, it is Sheila who, ignorant of everything up to that point, suddenly realises the whole situation. Not only that, but for the first time she introduces with the last line of the play a plot element of her own invention”.

Sums it up really. 

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Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

Witi’s Wahine by Nancy Brunning

Auckland Theatre Company

Auckland Waterfront Theatre

Until May 20

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

With “Witi’s Wahine” playwright Nancy Brunning has delved into the many books of Witi Ihimaera and re-presented them in a new dramatic form which shows both the richness of the authors writing and his ability to tell meaningful stories which are also fables and parables which offer insights into Māori life and culture.

As Witi and others  have noted, the meeting house is both a metaphor and a living entity representing the ancestors, the past tales, myths and aspirations of the iwi. It this concept that is at the heart of “Witi’s Wahine”. The  actors and performers both act out and share the stories and experiences of several women who we have previously encountered in Ihimaera’s fictional world but feel as though they have had a much greater impact.

They become part of the whare nui as the posts which support the structure and their tales are the tukutuku panels providing stories and metaphors.

Just as the tukutuku panels are made by weaving strands of material so the various stories which are recounted build, up a woven history of ancestors, individuals and families.

All these stories focus on the female protagonists, on the matriarchs who are healers, storytellers, keepers of children (and husbands) and truth-seekers. Māori myth and  cosmology is full of  stories of powerful women, and they have been given new life through  through the work of Ihimaera as well as female writers such as Robyn Kahukiwa and Patricia Grace.

The main actors – Pehia King, Olivia Violet Robinson-Falconer, Roimata Fox, Awhina-Rose Henare Ashby are like a group of Aunties engaged in a korero; relaxing, playing cards, remembering, guiding and instructing. They also engage with the audience as a whole as well as some individuals so we became part  of the story sharing which contributed to emotional dimensions of the work.

The stories they tell are range from the mythic tales of creation through to contemporary times and their locations range from the small East Coast town of Waituhi where Ihimaera grew up  to the  deserts of Tunisia.

Nancy Brunning has taken vignettes from several of  Ihimaera’s book as well as including the author’s first youthful piece of writing which is a reworking of the Rapunzel fairy story. The stories are drawn from his first book, Pounamu, Pounamu, Tangi, Whanau, The Matriarch and several others including The Whale Rider with its retelling of the myth of Paikea.

There was a subtle soundscape featuring the sounds  of birds, bees, whales and heartbeat along with two sets One is just the bare stage while the other a more abstract one with six openings suggestion  passage to the past and future. It is the actors who describe the settings with a minimum props and minimal action although the various dance performances are spirited and the re-enactment  of Te Kooti’s  battle and withdrawal  at Ngatapa was a  dramatic and stirring sequence.

In several scenes featuring dance and waiata that the other members of the cast – Raiha Moetara, Matawai Hanatia Winiata, Maramaria Ki-Tihirahi Moetora, and Pepi-ria Moetara-Pokai added a rich dimension to the play. The stories range over themes of birth illness, death, guilt and  discovery. Some are witty, some polemical, some tell  of myth and history most tell of the ordinary lives of delightful characters, rich lives full of humanity.

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Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

The magical panoramic Auckland paintings of George Baloghy

George Baloghy, Urban Pastoral

Artis Gallery

Until May 22

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

George Baloghy’s latest exhibition “Urban Pastoral” continues the artists interest in documenting and appreciating Auckland’s urban landscape  which his art practice has been concerned with for over fifty years.

The works in the exhibition highlight the fact that much of Auckland City is blessed with green open spaces, much of this made possible  through the protection of the city’s many volcanic cones. The paintings, like the city are dominated by these cones and green spaces such as Mt Eden, Mt Hobson, One Tree Hill/Cornwall Park and  Mt Victoria. They also highlight just how green and lush the landscape is.

Not only has Baloghy a history of painting urban views he is part of a long tradition of such painters going back hundreds of years with artists such as Canaletto, Vermeer and Pissarro.

With his paintings he also follows in the footsteps of artists like the Valentine Brothers whose photographs documented early Auckland. Like those photographs they were mainly taken from the high vantage points of the city such as  Mt Eden  partly  to capture the panorama but also as with Baloghy, to avoid the encroaching trees and buildings which could compromise the views.

The paintings are all recognisable images of Auckland and focus on the contrasts between the built environment and the natural landscape as well as referencing the changes which have occurred in Auckland over the course of its history.

In “Mount Hobson to Mount Eden” ($14,000) the curve of the motorway is  a reminder of the way the motorcar has defin3ed the city as much as its topography while “Mt Eden to One Tree Hill” with the  memorial atop the hill a reference to both Māori occupation and European settlement.

One is also conscious of the architectural changes which have altered the urban landscape not only with the large building projects such as Green Lane Hospital but also the slow displacement of the older villas by newer contemporary houses.

One of the more dramatic works is “Devonport Wharf”  ($12,500) which features a panoramic  view of Mt Eden as well as an impressive  view of the Waitemata along with much boat activity on the harbour. “Mount Eden to One Tree Hill” ($14,000) is also impressive with its dramatic vista like some  sort of homage to Cezanne’s iconic views of Mt St Victoire,

The views which Baloghy has produced are almost magical, encouraging the viewer to explore the city from multiple viewpoints and even though his views are recognisable, the impression is of a city of heightened colour, sharper light, tidier and more carefully arranged – like a model of the city rather than the real one.

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Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

New Zealand Symphony Orchestra

Bloch & Shostakovich, Enduring Spirit

In association with The Grand by SkyCity.

Auckland Town Hall

April 29 

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

The renowned Scottish conductor Sir Donald Runnicles made his New Zealand Symphony Orchestra debut last week with performance in Wellington and Auckland alongside German-French cellist Nicolas Altstaedt who has not performed in New Zealand since 2015.

The Enduring Spirit programme comprised Aaron Jay Kearnis’ “Musica Celestis”, Ernest Bloch’s cello composition “Schelomo”, and Dmitri Shostakovich’s “Tenth Symphony”, all works which were celebrations of. or reflections on belief system which have inspired or distorted the lives of people.

Kearnis previously said of his work  “Musica Celestis is inspired by the medieval conception of … the singing of the angels in heaven in praise of God without end.” He also notes the influence of “the soaring work of Hildegard of Bingen”.

This debt to medieval music was apparent from the opening with floating strings suggesting the  wispy shapes of angels and throughout the work  there was the impression of  the softly beating wings of angels.

The throbbing plucked sounds of the double basses at times contrasted with the insistent strings providing something of a conversation, a debate between the good and evil angels.

But this all resolved into blissful  vistas of heaven with all its imagined  mythic creatures –  cherubim, seraphim, archangels.

Bloch’s “Schelomo” was a significant work to be played this year as it is now the seventy fifth anniversary of the founding of the modern  state of Israel, an event Bloch can only have imagined when he composed the work in 1916. The final work in his “Jewish Cycle” it builds on much Jewish heritage and the prayer which ended many important Jewish events –  “Next year in Jerusalem”,  

“Schelomo” was intended to “express the struggle of King Schelomo (called Solomon in the Bible) to resist the world’s earthly pleasures … Bloch himself described the cello as the voice of Schelomo himself, specifically expressing the sentiment held in texts from Ecclesiastes… In contrast, the orchestra represents the tempting material world, including his wives and concubines”.

The work opened with a single high note from the cello  like the voice of a Jewish cantor calling on God and cellist Nicolas Altstaedt  seemed to be  both the voice of the composer and that of the spirit of the Jew.

This was followed by troubled strings and brass which conveyed a sense of physical and spiritual oppression, distance and dislocation, and as in Kearnis’, “Musica Celestis” there were visions of angels and  prophets.

The work touched on the notion of the  individual / state confronted by oppression and tumult in a continuation of the history of the Jew and the fate of Jerusalem / Israel.

Nicolas Altstaedt  played with a distinctive detachment as though in contemplation but he produced exquisite  sounds which were like agonising pleas which dissolved into melancholic acceptance.

Shostakovich said of his  Symphony No. 10 that “I did depict Stalin …. I wrote it right after Stalin’s death, and no one has yet guessed what the Symphony is about. It’s about Stalin and the Stalin years.”

While that is certainly the case it is also a depiction of the composer himself and his reactions to living under the Soviet regime of the time.

From the opening dark mummering of the strings one was conscious of the sombre mood which pervades the work and throughout  the symphony there are themes which represent the composer and Stalin and what might be the voice of Mother Russia.   

The composer is represented by a  more pensive  theme and that of Mother Russia looking back to pre-revolutionary times featured a feminine motif rendered by woodwind which conjured up images of Russian landscape. In the third movement there was also an enigmatic slow march which also seemed to hark back to a time of Russian folklore.

The second movement with its reckless martial sounds directed by the agitated Runnicles was an obvious portrait of the dictator and the regime. There was also an undercurrent of dark strings appearing throughout the work. 

At all times Runnicles controlled the orchestra with a supreme confidence. In the first movement he impressed with his grand gestures and his body at times wrestling with the music while at other times he was moving to the dance-like sounds.  He also showed great skill in moderating the volume taking the music from the  riotous through to barely a  whisper.

In the  last movement the various instruments saw moments of joy as well as a hectic battle between the sections of the orchestra leading to a final cacophony of sound.

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Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

Stage of Being

The New Zealand Dance Company

ASB Waterfront Theatre

April 22

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

The New Zealand Dance Company’s “Stage of Being” featured two dystopian works in which we encounter worlds where there is displacement, division and oppression.

“LittleBits and AddOns” by choreographer Tupua Tigafua and “Made in Them” by Xiao Chao Wen and Xin Ji  are fine example of dance addressing contemporary issues.

In “LittleBits and AddOns” the dancers are involved in changing and evolving interactions. Figures enter and leave, collect object, remove them, return and rearrange. The dancers by turns perform in a casual manner, robotically or with bird-like characteristics. These purposeful  movements contrasted with some more expressive and expansive movements. The anthropomorphic aspect of the dance seem to have connections with Laura Jean  McKay’s Book “The Animals in that Country” in confronting the notion of  inhabiting the consciousnesses of others. 

The  “birds” dance with avian-like gestures, movement and sounds and at one point provide themselves with hand shimmering plumage.

The various vignettes, each simple in themselves, build a surreal fable or metaphor about the connections between the animal and human worlds. This aspect is also highlighted by various figures who are contained or captured within capes or sacks.

In both these works the soundscape is  a dominant feature exerting a powerful force on both dancers and audience. In “LittleBits and AddOns” composer David Long combined deep sonic sounds, traditional guitar, French baroque music and eloquent silences to great effect.

As well as being animated by the music the dancers responded to a disembodied voice which offered commands and instructions. At a couple of points, the dancers also contemplated the projected image of the “Windows” symbol as though acknowledging another dimension and influence.

“Made in Them” was  a much more dramatic work with a dense, electronic soundscape designed by Benny Jennings. Where “LittleBits and AddOns” began with silence “Made in Them” opened with a dramatic bang accompanied by a huge set of light on a boom which was lowered, redefining the enclosed theatre space.

We are immediately in an otherworldly environment which is further emphasised by the appearance of figures wearing globular black masks like some alien creatures.

The lights continued to flicker through much of the work accompanied by pulsing electronic sounds to which the dancers respond, buffeted, twisting, and weaving with convoluted movements along with frantic gasps of breath.

There was much emphasis on weight and tension, action and reaction, intimacy and distance, the dancers continually in movement. In one sequence two bodies were intertwined in a mix of wrestling and sexual coupling.

There were also many sequences where the black helmeted figures act in a robotic manner, the light reflected on their helmets making them look like overgrown insects. Their taut  marching style and their sharp limb movements were like some form of semaphore signalling and conveyed a sense of aggression and coldness reinforced by regular disembodied announcement to the  “Dear Passenger”.

The two works build on earlier dance works such as “The Rite of Spring”, particularly  the more recent version by Pina Bausch where the emphasis is on the notion of ritual.

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Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

City of Dreams

Auckland Philharmonia

Conductor, Shiyeon Sung

Auckland Town Hall

April 20

Reviewed by John Daly-Peoples

The APO’s latest concert “City of Dreams” was significant for  a number of reasons, notably that this was the first appearance  of Shiyeon Sung who is now the Principal Guest conductor with the orchestra. This appointment  Along with that of Gemma New, as the Principal Conductor of the NZSO makes New Zealand a leader in promoting female conductors.

Shiyeon Sung made her first appearance with the orchestra just on a year ago when she conducted the first concert in the Auckland Town Hall for an audience  of two hundred as we were coming out of Covid 19 restrictions.

The “City of Dreams” concert opened with Beethoven’s “Coriolan Overture” which was originally written for a play by the Austrian dramatist Heinrich von Collin’s and follows much the same plot line as Shakespeare’s “Coriolanus” where the titular hero has to choose between an attack on the Roman Empire and acceding to his mother’s plea to desist and seek peace.

These two aspects are represented by two musical ideas which are at heart of the work and Sung ensured that the contrasts between percussive onslaughts and agitated strings served to highlight the conflicted drama of the work.

The intensity of the work was emphasised by the dramatic flourishes of Sung’s conducting as she shaped the music with elegant hand gestures and at other times seemed to exude an electrical force directed at the orchestra.

Following the Beethoven, the seventeen-year-old Korean cellist Jaemin Han  performed  Haydn’s Cello Concerto No1. It’s a work which allows the soloist to display their technical ability, an understanding of the music’s complexity along with exposing the works emotional  core.

Han’s performance was one that would be expected of a musician many years older. He played with an assurance and intensity which was riveting and much of the time he appeared to in a sort of reverie searching for inspiration.

The contrast between the gentle flow of the orchestra reading of the Baroque music and the cellist’s fervent playing was a true highlight. At time Han attacked his cello with an intense ferocity while at other time he was thoughtful, engrossed in the detail  of the music with a whispered contemplation.

Haydn has never sounded so modern with Han displaying not only a technical mastery but finding a sensuousness and an ecstatic energy in the music.

After interval and an outstanding Bach cello piece by Han the orchestra offered two twentieth century works.

The first was the short ”Dance in the Old Style by Erich Korngold which foreshadows the composers “Die Tote Stadt (The Dead City) which the APO will perform in July.

The work written by the composer when he was in his early twenties reveals much of the lyricism which was to be found twenty years later when he was a composer for Hollywood films.

His graceful inventive approach combining aspects of early minuets, late nineteenth century romanticism with traces of modernism was thoughtfully delivered by the orchestra.

The final piece on the program was a symphonic version of Paul Hindemith’s opera “Mathis der Maler”.

The work was an exploration of the clash between artists’ responsibility to their art and to the social and political issues of their time, which he based on the life of the 16th-century painter Matthias Grünewald, the  religious wars of the 16th century  and  the creation of Grunewald’s masterpiece, The Isenheim Altarpiece.

Like the altarpiece the work is, musically epic with a sense of narrative  and full of  energy. In the first movement the edgy horns and the lyrical strings created a tautness which was also seen in the conducting of Sung with her crisp hand directions and sharp finger pointing reinforcing the drama.

The brass which was heavily used throughout the work ranged from the burnished to the silky and  Sung  blended the various orchestral sections together to get perfect balance of sounds

After the dynamic opening movement the short second movement had an otherworldly or visionary sense. This was followed by the lengthy final movement with its denser darker sounds tinged with a savagery which seems relevant both to the time of Gruenwald and the Hindemith’s time in Nazi Germany when the work was written. Sung brilliantly negotiated the various mood and tempo changes, building tensions through to the  turbulent finale.

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