Shakti – The Woman in the Dunes
Shakti @ Nexus Multicultural Arts Centre
9:00pm, Fri 1 Mar 2002
Score: 5
Short Review: Inexplicable
After the unexpected pleasure of Tokyo Triangle in Tantra Vision , and having chatted with the wonderfully friendly Shakti after that show, I was really looking forward to this. Oh, how I was disappointed.
“The Woman in the Dunes” is supposed to represent the subconcious in all of us, Shakti explained in near-incomprehensible babble at the end of the show. Set to various pieces of gothic rhythms (with the exception of a horrendously out-of-place version of “I Put A Spell On You”), this dance was a repetitive group of movements, combined with inexplicable wiggling of eyebrows, tongue wagging and head bobbing.
The saving graces of the performance were the entry and exit silhouettes, the use of front-lighting to generate giant dancing shadows on the rear wall, and the periods of the dance where Shakti was joined by another dancer. Oh, and the net entrapment was a nice touch, too.
Somehow, I sensed that Shakti wanted to shock with this performance. Sadly, this was not achieved.