Bodies in Urban Spaces – Cie. Willi Dorner [Source: Gabriel Bienczycki]
Willie Dorner’s Cie. Willi Dorner of Vienna, Austria has a great range of work but one look at the photos and videos and you can see why Bodies in Urban Spaces gets so much attention.
Bodies in Urban Spaces is an adaptable piece that takes an audience from place to place in an urban landscape following dancers who run from one location to another creating unique group configurations based on the spots in which they temporarily settle.
The transitions in and out of group shapes are downplayed in the above video. Photographs typically focus on the shape and not the getting in or out and you can kind of see why from the end of the above video. As the dancers unravel from a colorful installation into a group preparing to bow, there’s kind of a deflation of the moment.
That’s not a criticism so much as a reality of the way they choose to work and helps explain why the videos just aren’t as interesting as the photos which makes me wonder if being there is not as good as checking out the documentation. Nevertheless, I’d love to see one of these events in action and would certainly check out anything else Cie. Willi Dorner is doing.
Official Site: Cie. Willi Dorner