"Chroma" by the National Ballet of Canada

(Four Seasons Centre, 15 June 2012)

If tutus had had aesthetic merit, they would have been adopted by popular culture some time in the past hundred years. By contrast, the costumes designed by Moritz Junge are fit to become mainstream. Unisex, unburdened by prejudice, they leave it to dancers to define what is unique about genders. The costumes bare every muscle capable of communicating without distracting. Beige and minimalist, the costumes frame the bodies, never speak on their behalf.

John Pawson's Apple-store-like set is pierced with the sounds that brushing minds make (arranged by Joby Talbot). Lit blindingly even in reflection (by Lucy Carter), dancers project directly onto the viewer, and yet do not intrude. Human body is revealed as the ultimate communicator, the highest form of art.

Ideas are the characters. Ideas animate the more perceptive minds, which light up bodies, are passed onto other bodies, then minds, and live for as long as they are in transit. Bodies live for twenty-three minutes.

Elena Lobsanova is a class apart. Peter Lorre learnt his early English parts phonetically. Similar delivery is often practiced by dancers (from ballet to ballroom) and opera singers. By contrast, Lobsanova is fluent in the language that she voices.

Lobsanova narrates each idea linearly, continuously, with dignity. She is in control of her body (never overstretching for effect; Wayne McGregor's choreography leaves no time for excess), and thus refines ideas, instead of being possessed by them. The knee that bends a little too far, the thigh full, the calf slender, the chest pliable---the Shiva of the peak shift executed right.

One consumes beauty in order to ascertain that the environment is safe and fertile. One produces beauty in order to feel alive. One can recall a fact and take comfort in it; emotions are harder to evoke at will. Hence the need for the constant reassurance of beauty.