Shadow Land

 Currently, while I have been in Denmark, I've seen posters for the theatre production, Shadow Land. The production already toured in Australia last year, where I was able to conduct an interview with one of the team creatives. Seeing that the production would be coming to Copenhagen I could think of no better time to post the interview. -  

For a few special nights last month, Her majesty’s theatre showcased dance company Pilobolus’ performance Shadowland. It was a remarkable performance revealing the best of human imagination, physical prowess, and aesthetic beauty as it followed the development of a young girl as she thirsts for independence. As she enters the frightful world of shadow beyond her bedroom wall, the audience follows her into a world of dreamlike logic and simplistic wonder. To better understand the performance and the work that went into it, creative and executive director Itamar Kubovy give some insights.

Q) There were a range of creatives on this project - did you all have particular tasks, or how was the work divided?

K) Pilobolus always creates with diversity, in expertise and redundancy in the roles. We are all in the room working at the same time but each of us focuses on a different aspect of the work – be it story, in the case of Steve Banks, head writer for SpongeBob Squarepants, or music in the case of David Poe, our amazing composer, or shadow techniques or Pilobolus partnering. It’s important to remember, I think, that in reimagining shadow-making we are exploring a unique performance style so there is no one to call and ask for help. We have to figure it out ourselves.

So Pilobolus is a dance company that seems to utilise a range of dance and performance disciplines, does that often include shadow and silhouette forms, or was this special to Shadow Land?

K) Pilobolus is primarily a dance company that develops movement and dances for the live stage, film, and advertising. Only a couple of our pieces, Shadowland being the primary example, contain shadows at all.

We started working with shadows in 2006, when we made a television advertisement for Hyundia, in which we were asked to make a car out of body shadows, that project quickly led to being asked to perform at the Oscars where we made iconic images representing the nominated films in a similar style.  Over the next two years the word soon realised we had reimagined an ancient art form and asked us to run around the world, creating many little three-minute pieces in shadow. Shadowland is the result of trying to weave what we intended during those years into a single full-evening presentation.

Q) In the performance the hair, the costume, even the body type of Kristina (the female lead), seemed to lend itself perfectly to silhouette performance, were they all deliberate choices?

K) Shadows are not very forgiving. Everything connected to a figure or object’s outline must be considered and deliberate, while appearing spontaneous and accidental.

Q) The scene with the centaur was magical, however I was wondering, of all the animals, mythical or otherwise, what made you chose a centaur? – Why have the female lead as a dog, for that matter?

K) A centaur is associated with sexuality and we knew we wanted to have a sexual rite of passage in that scene but rather than the traditional stud centaur, we were amused by the idea of a centaur who is ashamed of his horse half and can only find his sexuality when he encounters a girl who is ashamed of her dog head.

When the fashion designer Pierre Cardin, one of Pilobolus’ first patrons in the ‘70s, saw Shadowland in Paris a couple of years ago. We went to dinner afterwards with the cast and he kept saying, “the Animals. The Animals.” From the amazing fungus after which we (Pilobolus) are named, to the centaur, the elephant, the spiders, and the dog heads of Shadowland we have always been inspired by the expressive power of the natural world.

Q) The other side of the centaur is having two males in the romance as opposed to one, what was the reasoning behind that, as in why not a more familiar one male and one female dance?

K) Once we had a centaur made of two guys, the duet naturally turned into a trio. We tried to begin and end as a duet and elaborate as a trio. We name all of our moves and our favourite in that trio is know as “Tripplesex” – the Dog Girl and the two sides of the Centaur.

Q) The scene where she almost drowns, to me it seemed like a ceremonial rebirth, was that how it was meant or was there another creative purpose behind it?

K) We tried in Shadowland always to achieve depth with simplicity. We wanted to find a literal low point for the Dog Girl, the moment where she hits bottom. What kind of place could be lower than the bottom of the ocean? When she lands she is truly at the bedrock of the bottom and begins her ascent towards fulfillment.

Q) It seems even with the advance of special effects the continued development of CGI and animation, people are still drawn to theatre like this, theatre where they can see the mechanics behind the illusion, why do you think that is?

K) As the world becomes a more meditated place and we spend all day behind a screen, the importance of hand-made thing, touch and people spending time in the physical presence of each other becomes more important. Something live and handmade can truly captivate in a way that things made by computers can not. Think about the return of The LP.

Q) The encore in creating New York and then the trip to Australia was brilliant, perfect way to end on a high note, whose idea was that?

-       Compliments on the song choice there

Here the Audience loved it, how do audiences usually respond?

K) We try to create a local finale for every one of our performances. We have found a tremendous response around the world when we customise our finale to the audience. It connects is to the audience in a way that makes everyone feel more included. We have a whole team on the road that researches and advances ideas for each of our 

finales.