THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Thursday, March 16, 1995 TAG: 9503160037
SECTION: DAILY BREAK PAGE: E1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY TERESA ANNAS, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 93 lines
LISA GIOBBI has choreographed around tigers and elephants. Ann Carlson has danced on stage with goats and kittens.
The New Yorkers are among seven dancer-choreographers appearing Saturday at Norfolk's Harrison Opera House for ``Daniel Ezralow &. . . ,'' presenting some of the nation's most inventive movement artists performing their own work.
Ezralow, a dancer-choreographer with Iso, a troupe that performed here in 1990, pieced together this contemporary dance sampler. The evening will offer a diverse array of styles, costumes, music and content.
``It's a European-style gala,'' Giobbi said. ``Very common in Europe. You get together ballet stars from all over the world, and they each do their specialty acts.''
The variety calls to mind the circus, lately a major source of dance ideas for Giobbi.
In Norfolk, Giobbi and her dance partner, Timothy Harling, will perform a bittersweet lover's dance 20 feet above the stage floor - on a trapeze. There will be no net to soften their fall.
In the second half of the program, Giobbi will dangle in mid-air with no visible means of support. Throughout the dance, called ``Falling Angel,'' Giobbi will go through many moods - fear, fascination, joy.
She began acquiring such trickster skills in 1990, when she worked with choreographer Martha Clarke and the St. Louis-based Circus Flora to create a dance series based around the circus arts.
A year later, Giobbi became choreographer for Big Apple Circus, which visits Northern Virginia.
At the same time, she started her own company, Motion Pictures Movement Theater Productions. In Giobbi's trapeze piece, ``Fall From Grace,'' she brought an emotional depth to the circus arts.
The work is choreographed (in collaboration with Circus Flora's trapeze artist, Sacha Pavalata) to a love duet from Puccini's ``Tosca.'' ``It's a very tactile, emotional love duet, where we finally end up losing each other.''
The dance consists of an ongoing ebb and flow of lovers' embraces. ``Just the way a relationship goes - where one person is tumbling, and the other person lifts them up.''
Her solo was inspired by an actual incident in which a stewardess was sucked out of a plane miles above Nebraska. The dance is Giobbi's rumination about what the stewardess might have gone through as she fell, from the initial fear to fascination and joy.
Giobbi's challenge is to ``really become the experience, so that I can translate it honestly.''
Ann Carlson's duet - herself and kitten - employs no uncommon tricks. ``Visit Woman Move Story Cat Cat Cat'' explores the mystery of a gorilla's love for a kitten.
In ``Cat Cat Cat,'' from Carlson's ``Animals'' series, the award-winning choreographer dances nude with the kitten. Other dances in the series feature goats, dogs, duck decoys and a goldfish in a bowl.
In the same way a pick-up orchestra hires local players, Carlson has called ahead for an S.P.C.A. kitty - 8- to 11-weeks-old, please. ``And I've never had a problem having it adopted. These's always been someone who comes forward to adopt the kitten.''
``Cat Cat Cat'' is based on the true tale of Koko, the gorilla who was taught sign language, then asked for a kitten for her birthday. She was given a kitten, and bonded to it as mother.
The kitten grew to love Koko. One day, the cat slipped out of the cage, and was run over by a car. When the trainer told Koko what happened, the gorilla began to wail and grieve.
In Carlson's loping dance-on-all-fours, the Koko story conveys universal issues of grief, bonding, loss and connection.
The fact that she is nude doesn't faze her, Carlson said. ``I suppose there aren't many contexts where we see a woman naked, and it is not labeled erotic.
``The people who have objected haven't seen the work. I think of it along the lines of sculptural nudity, as opposed to human nakedness.''
Giobbi suggested another way of looking at the issue. ``People can be funny about nudity. But within 15 seconds, you're done with that. Ann creates such a fantastic character.
``Besides, we're not nude. We're bathed in a character, in light and in music.'' MEMO: DANCE FACTS
What: ``Daniel Ezralow & . . . ,'' featuring nine dances by seven
prominent dancer-choreographers. Presented by Tidewater Performing Arts
Society.
Where: Harrison Opera House, 160 Virginia Beach Blvd., Norfolk
When: 8 p.m. Saturday
How much: $16 to $20
Call: 627-2314; or charge by phone at 671-8100 ILLUSTRATION: Color photo by CAMI
Daniel Ezralow presents a dance sampler Saturday in Norfolk.
by CNB