Only half of each person is visible. Together, two people make one.
No, this isn’t some sort of social commentary, it’s MOMIX dance company performing “Lunar Sea” Jan. 16 and 17 at the University of Richmond’s Modlin Center. The show is a veritable visual feast of exploration into the myriad uses of bodies under black light.
Under the artistic direction of Moses Pendleton, the self-proclaimed dancer-illusionists present a dazzlingly surreal evening of floating, swimming, rolling and flying across the stage. Pendleton’s playful creativity knows no bounds.
For much of the show the dancers wear a body stocking that’s half black and half white, divided down their center, with a yin-yang shaped curve on their torsos. In other scenes only the dancers’ legs or arms are in white.
The show asks the audience not to wonder what the deeper meaning is, just to enjoy how amazing it looks when only certain parts of the body can be seen. The only question the audience might have is how they do it.
The movements would appear very basic if the audience could see the dancers’ whole bodies. But thanks to black light, the dancers frolic on the moon, weightless and playful.
Black-clad partners lift, whirl, toss and pull the half-seen dancers. This makes them look as if they are floating horizontally, a few feet above the ground, spinning around and upside-down, by themselves.
The dancers’ movement is fluid and flexible. They tend to be in a line of three or four, with their visible side to the audience. They make fun shapes and poses in unison, and rarely travel across the floor.
In one section, the dancers become human jellyfish by carrying umbrellas draped with stretchy white fabric that reaches the floor. They jump, swim and spin just like the real thing.
Another amazing feat of human puppetry comes when multiple pairs of striped tights become giant spiders. Michael Curry is the genius behind the puppets. Curry won a Drama Desk Award in 1998 for his puppet design in “The Lion King” on Broadway.
The music during most of the show is referred to in the program as “exotic electronica.” It combines ethereal electronic music with African, Indian and Celtic soundscapes. It sets a perfect tone of other-worldly ambience.
Throughout the performance a sheer scrim hangs at the front of the stage while video of plants, fire, animals, trees and skies project onto it. The video footage is paused and then played again at random times in the show.
The images are very close-up shots, of things like sunflowers or woven fabric. The pictures are skewed by a center line that acts as a mirror, reflecting half the image twice. The images provide added depth and texture through which to view the performance.
The show transports the audience to the moon, sea and back to earth again. The second half of the performance is more weighted. Two dancers in skin-colored underwear writhe in a sensual duet, flooded by red light. The dancers almost never let go of each other.
“Lunar Sea” is a sumptuous journey into the endlessly creative mind of Pendleton. He manipulates dancers into strange and beautiful other-worldly creatures.
MOMIX defends their title of internationally acclaimed illusionist dancers who continue to push the boundaries of creativity. They challenge the idea that seeing is believing.