Boulder

The Therapeutic Power Of Dance

by Alice Kaderlan | Mar 18, 2024 4:53 pm

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Posted to: Dance

Mindfield
Boulder Ballet
Boulder, Colorado
March 8 – 10, 2024

Boulder Ballet’s latest production, ​“Mindfield,” is ambitious to say the least and a departure from the company’s usual productions, which tend to be mixed-bill programs with works by some of today’s best known choreographers or favorite story ballets like ​“The Nutcracker” and the upcoming ​“Les Sylphides” (in May 2024).

Several years in the making, ​“Mindfield” is the brainchild of Boulder Ballet’s artistic director, Ben Needham-Wood. Its genesis was the study of the body-mind connection that Needham-Wood and his wife Sadie Brown, Boulder Ballet’s artistic consultant, undertook at the National Center for Choreography in Akron, Ohio, in 2021.

The experience inspired Needham-Wood to create a duet, which, in his words, ​“sparked a new choreographic approach and development of a movement language.” The aim was to express his understanding of what happens within and between the minds and bodies of both dancers and the audience during live performances.

In an effort to expand on this innovative idea, a significant challenge in itself, Needham-Wood decided to invite two other dancemakers — Andrea Schermoly of Louisville Ballet and Dayton Ballet’s Brandon Ragland — to join him as co-creators of a full-length contemporary ballet. But he went beyond that. Rather than giving each choreographer individual sections to create, Needham-Wood brought all three together in the studio, stretching the definition of artistic collaboration. 

This is an extraordinary and unusual way for choreographers to work — their creative process is typically solitary. That ​“Mindfield” holds together as a completely cohesive work, in which it’s impossible to tell who created which movements, is a testament to the synergy between the three choreographers. It also underscores the versatility of Boulder Ballet’s talented dancers, as they no doubt had to follow directions from the three choreographers continuously throughout the development of ​“Mindfield.”

The performance opens informally, with the dancers scattered across a darkened stage doing their basic warmups. As the audience enters, it’s not obvious if this is part of the actual show. (If you don’t pay attention, it doesn’t matter, although many dance fans like to watch dancers as they prepare their bodies to move.) 

When the lights come up, we see a huge fabric column of what appears to be translucent red netting. This is meant to suggest the body’s spinal column, the supporting structure for the limbic system — that part of the brain involved in our emotional and behavioral responses. 

From there the nine dancers — seven permanent members plus two guest artists — begin to move, fully clothed and folded in on themselves, through a series of basic steps. Each succeeding section is designed to express the different ways the body responds to what is happening in the mind and emotions. To that end, there are occasional recordings of spoken text, like ​“I can’t breathe” and ​“Where did they go when I needed them most,” that are intended to convey what the physical movements mean. The ballet ends with the dancers, now near nude, in wide open stances to suggest how they (and perhaps us viewers) have been ​“opened up” by the experience of the performance. 

Despite the versatility and talent of Boulder Ballet’s dancers, who are among the best in the Denver-Boulder metro area, and the inventiveness of Needham-Wood and KWEST’s eclectic and engaging score, ​“Mindfield” isn’t a total success. The meanings of the various sections were largely lost on me and the movements were all essentially in the same style, becoming overly repetitive at times. Rather than, or in addition to, a talk-back at the end of the show (which did clarify or reinforce what we had just watched) a pre-performance lecture would have helped.

But Needham-Wood, the two other choreographers and the company as a whole are to be commended for taking on such an innovative effort. In Needham-Woods words, ​“Mindfield” demonstrates ​“how dance is therapeutic, when you dance and when you watch dance.” In such times as these, when we need a break from the weight of difficult and depressing news, ​“Mindfield” provides much respite and joy.

Editor’s note: Mindfield was available for only three performances last weekend at The Dairy Arts Center in Boulder.