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Trajal Harrell: Dancing through history, into the future
Performed earlier this month at Barbican, we unpack Trajal Harrell’s dance project Porca Miseria – Triple Bill
By
Sam Kan
May 24, 2023
Dance has never been so popular, particularly in the art world: it has become one of the ‘coolest’ media for artists in the twenty-first century and is found in the programming of most major galleries. Often, however, contemporary dance practice feels divorced from its histories and geographies, especially when presented in a white cube space. Enter Trajal Harrell, whose performances assertively exist between art and theatre, whilst threading together multiple histories, both those well-known and those sometimes forgotten.
Harrell (b. 1973) is an American choreographer and dancer who first gained international acclaim with his series of performances Twenty Looks or Paris Is Burning at the Judson Church, with the last in the series premiering in 2012. Twenty Looks came from Harrell imagining an encounter between the early postmodern dance of Judson in Downtown New York and vogueing from the ballrooms of Uptown. It was also a response to the erasure often written into histories of the arts: dance history includes Judson, but Ballroom culture is often omitted.
Continuing his ploughing of dance history, and these fertile boundaries between dance genres, Harrell has created Porca Miseria, a new triple bill first presented in its entirety at the 2022 Holland Festival. Each work has been inspired by an extraordinary woman, and the triptych is a rethinking of the ‘notion of the bitch’, according to Harrell. In Deathbed, dancers enact a literal, and metaphorical, rummaging through a dressing-up box or curiosity cabinet - they move in and out from behind a dressing room, adorned with different garments and carrying various miscellaneous items. The music is eclectic too, changing swiftly between genres, and directing the performers to switch between movement styles – from ballet and Butoh to vogueing and strutting like a catwalk-model. The piece ends with one performer, increasingly weighed with sadness, swaddled (or smothered) with cloth by the others, until they’re rendered immobile and carried offstage by pallbearers. Deathbed is supposedly inspired by the choreographer, activist and “matriarch of Black dance” Katherine Dunham. The connection to Dunham isn’t strikingly obvious, but the work reads as a contemplative funerary commemoration (Dunham died in 2006) and a provocative rediscovering of dance history.
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The second work O Medea is an unimpactful film, that doesn’t invoke the eponymous Greek heroine or tragedy. The film seems to be distracted in its direction and the recorded performance struggles to stand up to the live works sandwiching it in the bill. The final piece Maggie the Cat, however, is triumphant, and is a highly pleasurable and astutely political response to Maggie, the dissatisfied wife in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the whole play as a portrait of Southern America in the 1950s. It is a ball: dancers parade and vogue down the stage-turned-catwalk, modelling endless outfits fashioned from domestic items – towels, sofa cushions, bed sheets - whilst Harrell and Perle Palombe MC as ‘Big Mama’ and ‘Big Daddy’ respectively (other character names from Williams’ play but playfully queered here). The suggestion is that these performers represent the Black characters in the play: the slaves working on the Pollitt plantation, who are marginal in the text. Here, though, they claim centre-stage and impress with their creativity, joy and sexiness: Harrell once again giving space to those who have been erased. The use of mundane items to make stunning looks both reflects the DIY outfits of ballroom dancers, and the way that Maggie, from a poor upbringing, has learnt to perform the role of a wealthy wife.
Harrell’s choreography continuously weaves together many different, and sometimes jarring, dance styles. This reflects his extensive research into dance histories, including the life of Dunham who brought together African and Caribbean dance with traditional ballet and the work of Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the original developers of Butoh. He then combines this with references to popular culture, such as invoking the visuals of fashion catwalks – some of the outfits in Maggie are strikingly similar to Rei Kawakubo designs- and including pop music from the likes of ANHONI. The result, as Deathbed examples, is a sometimes blurry but often remarkable reimagining of dance history: a history presented as non-linear, liberated from hierarchies, embracing of multiple geographies. Harrell has described his work as producing a so-called ‘fictional archive’. This ‘archive’ is rich with potential: in rediscovering histories, Harrell offers infinite starting points for future choreography.
Harrell’s work isn’t just rich with creative potential, but political too. His ‘archive’ doesn’t prioritise one history, geography, or art form, and instead gives equal platform to all that’s represented. Furthermore, in a continuation of the traditions of Judson dance, he embraces the everyday and mundane in his choreography and design. Steps and movements are often very simple, suggesting to the viewer that they’re easily reproducible by anyone, whilst the chosen props are those that you could probably find at home: a laptop charger, piles of bedding, wet wipes. The emphasis on accessibility is mirrored in Harrell’s casting: his dancers represent a broad range of identities and body-types, with each performer given equal standing in the work. Harrell is encouraging a democratisation of dance, as the artists of Judson did, however flawed his and their efforts may have been.
What felt perhaps most radical was the joy invoked in Maggie the Cat. Joy, when experienced by marginalised people and given public platform, can be a politically charged emotional expression. The celebratory, carnivalesque atmosphere generated in the early ballrooms of New York certainly represented the important creation of a safe and joyful community for the queer people present. Similarly, Harrell’s reimagining of Williams’ slaves as thoroughly enjoying themselves and each other, offers a complete alternative to their representation in the original play. Even Harrell’s own presence in Maggie – dancing, MCing, sometimes directing the dancers – feels unashamed in its depiction of a choreographer actively creating and enjoying their work; a depiction that runs contrary to the serious, and often invisible, choreographer figure in contemporary dance. Porca Miseria runs to a total of four hours (admittedly with an oddly extended one hour interval), and I have noticed that several articles reviewing it level criticisms of ‘self-indulgence’: indulgence, in the joy of performing, of watching, felt to me, exactly the point. Harrell’s work is unarguably overflowing with energy and research, and by bringing these two together he offers exciting insight into the potential futures of dance.
Dance has never been so popular, particularly in the art world: it has become one of the ‘coolest’ media for artists in the twenty-first century and is found in the programming of most major galleries. Often, however, contemporary dance practice feels divorced from its histories and geographies, especially when presented in a white cube space. Enter Trajal Harrell, whose performances assertively exist between art and theatre, whilst threading together multiple histories, both those well-known and those sometimes forgotten.
Harrell (b. 1973) is an American choreographer and dancer who first gained international acclaim with his series of performances Twenty Looks or Paris Is Burning at the Judson Church, with the last in the series premiering in 2012. Twenty Looks came from Harrell imagining an encounter between the early postmodern dance of Judson in Downtown New York and vogueing from the ballrooms of Uptown. It was also a response to the erasure often written into histories of the arts: dance history includes Judson, but Ballroom culture is often omitted.
Continuing his ploughing of dance history, and these fertile boundaries between dance genres, Harrell has created Porca Miseria, a new triple bill first presented in its entirety at the 2022 Holland Festival. Each work has been inspired by an extraordinary woman, and the triptych is a rethinking of the ‘notion of the bitch’, according to Harrell. In Deathbed, dancers enact a literal, and metaphorical, rummaging through a dressing-up box or curiosity cabinet - they move in and out from behind a dressing room, adorned with different garments and carrying various miscellaneous items. The music is eclectic too, changing swiftly between genres, and directing the performers to switch between movement styles – from ballet and Butoh to vogueing and strutting like a catwalk-model. The piece ends with one performer, increasingly weighed with sadness, swaddled (or smothered) with cloth by the others, until they’re rendered immobile and carried offstage by pallbearers. Deathbed is supposedly inspired by the choreographer, activist and “matriarch of Black dance” Katherine Dunham. The connection to Dunham isn’t strikingly obvious, but the work reads as a contemplative funerary commemoration (Dunham died in 2006) and a provocative rediscovering of dance history.
The second work O Medea is an unimpactful film, that doesn’t invoke the eponymous Greek heroine or tragedy. The film seems to be distracted in its direction and the recorded performance struggles to stand up to the live works sandwiching it in the bill. The final piece Maggie the Cat, however, is triumphant, and is a highly pleasurable and astutely political response to Maggie, the dissatisfied wife in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the whole play as a portrait of Southern America in the 1950s. It is a ball: dancers parade and vogue down the stage-turned-catwalk, modelling endless outfits fashioned from domestic items – towels, sofa cushions, bed sheets - whilst Harrell and Perle Palombe MC as ‘Big Mama’ and ‘Big Daddy’ respectively (other character names from Williams’ play but playfully queered here). The suggestion is that these performers represent the Black characters in the play: the slaves working on the Pollitt plantation, who are marginal in the text. Here, though, they claim centre-stage and impress with their creativity, joy and sexiness: Harrell once again giving space to those who have been erased. The use of mundane items to make stunning looks both reflects the DIY outfits of ballroom dancers, and the way that Maggie, from a poor upbringing, has learnt to perform the role of a wealthy wife.
Harrell’s choreography continuously weaves together many different, and sometimes jarring, dance styles. This reflects his extensive research into dance histories, including the life of Dunham who brought together African and Caribbean dance with traditional ballet and the work of Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the original developers of Butoh. He then combines this with references to popular culture, such as invoking the visuals of fashion catwalks – some of the outfits in Maggie are strikingly similar to Rei Kawakubo designs- and including pop music from the likes of ANHONI. The result, as Deathbed examples, is a sometimes blurry but often remarkable reimagining of dance history: a history presented as non-linear, liberated from hierarchies, embracing of multiple geographies. Harrell has described his work as producing a so-called ‘fictional archive’. This ‘archive’ is rich with potential: in rediscovering histories, Harrell offers infinite starting points for future choreography.
Harrell’s work isn’t just rich with creative potential, but political too. His ‘archive’ doesn’t prioritise one history, geography, or art form, and instead gives equal platform to all that’s represented. Furthermore, in a continuation of the traditions of Judson dance, he embraces the everyday and mundane in his choreography and design. Steps and movements are often very simple, suggesting to the viewer that they’re easily reproducible by anyone, whilst the chosen props are those that you could probably find at home: a laptop charger, piles of bedding, wet wipes. The emphasis on accessibility is mirrored in Harrell’s casting: his dancers represent a broad range of identities and body-types, with each performer given equal standing in the work. Harrell is encouraging a democratisation of dance, as the artists of Judson did, however flawed his and their efforts may have been.
What felt perhaps most radical was the joy invoked in Maggie the Cat. Joy, when experienced by marginalised people and given public platform, can be a politically charged emotional expression. The celebratory, carnivalesque atmosphere generated in the early ballrooms of New York certainly represented the important creation of a safe and joyful community for the queer people present. Similarly, Harrell’s reimagining of Williams’ slaves as thoroughly enjoying themselves and each other, offers a complete alternative to their representation in the original play. Even Harrell’s own presence in Maggie – dancing, MCing, sometimes directing the dancers – feels unashamed in its depiction of a choreographer actively creating and enjoying their work; a depiction that runs contrary to the serious, and often invisible, choreographer figure in contemporary dance. Porca Miseria runs to a total of four hours (admittedly with an oddly extended one hour interval), and I have noticed that several articles reviewing it level criticisms of ‘self-indulgence’: indulgence, in the joy of performing, of watching, felt to me, exactly the point. Harrell’s work is unarguably overflowing with energy and research, and by bringing these two together he offers exciting insight into the potential futures of dance.
Dance has never been so popular, particularly in the art world: it has become one of the ‘coolest’ media for artists in the twenty-first century and is found in the programming of most major galleries. Often, however, contemporary dance practice feels divorced from its histories and geographies, especially when presented in a white cube space. Enter Trajal Harrell, whose performances assertively exist between art and theatre, whilst threading together multiple histories, both those well-known and those sometimes forgotten.
Harrell (b. 1973) is an American choreographer and dancer who first gained international acclaim with his series of performances Twenty Looks or Paris Is Burning at the Judson Church, with the last in the series premiering in 2012. Twenty Looks came from Harrell imagining an encounter between the early postmodern dance of Judson in Downtown New York and vogueing from the ballrooms of Uptown. It was also a response to the erasure often written into histories of the arts: dance history includes Judson, but Ballroom culture is often omitted.
Continuing his ploughing of dance history, and these fertile boundaries between dance genres, Harrell has created Porca Miseria, a new triple bill first presented in its entirety at the 2022 Holland Festival. Each work has been inspired by an extraordinary woman, and the triptych is a rethinking of the ‘notion of the bitch’, according to Harrell. In Deathbed, dancers enact a literal, and metaphorical, rummaging through a dressing-up box or curiosity cabinet - they move in and out from behind a dressing room, adorned with different garments and carrying various miscellaneous items. The music is eclectic too, changing swiftly between genres, and directing the performers to switch between movement styles – from ballet and Butoh to vogueing and strutting like a catwalk-model. The piece ends with one performer, increasingly weighed with sadness, swaddled (or smothered) with cloth by the others, until they’re rendered immobile and carried offstage by pallbearers. Deathbed is supposedly inspired by the choreographer, activist and “matriarch of Black dance” Katherine Dunham. The connection to Dunham isn’t strikingly obvious, but the work reads as a contemplative funerary commemoration (Dunham died in 2006) and a provocative rediscovering of dance history.
The second work O Medea is an unimpactful film, that doesn’t invoke the eponymous Greek heroine or tragedy. The film seems to be distracted in its direction and the recorded performance struggles to stand up to the live works sandwiching it in the bill. The final piece Maggie the Cat, however, is triumphant, and is a highly pleasurable and astutely political response to Maggie, the dissatisfied wife in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the whole play as a portrait of Southern America in the 1950s. It is a ball: dancers parade and vogue down the stage-turned-catwalk, modelling endless outfits fashioned from domestic items – towels, sofa cushions, bed sheets - whilst Harrell and Perle Palombe MC as ‘Big Mama’ and ‘Big Daddy’ respectively (other character names from Williams’ play but playfully queered here). The suggestion is that these performers represent the Black characters in the play: the slaves working on the Pollitt plantation, who are marginal in the text. Here, though, they claim centre-stage and impress with their creativity, joy and sexiness: Harrell once again giving space to those who have been erased. The use of mundane items to make stunning looks both reflects the DIY outfits of ballroom dancers, and the way that Maggie, from a poor upbringing, has learnt to perform the role of a wealthy wife.
Harrell’s choreography continuously weaves together many different, and sometimes jarring, dance styles. This reflects his extensive research into dance histories, including the life of Dunham who brought together African and Caribbean dance with traditional ballet and the work of Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the original developers of Butoh. He then combines this with references to popular culture, such as invoking the visuals of fashion catwalks – some of the outfits in Maggie are strikingly similar to Rei Kawakubo designs- and including pop music from the likes of ANHONI. The result, as Deathbed examples, is a sometimes blurry but often remarkable reimagining of dance history: a history presented as non-linear, liberated from hierarchies, embracing of multiple geographies. Harrell has described his work as producing a so-called ‘fictional archive’. This ‘archive’ is rich with potential: in rediscovering histories, Harrell offers infinite starting points for future choreography.
Harrell’s work isn’t just rich with creative potential, but political too. His ‘archive’ doesn’t prioritise one history, geography, or art form, and instead gives equal platform to all that’s represented. Furthermore, in a continuation of the traditions of Judson dance, he embraces the everyday and mundane in his choreography and design. Steps and movements are often very simple, suggesting to the viewer that they’re easily reproducible by anyone, whilst the chosen props are those that you could probably find at home: a laptop charger, piles of bedding, wet wipes. The emphasis on accessibility is mirrored in Harrell’s casting: his dancers represent a broad range of identities and body-types, with each performer given equal standing in the work. Harrell is encouraging a democratisation of dance, as the artists of Judson did, however flawed his and their efforts may have been.
What felt perhaps most radical was the joy invoked in Maggie the Cat. Joy, when experienced by marginalised people and given public platform, can be a politically charged emotional expression. The celebratory, carnivalesque atmosphere generated in the early ballrooms of New York certainly represented the important creation of a safe and joyful community for the queer people present. Similarly, Harrell’s reimagining of Williams’ slaves as thoroughly enjoying themselves and each other, offers a complete alternative to their representation in the original play. Even Harrell’s own presence in Maggie – dancing, MCing, sometimes directing the dancers – feels unashamed in its depiction of a choreographer actively creating and enjoying their work; a depiction that runs contrary to the serious, and often invisible, choreographer figure in contemporary dance. Porca Miseria runs to a total of four hours (admittedly with an oddly extended one hour interval), and I have noticed that several articles reviewing it level criticisms of ‘self-indulgence’: indulgence, in the joy of performing, of watching, felt to me, exactly the point. Harrell’s work is unarguably overflowing with energy and research, and by bringing these two together he offers exciting insight into the potential futures of dance.
Dance has never been so popular, particularly in the art world: it has become one of the ‘coolest’ media for artists in the twenty-first century and is found in the programming of most major galleries. Often, however, contemporary dance practice feels divorced from its histories and geographies, especially when presented in a white cube space. Enter Trajal Harrell, whose performances assertively exist between art and theatre, whilst threading together multiple histories, both those well-known and those sometimes forgotten.
Harrell (b. 1973) is an American choreographer and dancer who first gained international acclaim with his series of performances Twenty Looks or Paris Is Burning at the Judson Church, with the last in the series premiering in 2012. Twenty Looks came from Harrell imagining an encounter between the early postmodern dance of Judson in Downtown New York and vogueing from the ballrooms of Uptown. It was also a response to the erasure often written into histories of the arts: dance history includes Judson, but Ballroom culture is often omitted.
Continuing his ploughing of dance history, and these fertile boundaries between dance genres, Harrell has created Porca Miseria, a new triple bill first presented in its entirety at the 2022 Holland Festival. Each work has been inspired by an extraordinary woman, and the triptych is a rethinking of the ‘notion of the bitch’, according to Harrell. In Deathbed, dancers enact a literal, and metaphorical, rummaging through a dressing-up box or curiosity cabinet - they move in and out from behind a dressing room, adorned with different garments and carrying various miscellaneous items. The music is eclectic too, changing swiftly between genres, and directing the performers to switch between movement styles – from ballet and Butoh to vogueing and strutting like a catwalk-model. The piece ends with one performer, increasingly weighed with sadness, swaddled (or smothered) with cloth by the others, until they’re rendered immobile and carried offstage by pallbearers. Deathbed is supposedly inspired by the choreographer, activist and “matriarch of Black dance” Katherine Dunham. The connection to Dunham isn’t strikingly obvious, but the work reads as a contemplative funerary commemoration (Dunham died in 2006) and a provocative rediscovering of dance history.
The second work O Medea is an unimpactful film, that doesn’t invoke the eponymous Greek heroine or tragedy. The film seems to be distracted in its direction and the recorded performance struggles to stand up to the live works sandwiching it in the bill. The final piece Maggie the Cat, however, is triumphant, and is a highly pleasurable and astutely political response to Maggie, the dissatisfied wife in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the whole play as a portrait of Southern America in the 1950s. It is a ball: dancers parade and vogue down the stage-turned-catwalk, modelling endless outfits fashioned from domestic items – towels, sofa cushions, bed sheets - whilst Harrell and Perle Palombe MC as ‘Big Mama’ and ‘Big Daddy’ respectively (other character names from Williams’ play but playfully queered here). The suggestion is that these performers represent the Black characters in the play: the slaves working on the Pollitt plantation, who are marginal in the text. Here, though, they claim centre-stage and impress with their creativity, joy and sexiness: Harrell once again giving space to those who have been erased. The use of mundane items to make stunning looks both reflects the DIY outfits of ballroom dancers, and the way that Maggie, from a poor upbringing, has learnt to perform the role of a wealthy wife.
Harrell’s choreography continuously weaves together many different, and sometimes jarring, dance styles. This reflects his extensive research into dance histories, including the life of Dunham who brought together African and Caribbean dance with traditional ballet and the work of Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the original developers of Butoh. He then combines this with references to popular culture, such as invoking the visuals of fashion catwalks – some of the outfits in Maggie are strikingly similar to Rei Kawakubo designs- and including pop music from the likes of ANHONI. The result, as Deathbed examples, is a sometimes blurry but often remarkable reimagining of dance history: a history presented as non-linear, liberated from hierarchies, embracing of multiple geographies. Harrell has described his work as producing a so-called ‘fictional archive’. This ‘archive’ is rich with potential: in rediscovering histories, Harrell offers infinite starting points for future choreography.
Harrell’s work isn’t just rich with creative potential, but political too. His ‘archive’ doesn’t prioritise one history, geography, or art form, and instead gives equal platform to all that’s represented. Furthermore, in a continuation of the traditions of Judson dance, he embraces the everyday and mundane in his choreography and design. Steps and movements are often very simple, suggesting to the viewer that they’re easily reproducible by anyone, whilst the chosen props are those that you could probably find at home: a laptop charger, piles of bedding, wet wipes. The emphasis on accessibility is mirrored in Harrell’s casting: his dancers represent a broad range of identities and body-types, with each performer given equal standing in the work. Harrell is encouraging a democratisation of dance, as the artists of Judson did, however flawed his and their efforts may have been.
What felt perhaps most radical was the joy invoked in Maggie the Cat. Joy, when experienced by marginalised people and given public platform, can be a politically charged emotional expression. The celebratory, carnivalesque atmosphere generated in the early ballrooms of New York certainly represented the important creation of a safe and joyful community for the queer people present. Similarly, Harrell’s reimagining of Williams’ slaves as thoroughly enjoying themselves and each other, offers a complete alternative to their representation in the original play. Even Harrell’s own presence in Maggie – dancing, MCing, sometimes directing the dancers – feels unashamed in its depiction of a choreographer actively creating and enjoying their work; a depiction that runs contrary to the serious, and often invisible, choreographer figure in contemporary dance. Porca Miseria runs to a total of four hours (admittedly with an oddly extended one hour interval), and I have noticed that several articles reviewing it level criticisms of ‘self-indulgence’: indulgence, in the joy of performing, of watching, felt to me, exactly the point. Harrell’s work is unarguably overflowing with energy and research, and by bringing these two together he offers exciting insight into the potential futures of dance.
Dance has never been so popular, particularly in the art world: it has become one of the ‘coolest’ media for artists in the twenty-first century and is found in the programming of most major galleries. Often, however, contemporary dance practice feels divorced from its histories and geographies, especially when presented in a white cube space. Enter Trajal Harrell, whose performances assertively exist between art and theatre, whilst threading together multiple histories, both those well-known and those sometimes forgotten.
Harrell (b. 1973) is an American choreographer and dancer who first gained international acclaim with his series of performances Twenty Looks or Paris Is Burning at the Judson Church, with the last in the series premiering in 2012. Twenty Looks came from Harrell imagining an encounter between the early postmodern dance of Judson in Downtown New York and vogueing from the ballrooms of Uptown. It was also a response to the erasure often written into histories of the arts: dance history includes Judson, but Ballroom culture is often omitted.
Continuing his ploughing of dance history, and these fertile boundaries between dance genres, Harrell has created Porca Miseria, a new triple bill first presented in its entirety at the 2022 Holland Festival. Each work has been inspired by an extraordinary woman, and the triptych is a rethinking of the ‘notion of the bitch’, according to Harrell. In Deathbed, dancers enact a literal, and metaphorical, rummaging through a dressing-up box or curiosity cabinet - they move in and out from behind a dressing room, adorned with different garments and carrying various miscellaneous items. The music is eclectic too, changing swiftly between genres, and directing the performers to switch between movement styles – from ballet and Butoh to vogueing and strutting like a catwalk-model. The piece ends with one performer, increasingly weighed with sadness, swaddled (or smothered) with cloth by the others, until they’re rendered immobile and carried offstage by pallbearers. Deathbed is supposedly inspired by the choreographer, activist and “matriarch of Black dance” Katherine Dunham. The connection to Dunham isn’t strikingly obvious, but the work reads as a contemplative funerary commemoration (Dunham died in 2006) and a provocative rediscovering of dance history.
The second work O Medea is an unimpactful film, that doesn’t invoke the eponymous Greek heroine or tragedy. The film seems to be distracted in its direction and the recorded performance struggles to stand up to the live works sandwiching it in the bill. The final piece Maggie the Cat, however, is triumphant, and is a highly pleasurable and astutely political response to Maggie, the dissatisfied wife in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the whole play as a portrait of Southern America in the 1950s. It is a ball: dancers parade and vogue down the stage-turned-catwalk, modelling endless outfits fashioned from domestic items – towels, sofa cushions, bed sheets - whilst Harrell and Perle Palombe MC as ‘Big Mama’ and ‘Big Daddy’ respectively (other character names from Williams’ play but playfully queered here). The suggestion is that these performers represent the Black characters in the play: the slaves working on the Pollitt plantation, who are marginal in the text. Here, though, they claim centre-stage and impress with their creativity, joy and sexiness: Harrell once again giving space to those who have been erased. The use of mundane items to make stunning looks both reflects the DIY outfits of ballroom dancers, and the way that Maggie, from a poor upbringing, has learnt to perform the role of a wealthy wife.
Harrell’s choreography continuously weaves together many different, and sometimes jarring, dance styles. This reflects his extensive research into dance histories, including the life of Dunham who brought together African and Caribbean dance with traditional ballet and the work of Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the original developers of Butoh. He then combines this with references to popular culture, such as invoking the visuals of fashion catwalks – some of the outfits in Maggie are strikingly similar to Rei Kawakubo designs- and including pop music from the likes of ANHONI. The result, as Deathbed examples, is a sometimes blurry but often remarkable reimagining of dance history: a history presented as non-linear, liberated from hierarchies, embracing of multiple geographies. Harrell has described his work as producing a so-called ‘fictional archive’. This ‘archive’ is rich with potential: in rediscovering histories, Harrell offers infinite starting points for future choreography.
Harrell’s work isn’t just rich with creative potential, but political too. His ‘archive’ doesn’t prioritise one history, geography, or art form, and instead gives equal platform to all that’s represented. Furthermore, in a continuation of the traditions of Judson dance, he embraces the everyday and mundane in his choreography and design. Steps and movements are often very simple, suggesting to the viewer that they’re easily reproducible by anyone, whilst the chosen props are those that you could probably find at home: a laptop charger, piles of bedding, wet wipes. The emphasis on accessibility is mirrored in Harrell’s casting: his dancers represent a broad range of identities and body-types, with each performer given equal standing in the work. Harrell is encouraging a democratisation of dance, as the artists of Judson did, however flawed his and their efforts may have been.
What felt perhaps most radical was the joy invoked in Maggie the Cat. Joy, when experienced by marginalised people and given public platform, can be a politically charged emotional expression. The celebratory, carnivalesque atmosphere generated in the early ballrooms of New York certainly represented the important creation of a safe and joyful community for the queer people present. Similarly, Harrell’s reimagining of Williams’ slaves as thoroughly enjoying themselves and each other, offers a complete alternative to their representation in the original play. Even Harrell’s own presence in Maggie – dancing, MCing, sometimes directing the dancers – feels unashamed in its depiction of a choreographer actively creating and enjoying their work; a depiction that runs contrary to the serious, and often invisible, choreographer figure in contemporary dance. Porca Miseria runs to a total of four hours (admittedly with an oddly extended one hour interval), and I have noticed that several articles reviewing it level criticisms of ‘self-indulgence’: indulgence, in the joy of performing, of watching, felt to me, exactly the point. Harrell’s work is unarguably overflowing with energy and research, and by bringing these two together he offers exciting insight into the potential futures of dance.
Dance has never been so popular, particularly in the art world: it has become one of the ‘coolest’ media for artists in the twenty-first century and is found in the programming of most major galleries. Often, however, contemporary dance practice feels divorced from its histories and geographies, especially when presented in a white cube space. Enter Trajal Harrell, whose performances assertively exist between art and theatre, whilst threading together multiple histories, both those well-known and those sometimes forgotten.
Harrell (b. 1973) is an American choreographer and dancer who first gained international acclaim with his series of performances Twenty Looks or Paris Is Burning at the Judson Church, with the last in the series premiering in 2012. Twenty Looks came from Harrell imagining an encounter between the early postmodern dance of Judson in Downtown New York and vogueing from the ballrooms of Uptown. It was also a response to the erasure often written into histories of the arts: dance history includes Judson, but Ballroom culture is often omitted.
Continuing his ploughing of dance history, and these fertile boundaries between dance genres, Harrell has created Porca Miseria, a new triple bill first presented in its entirety at the 2022 Holland Festival. Each work has been inspired by an extraordinary woman, and the triptych is a rethinking of the ‘notion of the bitch’, according to Harrell. In Deathbed, dancers enact a literal, and metaphorical, rummaging through a dressing-up box or curiosity cabinet - they move in and out from behind a dressing room, adorned with different garments and carrying various miscellaneous items. The music is eclectic too, changing swiftly between genres, and directing the performers to switch between movement styles – from ballet and Butoh to vogueing and strutting like a catwalk-model. The piece ends with one performer, increasingly weighed with sadness, swaddled (or smothered) with cloth by the others, until they’re rendered immobile and carried offstage by pallbearers. Deathbed is supposedly inspired by the choreographer, activist and “matriarch of Black dance” Katherine Dunham. The connection to Dunham isn’t strikingly obvious, but the work reads as a contemplative funerary commemoration (Dunham died in 2006) and a provocative rediscovering of dance history.
The second work O Medea is an unimpactful film, that doesn’t invoke the eponymous Greek heroine or tragedy. The film seems to be distracted in its direction and the recorded performance struggles to stand up to the live works sandwiching it in the bill. The final piece Maggie the Cat, however, is triumphant, and is a highly pleasurable and astutely political response to Maggie, the dissatisfied wife in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the whole play as a portrait of Southern America in the 1950s. It is a ball: dancers parade and vogue down the stage-turned-catwalk, modelling endless outfits fashioned from domestic items – towels, sofa cushions, bed sheets - whilst Harrell and Perle Palombe MC as ‘Big Mama’ and ‘Big Daddy’ respectively (other character names from Williams’ play but playfully queered here). The suggestion is that these performers represent the Black characters in the play: the slaves working on the Pollitt plantation, who are marginal in the text. Here, though, they claim centre-stage and impress with their creativity, joy and sexiness: Harrell once again giving space to those who have been erased. The use of mundane items to make stunning looks both reflects the DIY outfits of ballroom dancers, and the way that Maggie, from a poor upbringing, has learnt to perform the role of a wealthy wife.
Harrell’s choreography continuously weaves together many different, and sometimes jarring, dance styles. This reflects his extensive research into dance histories, including the life of Dunham who brought together African and Caribbean dance with traditional ballet and the work of Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the original developers of Butoh. He then combines this with references to popular culture, such as invoking the visuals of fashion catwalks – some of the outfits in Maggie are strikingly similar to Rei Kawakubo designs- and including pop music from the likes of ANHONI. The result, as Deathbed examples, is a sometimes blurry but often remarkable reimagining of dance history: a history presented as non-linear, liberated from hierarchies, embracing of multiple geographies. Harrell has described his work as producing a so-called ‘fictional archive’. This ‘archive’ is rich with potential: in rediscovering histories, Harrell offers infinite starting points for future choreography.
Harrell’s work isn’t just rich with creative potential, but political too. His ‘archive’ doesn’t prioritise one history, geography, or art form, and instead gives equal platform to all that’s represented. Furthermore, in a continuation of the traditions of Judson dance, he embraces the everyday and mundane in his choreography and design. Steps and movements are often very simple, suggesting to the viewer that they’re easily reproducible by anyone, whilst the chosen props are those that you could probably find at home: a laptop charger, piles of bedding, wet wipes. The emphasis on accessibility is mirrored in Harrell’s casting: his dancers represent a broad range of identities and body-types, with each performer given equal standing in the work. Harrell is encouraging a democratisation of dance, as the artists of Judson did, however flawed his and their efforts may have been.
What felt perhaps most radical was the joy invoked in Maggie the Cat. Joy, when experienced by marginalised people and given public platform, can be a politically charged emotional expression. The celebratory, carnivalesque atmosphere generated in the early ballrooms of New York certainly represented the important creation of a safe and joyful community for the queer people present. Similarly, Harrell’s reimagining of Williams’ slaves as thoroughly enjoying themselves and each other, offers a complete alternative to their representation in the original play. Even Harrell’s own presence in Maggie – dancing, MCing, sometimes directing the dancers – feels unashamed in its depiction of a choreographer actively creating and enjoying their work; a depiction that runs contrary to the serious, and often invisible, choreographer figure in contemporary dance. Porca Miseria runs to a total of four hours (admittedly with an oddly extended one hour interval), and I have noticed that several articles reviewing it level criticisms of ‘self-indulgence’: indulgence, in the joy of performing, of watching, felt to me, exactly the point. Harrell’s work is unarguably overflowing with energy and research, and by bringing these two together he offers exciting insight into the potential futures of dance.
Dance has never been so popular, particularly in the art world: it has become one of the ‘coolest’ media for artists in the twenty-first century and is found in the programming of most major galleries. Often, however, contemporary dance practice feels divorced from its histories and geographies, especially when presented in a white cube space. Enter Trajal Harrell, whose performances assertively exist between art and theatre, whilst threading together multiple histories, both those well-known and those sometimes forgotten.
Harrell (b. 1973) is an American choreographer and dancer who first gained international acclaim with his series of performances Twenty Looks or Paris Is Burning at the Judson Church, with the last in the series premiering in 2012. Twenty Looks came from Harrell imagining an encounter between the early postmodern dance of Judson in Downtown New York and vogueing from the ballrooms of Uptown. It was also a response to the erasure often written into histories of the arts: dance history includes Judson, but Ballroom culture is often omitted.
Continuing his ploughing of dance history, and these fertile boundaries between dance genres, Harrell has created Porca Miseria, a new triple bill first presented in its entirety at the 2022 Holland Festival. Each work has been inspired by an extraordinary woman, and the triptych is a rethinking of the ‘notion of the bitch’, according to Harrell. In Deathbed, dancers enact a literal, and metaphorical, rummaging through a dressing-up box or curiosity cabinet - they move in and out from behind a dressing room, adorned with different garments and carrying various miscellaneous items. The music is eclectic too, changing swiftly between genres, and directing the performers to switch between movement styles – from ballet and Butoh to vogueing and strutting like a catwalk-model. The piece ends with one performer, increasingly weighed with sadness, swaddled (or smothered) with cloth by the others, until they’re rendered immobile and carried offstage by pallbearers. Deathbed is supposedly inspired by the choreographer, activist and “matriarch of Black dance” Katherine Dunham. The connection to Dunham isn’t strikingly obvious, but the work reads as a contemplative funerary commemoration (Dunham died in 2006) and a provocative rediscovering of dance history.
The second work O Medea is an unimpactful film, that doesn’t invoke the eponymous Greek heroine or tragedy. The film seems to be distracted in its direction and the recorded performance struggles to stand up to the live works sandwiching it in the bill. The final piece Maggie the Cat, however, is triumphant, and is a highly pleasurable and astutely political response to Maggie, the dissatisfied wife in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the whole play as a portrait of Southern America in the 1950s. It is a ball: dancers parade and vogue down the stage-turned-catwalk, modelling endless outfits fashioned from domestic items – towels, sofa cushions, bed sheets - whilst Harrell and Perle Palombe MC as ‘Big Mama’ and ‘Big Daddy’ respectively (other character names from Williams’ play but playfully queered here). The suggestion is that these performers represent the Black characters in the play: the slaves working on the Pollitt plantation, who are marginal in the text. Here, though, they claim centre-stage and impress with their creativity, joy and sexiness: Harrell once again giving space to those who have been erased. The use of mundane items to make stunning looks both reflects the DIY outfits of ballroom dancers, and the way that Maggie, from a poor upbringing, has learnt to perform the role of a wealthy wife.
Harrell’s choreography continuously weaves together many different, and sometimes jarring, dance styles. This reflects his extensive research into dance histories, including the life of Dunham who brought together African and Caribbean dance with traditional ballet and the work of Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the original developers of Butoh. He then combines this with references to popular culture, such as invoking the visuals of fashion catwalks – some of the outfits in Maggie are strikingly similar to Rei Kawakubo designs- and including pop music from the likes of ANHONI. The result, as Deathbed examples, is a sometimes blurry but often remarkable reimagining of dance history: a history presented as non-linear, liberated from hierarchies, embracing of multiple geographies. Harrell has described his work as producing a so-called ‘fictional archive’. This ‘archive’ is rich with potential: in rediscovering histories, Harrell offers infinite starting points for future choreography.
Harrell’s work isn’t just rich with creative potential, but political too. His ‘archive’ doesn’t prioritise one history, geography, or art form, and instead gives equal platform to all that’s represented. Furthermore, in a continuation of the traditions of Judson dance, he embraces the everyday and mundane in his choreography and design. Steps and movements are often very simple, suggesting to the viewer that they’re easily reproducible by anyone, whilst the chosen props are those that you could probably find at home: a laptop charger, piles of bedding, wet wipes. The emphasis on accessibility is mirrored in Harrell’s casting: his dancers represent a broad range of identities and body-types, with each performer given equal standing in the work. Harrell is encouraging a democratisation of dance, as the artists of Judson did, however flawed his and their efforts may have been.
What felt perhaps most radical was the joy invoked in Maggie the Cat. Joy, when experienced by marginalised people and given public platform, can be a politically charged emotional expression. The celebratory, carnivalesque atmosphere generated in the early ballrooms of New York certainly represented the important creation of a safe and joyful community for the queer people present. Similarly, Harrell’s reimagining of Williams’ slaves as thoroughly enjoying themselves and each other, offers a complete alternative to their representation in the original play. Even Harrell’s own presence in Maggie – dancing, MCing, sometimes directing the dancers – feels unashamed in its depiction of a choreographer actively creating and enjoying their work; a depiction that runs contrary to the serious, and often invisible, choreographer figure in contemporary dance. Porca Miseria runs to a total of four hours (admittedly with an oddly extended one hour interval), and I have noticed that several articles reviewing it level criticisms of ‘self-indulgence’: indulgence, in the joy of performing, of watching, felt to me, exactly the point. Harrell’s work is unarguably overflowing with energy and research, and by bringing these two together he offers exciting insight into the potential futures of dance.
Dance has never been so popular, particularly in the art world: it has become one of the ‘coolest’ media for artists in the twenty-first century and is found in the programming of most major galleries. Often, however, contemporary dance practice feels divorced from its histories and geographies, especially when presented in a white cube space. Enter Trajal Harrell, whose performances assertively exist between art and theatre, whilst threading together multiple histories, both those well-known and those sometimes forgotten.
Harrell (b. 1973) is an American choreographer and dancer who first gained international acclaim with his series of performances Twenty Looks or Paris Is Burning at the Judson Church, with the last in the series premiering in 2012. Twenty Looks came from Harrell imagining an encounter between the early postmodern dance of Judson in Downtown New York and vogueing from the ballrooms of Uptown. It was also a response to the erasure often written into histories of the arts: dance history includes Judson, but Ballroom culture is often omitted.
Continuing his ploughing of dance history, and these fertile boundaries between dance genres, Harrell has created Porca Miseria, a new triple bill first presented in its entirety at the 2022 Holland Festival. Each work has been inspired by an extraordinary woman, and the triptych is a rethinking of the ‘notion of the bitch’, according to Harrell. In Deathbed, dancers enact a literal, and metaphorical, rummaging through a dressing-up box or curiosity cabinet - they move in and out from behind a dressing room, adorned with different garments and carrying various miscellaneous items. The music is eclectic too, changing swiftly between genres, and directing the performers to switch between movement styles – from ballet and Butoh to vogueing and strutting like a catwalk-model. The piece ends with one performer, increasingly weighed with sadness, swaddled (or smothered) with cloth by the others, until they’re rendered immobile and carried offstage by pallbearers. Deathbed is supposedly inspired by the choreographer, activist and “matriarch of Black dance” Katherine Dunham. The connection to Dunham isn’t strikingly obvious, but the work reads as a contemplative funerary commemoration (Dunham died in 2006) and a provocative rediscovering of dance history.
The second work O Medea is an unimpactful film, that doesn’t invoke the eponymous Greek heroine or tragedy. The film seems to be distracted in its direction and the recorded performance struggles to stand up to the live works sandwiching it in the bill. The final piece Maggie the Cat, however, is triumphant, and is a highly pleasurable and astutely political response to Maggie, the dissatisfied wife in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the whole play as a portrait of Southern America in the 1950s. It is a ball: dancers parade and vogue down the stage-turned-catwalk, modelling endless outfits fashioned from domestic items – towels, sofa cushions, bed sheets - whilst Harrell and Perle Palombe MC as ‘Big Mama’ and ‘Big Daddy’ respectively (other character names from Williams’ play but playfully queered here). The suggestion is that these performers represent the Black characters in the play: the slaves working on the Pollitt plantation, who are marginal in the text. Here, though, they claim centre-stage and impress with their creativity, joy and sexiness: Harrell once again giving space to those who have been erased. The use of mundane items to make stunning looks both reflects the DIY outfits of ballroom dancers, and the way that Maggie, from a poor upbringing, has learnt to perform the role of a wealthy wife.
Harrell’s choreography continuously weaves together many different, and sometimes jarring, dance styles. This reflects his extensive research into dance histories, including the life of Dunham who brought together African and Caribbean dance with traditional ballet and the work of Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the original developers of Butoh. He then combines this with references to popular culture, such as invoking the visuals of fashion catwalks – some of the outfits in Maggie are strikingly similar to Rei Kawakubo designs- and including pop music from the likes of ANHONI. The result, as Deathbed examples, is a sometimes blurry but often remarkable reimagining of dance history: a history presented as non-linear, liberated from hierarchies, embracing of multiple geographies. Harrell has described his work as producing a so-called ‘fictional archive’. This ‘archive’ is rich with potential: in rediscovering histories, Harrell offers infinite starting points for future choreography.
Harrell’s work isn’t just rich with creative potential, but political too. His ‘archive’ doesn’t prioritise one history, geography, or art form, and instead gives equal platform to all that’s represented. Furthermore, in a continuation of the traditions of Judson dance, he embraces the everyday and mundane in his choreography and design. Steps and movements are often very simple, suggesting to the viewer that they’re easily reproducible by anyone, whilst the chosen props are those that you could probably find at home: a laptop charger, piles of bedding, wet wipes. The emphasis on accessibility is mirrored in Harrell’s casting: his dancers represent a broad range of identities and body-types, with each performer given equal standing in the work. Harrell is encouraging a democratisation of dance, as the artists of Judson did, however flawed his and their efforts may have been.
What felt perhaps most radical was the joy invoked in Maggie the Cat. Joy, when experienced by marginalised people and given public platform, can be a politically charged emotional expression. The celebratory, carnivalesque atmosphere generated in the early ballrooms of New York certainly represented the important creation of a safe and joyful community for the queer people present. Similarly, Harrell’s reimagining of Williams’ slaves as thoroughly enjoying themselves and each other, offers a complete alternative to their representation in the original play. Even Harrell’s own presence in Maggie – dancing, MCing, sometimes directing the dancers – feels unashamed in its depiction of a choreographer actively creating and enjoying their work; a depiction that runs contrary to the serious, and often invisible, choreographer figure in contemporary dance. Porca Miseria runs to a total of four hours (admittedly with an oddly extended one hour interval), and I have noticed that several articles reviewing it level criticisms of ‘self-indulgence’: indulgence, in the joy of performing, of watching, felt to me, exactly the point. Harrell’s work is unarguably overflowing with energy and research, and by bringing these two together he offers exciting insight into the potential futures of dance.
Dance has never been so popular, particularly in the art world: it has become one of the ‘coolest’ media for artists in the twenty-first century and is found in the programming of most major galleries. Often, however, contemporary dance practice feels divorced from its histories and geographies, especially when presented in a white cube space. Enter Trajal Harrell, whose performances assertively exist between art and theatre, whilst threading together multiple histories, both those well-known and those sometimes forgotten.
Harrell (b. 1973) is an American choreographer and dancer who first gained international acclaim with his series of performances Twenty Looks or Paris Is Burning at the Judson Church, with the last in the series premiering in 2012. Twenty Looks came from Harrell imagining an encounter between the early postmodern dance of Judson in Downtown New York and vogueing from the ballrooms of Uptown. It was also a response to the erasure often written into histories of the arts: dance history includes Judson, but Ballroom culture is often omitted.
Continuing his ploughing of dance history, and these fertile boundaries between dance genres, Harrell has created Porca Miseria, a new triple bill first presented in its entirety at the 2022 Holland Festival. Each work has been inspired by an extraordinary woman, and the triptych is a rethinking of the ‘notion of the bitch’, according to Harrell. In Deathbed, dancers enact a literal, and metaphorical, rummaging through a dressing-up box or curiosity cabinet - they move in and out from behind a dressing room, adorned with different garments and carrying various miscellaneous items. The music is eclectic too, changing swiftly between genres, and directing the performers to switch between movement styles – from ballet and Butoh to vogueing and strutting like a catwalk-model. The piece ends with one performer, increasingly weighed with sadness, swaddled (or smothered) with cloth by the others, until they’re rendered immobile and carried offstage by pallbearers. Deathbed is supposedly inspired by the choreographer, activist and “matriarch of Black dance” Katherine Dunham. The connection to Dunham isn’t strikingly obvious, but the work reads as a contemplative funerary commemoration (Dunham died in 2006) and a provocative rediscovering of dance history.
The second work O Medea is an unimpactful film, that doesn’t invoke the eponymous Greek heroine or tragedy. The film seems to be distracted in its direction and the recorded performance struggles to stand up to the live works sandwiching it in the bill. The final piece Maggie the Cat, however, is triumphant, and is a highly pleasurable and astutely political response to Maggie, the dissatisfied wife in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the whole play as a portrait of Southern America in the 1950s. It is a ball: dancers parade and vogue down the stage-turned-catwalk, modelling endless outfits fashioned from domestic items – towels, sofa cushions, bed sheets - whilst Harrell and Perle Palombe MC as ‘Big Mama’ and ‘Big Daddy’ respectively (other character names from Williams’ play but playfully queered here). The suggestion is that these performers represent the Black characters in the play: the slaves working on the Pollitt plantation, who are marginal in the text. Here, though, they claim centre-stage and impress with their creativity, joy and sexiness: Harrell once again giving space to those who have been erased. The use of mundane items to make stunning looks both reflects the DIY outfits of ballroom dancers, and the way that Maggie, from a poor upbringing, has learnt to perform the role of a wealthy wife.
Harrell’s choreography continuously weaves together many different, and sometimes jarring, dance styles. This reflects his extensive research into dance histories, including the life of Dunham who brought together African and Caribbean dance with traditional ballet and the work of Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the original developers of Butoh. He then combines this with references to popular culture, such as invoking the visuals of fashion catwalks – some of the outfits in Maggie are strikingly similar to Rei Kawakubo designs- and including pop music from the likes of ANHONI. The result, as Deathbed examples, is a sometimes blurry but often remarkable reimagining of dance history: a history presented as non-linear, liberated from hierarchies, embracing of multiple geographies. Harrell has described his work as producing a so-called ‘fictional archive’. This ‘archive’ is rich with potential: in rediscovering histories, Harrell offers infinite starting points for future choreography.
Harrell’s work isn’t just rich with creative potential, but political too. His ‘archive’ doesn’t prioritise one history, geography, or art form, and instead gives equal platform to all that’s represented. Furthermore, in a continuation of the traditions of Judson dance, he embraces the everyday and mundane in his choreography and design. Steps and movements are often very simple, suggesting to the viewer that they’re easily reproducible by anyone, whilst the chosen props are those that you could probably find at home: a laptop charger, piles of bedding, wet wipes. The emphasis on accessibility is mirrored in Harrell’s casting: his dancers represent a broad range of identities and body-types, with each performer given equal standing in the work. Harrell is encouraging a democratisation of dance, as the artists of Judson did, however flawed his and their efforts may have been.
What felt perhaps most radical was the joy invoked in Maggie the Cat. Joy, when experienced by marginalised people and given public platform, can be a politically charged emotional expression. The celebratory, carnivalesque atmosphere generated in the early ballrooms of New York certainly represented the important creation of a safe and joyful community for the queer people present. Similarly, Harrell’s reimagining of Williams’ slaves as thoroughly enjoying themselves and each other, offers a complete alternative to their representation in the original play. Even Harrell’s own presence in Maggie – dancing, MCing, sometimes directing the dancers – feels unashamed in its depiction of a choreographer actively creating and enjoying their work; a depiction that runs contrary to the serious, and often invisible, choreographer figure in contemporary dance. Porca Miseria runs to a total of four hours (admittedly with an oddly extended one hour interval), and I have noticed that several articles reviewing it level criticisms of ‘self-indulgence’: indulgence, in the joy of performing, of watching, felt to me, exactly the point. Harrell’s work is unarguably overflowing with energy and research, and by bringing these two together he offers exciting insight into the potential futures of dance.
Dance has never been so popular, particularly in the art world: it has become one of the ‘coolest’ media for artists in the twenty-first century and is found in the programming of most major galleries. Often, however, contemporary dance practice feels divorced from its histories and geographies, especially when presented in a white cube space. Enter Trajal Harrell, whose performances assertively exist between art and theatre, whilst threading together multiple histories, both those well-known and those sometimes forgotten.
Harrell (b. 1973) is an American choreographer and dancer who first gained international acclaim with his series of performances Twenty Looks or Paris Is Burning at the Judson Church, with the last in the series premiering in 2012. Twenty Looks came from Harrell imagining an encounter between the early postmodern dance of Judson in Downtown New York and vogueing from the ballrooms of Uptown. It was also a response to the erasure often written into histories of the arts: dance history includes Judson, but Ballroom culture is often omitted.
Continuing his ploughing of dance history, and these fertile boundaries between dance genres, Harrell has created Porca Miseria, a new triple bill first presented in its entirety at the 2022 Holland Festival. Each work has been inspired by an extraordinary woman, and the triptych is a rethinking of the ‘notion of the bitch’, according to Harrell. In Deathbed, dancers enact a literal, and metaphorical, rummaging through a dressing-up box or curiosity cabinet - they move in and out from behind a dressing room, adorned with different garments and carrying various miscellaneous items. The music is eclectic too, changing swiftly between genres, and directing the performers to switch between movement styles – from ballet and Butoh to vogueing and strutting like a catwalk-model. The piece ends with one performer, increasingly weighed with sadness, swaddled (or smothered) with cloth by the others, until they’re rendered immobile and carried offstage by pallbearers. Deathbed is supposedly inspired by the choreographer, activist and “matriarch of Black dance” Katherine Dunham. The connection to Dunham isn’t strikingly obvious, but the work reads as a contemplative funerary commemoration (Dunham died in 2006) and a provocative rediscovering of dance history.
The second work O Medea is an unimpactful film, that doesn’t invoke the eponymous Greek heroine or tragedy. The film seems to be distracted in its direction and the recorded performance struggles to stand up to the live works sandwiching it in the bill. The final piece Maggie the Cat, however, is triumphant, and is a highly pleasurable and astutely political response to Maggie, the dissatisfied wife in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the whole play as a portrait of Southern America in the 1950s. It is a ball: dancers parade and vogue down the stage-turned-catwalk, modelling endless outfits fashioned from domestic items – towels, sofa cushions, bed sheets - whilst Harrell and Perle Palombe MC as ‘Big Mama’ and ‘Big Daddy’ respectively (other character names from Williams’ play but playfully queered here). The suggestion is that these performers represent the Black characters in the play: the slaves working on the Pollitt plantation, who are marginal in the text. Here, though, they claim centre-stage and impress with their creativity, joy and sexiness: Harrell once again giving space to those who have been erased. The use of mundane items to make stunning looks both reflects the DIY outfits of ballroom dancers, and the way that Maggie, from a poor upbringing, has learnt to perform the role of a wealthy wife.
Harrell’s choreography continuously weaves together many different, and sometimes jarring, dance styles. This reflects his extensive research into dance histories, including the life of Dunham who brought together African and Caribbean dance with traditional ballet and the work of Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the original developers of Butoh. He then combines this with references to popular culture, such as invoking the visuals of fashion catwalks – some of the outfits in Maggie are strikingly similar to Rei Kawakubo designs- and including pop music from the likes of ANHONI. The result, as Deathbed examples, is a sometimes blurry but often remarkable reimagining of dance history: a history presented as non-linear, liberated from hierarchies, embracing of multiple geographies. Harrell has described his work as producing a so-called ‘fictional archive’. This ‘archive’ is rich with potential: in rediscovering histories, Harrell offers infinite starting points for future choreography.
Harrell’s work isn’t just rich with creative potential, but political too. His ‘archive’ doesn’t prioritise one history, geography, or art form, and instead gives equal platform to all that’s represented. Furthermore, in a continuation of the traditions of Judson dance, he embraces the everyday and mundane in his choreography and design. Steps and movements are often very simple, suggesting to the viewer that they’re easily reproducible by anyone, whilst the chosen props are those that you could probably find at home: a laptop charger, piles of bedding, wet wipes. The emphasis on accessibility is mirrored in Harrell’s casting: his dancers represent a broad range of identities and body-types, with each performer given equal standing in the work. Harrell is encouraging a democratisation of dance, as the artists of Judson did, however flawed his and their efforts may have been.
What felt perhaps most radical was the joy invoked in Maggie the Cat. Joy, when experienced by marginalised people and given public platform, can be a politically charged emotional expression. The celebratory, carnivalesque atmosphere generated in the early ballrooms of New York certainly represented the important creation of a safe and joyful community for the queer people present. Similarly, Harrell’s reimagining of Williams’ slaves as thoroughly enjoying themselves and each other, offers a complete alternative to their representation in the original play. Even Harrell’s own presence in Maggie – dancing, MCing, sometimes directing the dancers – feels unashamed in its depiction of a choreographer actively creating and enjoying their work; a depiction that runs contrary to the serious, and often invisible, choreographer figure in contemporary dance. Porca Miseria runs to a total of four hours (admittedly with an oddly extended one hour interval), and I have noticed that several articles reviewing it level criticisms of ‘self-indulgence’: indulgence, in the joy of performing, of watching, felt to me, exactly the point. Harrell’s work is unarguably overflowing with energy and research, and by bringing these two together he offers exciting insight into the potential futures of dance.
Dance has never been so popular, particularly in the art world: it has become one of the ‘coolest’ media for artists in the twenty-first century and is found in the programming of most major galleries. Often, however, contemporary dance practice feels divorced from its histories and geographies, especially when presented in a white cube space. Enter Trajal Harrell, whose performances assertively exist between art and theatre, whilst threading together multiple histories, both those well-known and those sometimes forgotten.
Harrell (b. 1973) is an American choreographer and dancer who first gained international acclaim with his series of performances Twenty Looks or Paris Is Burning at the Judson Church, with the last in the series premiering in 2012. Twenty Looks came from Harrell imagining an encounter between the early postmodern dance of Judson in Downtown New York and vogueing from the ballrooms of Uptown. It was also a response to the erasure often written into histories of the arts: dance history includes Judson, but Ballroom culture is often omitted.
Continuing his ploughing of dance history, and these fertile boundaries between dance genres, Harrell has created Porca Miseria, a new triple bill first presented in its entirety at the 2022 Holland Festival. Each work has been inspired by an extraordinary woman, and the triptych is a rethinking of the ‘notion of the bitch’, according to Harrell. In Deathbed, dancers enact a literal, and metaphorical, rummaging through a dressing-up box or curiosity cabinet - they move in and out from behind a dressing room, adorned with different garments and carrying various miscellaneous items. The music is eclectic too, changing swiftly between genres, and directing the performers to switch between movement styles – from ballet and Butoh to vogueing and strutting like a catwalk-model. The piece ends with one performer, increasingly weighed with sadness, swaddled (or smothered) with cloth by the others, until they’re rendered immobile and carried offstage by pallbearers. Deathbed is supposedly inspired by the choreographer, activist and “matriarch of Black dance” Katherine Dunham. The connection to Dunham isn’t strikingly obvious, but the work reads as a contemplative funerary commemoration (Dunham died in 2006) and a provocative rediscovering of dance history.
The second work O Medea is an unimpactful film, that doesn’t invoke the eponymous Greek heroine or tragedy. The film seems to be distracted in its direction and the recorded performance struggles to stand up to the live works sandwiching it in the bill. The final piece Maggie the Cat, however, is triumphant, and is a highly pleasurable and astutely political response to Maggie, the dissatisfied wife in Tennessee Williams’ Cat on a Hot Tin Roof and the whole play as a portrait of Southern America in the 1950s. It is a ball: dancers parade and vogue down the stage-turned-catwalk, modelling endless outfits fashioned from domestic items – towels, sofa cushions, bed sheets - whilst Harrell and Perle Palombe MC as ‘Big Mama’ and ‘Big Daddy’ respectively (other character names from Williams’ play but playfully queered here). The suggestion is that these performers represent the Black characters in the play: the slaves working on the Pollitt plantation, who are marginal in the text. Here, though, they claim centre-stage and impress with their creativity, joy and sexiness: Harrell once again giving space to those who have been erased. The use of mundane items to make stunning looks both reflects the DIY outfits of ballroom dancers, and the way that Maggie, from a poor upbringing, has learnt to perform the role of a wealthy wife.
Harrell’s choreography continuously weaves together many different, and sometimes jarring, dance styles. This reflects his extensive research into dance histories, including the life of Dunham who brought together African and Caribbean dance with traditional ballet and the work of Tatsumi Hijikata, one of the original developers of Butoh. He then combines this with references to popular culture, such as invoking the visuals of fashion catwalks – some of the outfits in Maggie are strikingly similar to Rei Kawakubo designs- and including pop music from the likes of ANHONI. The result, as Deathbed examples, is a sometimes blurry but often remarkable reimagining of dance history: a history presented as non-linear, liberated from hierarchies, embracing of multiple geographies. Harrell has described his work as producing a so-called ‘fictional archive’. This ‘archive’ is rich with potential: in rediscovering histories, Harrell offers infinite starting points for future choreography.
Harrell’s work isn’t just rich with creative potential, but political too. His ‘archive’ doesn’t prioritise one history, geography, or art form, and instead gives equal platform to all that’s represented. Furthermore, in a continuation of the traditions of Judson dance, he embraces the everyday and mundane in his choreography and design. Steps and movements are often very simple, suggesting to the viewer that they’re easily reproducible by anyone, whilst the chosen props are those that you could probably find at home: a laptop charger, piles of bedding, wet wipes. The emphasis on accessibility is mirrored in Harrell’s casting: his dancers represent a broad range of identities and body-types, with each performer given equal standing in the work. Harrell is encouraging a democratisation of dance, as the artists of Judson did, however flawed his and their efforts may have been.
What felt perhaps most radical was the joy invoked in Maggie the Cat. Joy, when experienced by marginalised people and given public platform, can be a politically charged emotional expression. The celebratory, carnivalesque atmosphere generated in the early ballrooms of New York certainly represented the important creation of a safe and joyful community for the queer people present. Similarly, Harrell’s reimagining of Williams’ slaves as thoroughly enjoying themselves and each other, offers a complete alternative to their representation in the original play. Even Harrell’s own presence in Maggie – dancing, MCing, sometimes directing the dancers – feels unashamed in its depiction of a choreographer actively creating and enjoying their work; a depiction that runs contrary to the serious, and often invisible, choreographer figure in contemporary dance. Porca Miseria runs to a total of four hours (admittedly with an oddly extended one hour interval), and I have noticed that several articles reviewing it level criticisms of ‘self-indulgence’: indulgence, in the joy of performing, of watching, felt to me, exactly the point. Harrell’s work is unarguably overflowing with energy and research, and by bringing these two together he offers exciting insight into the potential futures of dance.
