Body talk Pilobolus’ sublime ‘psychic garbage’ BY JOHNETTE RODRIGUEZ
	Grand opening   Prior to Pilobolus’ performance at 8 p.m., there will be opening festivities for the first FirstWorksProv Festival in the lobby of the VMA Arts & Cultural Center at 6:30 p.m. Shinbone Alley Stilts will astound and amuse audiences with their black-tie stilt-walking routines. Pink, Inc.’s soft-sculpture costumes will turn Fusionworks dancers into ethereal hourglass divas and antic hooplas. And the Young Fish School of World Drumming will set the beat for the evening. Pilobolus will engage audience members in a lively post-performance conversation. Go to www.firstworksprov.org for details. — J.R.

What started as a class project at Dartmouth in the fall of 1970 has turned into the groundbreaking, internationally-known dance company called Pilobolus. In their first Rhode Island appearance, Pilobolus is the opening attraction on October 2 at the VMA Arts & Cultural Center of the three-weekend FirstWorksProv Festival (through October 17).

More than 30 years ago, Michael Tracy, Jonathan Wolken, and Robby Barnett met in a dance class taught by Alison Chase. When dance itself did not exactly take with these fellows, Chase taught them how to "make dances," using their youthful enthusiasm for experimentation and their lean and sturdy athleticism, which lent itself to building sculptural poses and movement.

These four are still the artistic directors of Pilobolus, which they named after a barnyard fungus whose spores can blast off from 0 to 40 mph in the first millimeter of flight! Pilobolus, the arts organization, may not have seeded itself quite so quickly, but certainly as widely, with a six-person touring company, a duet company, an educational institute, and consulting services for commercial and artistic organizations.

Over the years, the original dancers have been replaced by a new generation of performers, but the founders are never far from shaping the dances and the company, as administrators, directors, and choreographers. Robby Barnett and his family live in the small northwestern Connecticut town of Washington Depot, where Pilobolus is headquartered. Though Barnett, 55, has designed gardens, taught high school art, and done technical metal work over the years, he has earned his living from Pilobolus since he was 21 and he still loves his primary gig.

"The impulses remain the same as they were in the beginning," Barnett emphasized in a recent phone conversation. "Our fundamental interest is making dances through which we can explore our lives in some detail. It’s still a very, very effective way of looking into ourselves, and that fundamental desire to know who we are remains as intact as it does with most productive, creative people."

As new dancers bring new skills and abilities (capoeira, hip hop, breakdance) into the collaborative process, they are encouraged by Pilobolus to evaluate and celebrate what they contribute to the mix. "Clearly, each dancer brings something unique to us," Barnett reflected, "and it’s our job as thoughtful choreographers to see what those things are and what we can make of it.

"The work is, to some degree, hugely changed and affected or improved by the idiosyncrasies of the people we work with," he continued. "But, on the other hand, mysteriously, there is something that is identifiably Pilobolean about the pieces. As the face ages, you can see the kid still down inside there. The world reflects itself in our faces, and that has something to do with this idea of looking for deep structure."

Each Pilobolus piece begins with a period of "creative play," determined by how much time (and money) the company can expend on pure exploration. It’s in that "organic stew," as Barnett terms it, that the basic raw materials for the dance are discovered.

"It’s a little bit like dreams," he explained. "There’s a theory of dreams that our minds are just continually floating images up that our pre-conscious mind tries to assemble into some order to make some sense of them. It’s sort of what dances are. It’s psychic garbage — some assembly required."

So it was with their newest piece, Megawatt (2004), which they will perform at the VMA. It began with an idea that the dancers would try to push themselves to physical limits (in strength and stamina) over a 15-minute period of time. And, to the music of Primus, Radiohead, and Squarepusher, they accomplish it all at an astonishing pace. This is one of a handful of dances in which Pilobolus dancers are moving without being attached to another dancer.

"Much of our work has been concerned with how bodies move in linkage with each other," Barnett noted. "And this is a piece that is almost entirely unlinked — a nice opportunity for our dancers to flip it out."

They will also perform one of their earliest works, Walklyndon (1971), which they have done in variations from a duet to an octet. Pilobolus dancers have sometimes incorporated dogs and streakers into this act. But this time a sextet of human (and clothed) dancers will present the colorful and comic vaudeville romp.

Two more recent pieces are the solo Femme Noire (1999) and the duet Symbiosis (2001). Barnett describes the former as a "short psychological portrait that looks at the area between performance and private life—the degree to which a performer can hide while they’re still out in front of people." The latter is classically Pilobolean, as a man and a woman intertwine in very focused and very captivating poses and movement.

The fifth piece on the Providence program is Star-Cross’d (2003), the first part of an adaptation of the Romeo and Juliet story. The dancers trained with two circus performers to learn the "Spanish veils" number that became the basis for Star-Cross’d. Using long silk ropes, the dancers remain airborne for most of the piece.

By taking a completely different look at the way bodies move and posture together, Pilobolus has been a strong influence in the dance world from its very beginning. As they’ve built the educational and consulting branches of their organization, they’ve also been influential in corporate boardrooms across the country, from IBM to Dupont.

"We try to suggest ways of creative exploration within small groups," Barnett observed. "That allows us to talk about cooperation, leadership, trust — things that are essential for small groups of people to work effectively, really, in any field."

Certainly they’ve proved that it works for them. Pilobolus puts together approximately three new pieces a year. They are currently planning a full-evening version of Megawatt; pondering a duet in the air, this one with rigging; and doing a commission for the Carpenter Center in Long Beach called The Aquarium Project, based loosely on ocean themes.

"It is still possible in a sense to be a Renaissance man or woman when it comes to this physical stuff," Barnett mused.