Note (ZL): In May 2015, Mocean Dance, a contemporary Canadian company, premiered Serge Bennathan’s new, forty-minute piece titled “Sable Island”. Arts reviewer Elissa Barnard writes that Bennathan, an award-winning Canadian choreographer, was inspired by perceptions of wild horses struggling to survive on the barren, windswept island and Mocean Dance struggling “to create professional dance away from national centres”, and that Bennathan “captures the feeling of a struggle to survive, of courage, of torment, of the individual within the group or the tribe or the herd.” Elissa Barnard’s brief descriptions of the five dancers’ impressive and expressive motions and movement demonstrating physical strength and endurance, the original score by Montreal composer Bertrand Chénier, and the lighting design by Stephane Menigot summarize a remarkable performance of a demanding piece. Referring to “dreams withering on Nova Scotia’s rocky soil”, Barnard seems to compare Mocean’s ability to make dance in this “cold, inhospitable part of the world”, with the people of this region “who huddle like the horses of Sable Island and support one another to survive”. An interesting review.
