CATHERINE GALLANT/DANCE

Catherine Gallant/Dance presented Escape from the House of Mercy at The Performance Project University Settlement in NYC. Choreographed and developed by Gallant with the performers, they explored the dark history of institutions like workhouses, poorhouses, and laundries, primarily for women and girls, in the US and Ireland.

Combining spoken and sung text, video, props, and a diverse sound score, the performance took the audience through a 50-minute experimental journey. The real House of Mercy, located in Inwood Hill Park, NYC, was a workhouse for women, imprisoned for minor offenses like dancing or walking alone. The brutality towards women that took place there is central to the work.

Escape from the House of Mercy was also adapted into a short dance film, “STONES: Whispers from the Workhouse”, which was shown at the end of the performance. It was a great addition, as the audience got to witness it in its embodied totality, then in a shorter formed, concentrated vision. Both the performance and the film complimented one another, revealing ideas that may not have been fully realized in the other viewing format.

A contemporary duet transformed into a struggle between two of the performers. Then the rest of the performers exited, only to return holding their bodies tightly. The light dimmed and this tightness closed in, as did the dancers to the spotlight in the center of the space. They began circling, and whispering. It was eerie and confusing, until all of a sudden their bodies and voices broke free in an overwhelming scream that caused a few (myself included) to jump in their seats.

Immediately the lights came up and the scene shifted again, into phrase work that balanced a multitude of differing groups and duets. They ran to the walls, then ran off, leaving only a few dancers who pulled a long piece of blue mesh from stage left into the center. With it, they created a cage — dancers entered, supporting its structure, until they were all within the 4-walled mesh design. Gallant returned and removed the material, leaving the dancers in the space. They formed a semi-circle facing the audience, and yet not a single performer engaged. On their knees they recited a poem, a dark, moody, disturbing poem about the “house”, each with an unidentified, absent gaze ahead of them.

To begin, the room went dark and upon the back wall, an eerie film was projected. A lit doorway revealed dancers making their way through it, transcending into the surrounding darkness. Then, as if they passed through the screen door, they emerged from behind the projection wall. The first one to appear was Gallant, singing. Dancers, covered in blue mesh, emerged behind her, slowly making their way into the space. As the music seeped in, the dancers symbolically ripped the fabric off of themselves frantically, setting the tone for the work.’s emodiment of escapism.

The dancing continued like this in different episodic scenes, some of which were accompanied by footage projected onto the wall. The blue mesh lay on different structures outside, old footage of abandoned buildings, faces of women and girls. Performers sang, acted, and danced with props; in one section a white button down shirt became a tethered,
rope-like motif, dancers pulling into and away from it, trapped in the arms.

Ultimately, Catherine Gallant/Dance used the intersection of multiple mediums of art making to transform a history into a current day recitation. Film, movement, acting, vocalising, screaming; these were tactics and tools used to share the story of a haunted past, that in many ways still bubbles up in today’s society.

It is works like these that continue to push the line between social movements and art,and bring voices to stories not always told.

EYE ON THE ARTS, NY — Emma Morris