Coronet Theatre, London
September 13, 2023
Co-founder, artistic director and choreographer of Ambiguous Dance Company from South Korea, Boram Kim believes that all of us have our own natural rhythm, our own natural dance, which exists way before we start learning dance steps, styles or choreography. That’s probably correct. Watching someone improvise completely freely has always been an excellent way to see how they move naturally. Our unique rhythms get buried as what we wish to do gets overtaken by the societal expectations and norms.
That is the starting point for Rhythm of Human , in which five dancers represent modern men who succumb to the straightjacket imposed by society, although one does eventually break free.
Kim previously spent ten years as a street dancer and then back up performer for music videos, so it’s no surprise that hip hop is to the fore, although the choreography also draws on several other genres with even the occasional ballet step finding its way in. The quintet of performers (Hak Lee, Kyeongmin Jang, Kyum Ahn, Sihan Park and Sungtae Jung) are fabulous. When they come, the hip hop dance sections are terrific. Tightly choreographed, tightly danced, they bristle with energy and togetherness.
Photo Sang Hoon Ok
The dancers are introduced one at a time. That they all wear only sunglasses and identical hipsters (with a vivid strawberry design) signifies they are part of a collective. Yet there is much individuality as they cheerfully strut, pose and show off to us and each other. As throughout the piece, there’s rather a lot of hands in front of private parts and crotches being groped. It’s only mildly amusing initially and adds little to the work.
That opening cycles four times in all. At the end of each, the quintet retreat, appearing almost embarrassed by themselves, by daring to be themselves. All in silence. It lasts around twenty minutes. Although there is some variation and speeding up, and despite the message it delivers, it starts to feel overdone. Ambiguous it is not. You start to wonder where it is all going, if anywhere.
But, after the dancers have covered themselves in marker pen hidden down their underwear (where else?), including some depictions of penises peeking out (yawn), go somewhere it does.
The boys grow up. Hereon in, Rhythm of Human just gets better and better. The colourful hipsters are slowly replaced by formal white shirts, grey suits and ties. The transition is accompanied by the Cuban song, ‘Amor de Loca Juventud,’ which is rather appropriately about how the past, how illusions and dreams, are slowly dying.
When that music gives way to Mozart’s Piano Concerto No.20, Kim’s hip hop choreography echoes the master’s formality and rhythms. Absolutely in time with each other, it maybe new meeting old, but everything fits like a glove. Now smart-suited, although still in sunglasses, the busy, non-stop nature of city life is depicted in a walking pattern dance to Daft Punk’s ‘Da Funk.’ But individuality is not completely crushed it seems as every so often one of the cast break free and dances to their own beat before being subsumed back into the mass.
But all is not lost. Rhythm of Human ends with a moment of encouragement. To Cole Porter and Noel Coward’s ‘Let’s Fall in Love,’ Kim closes by telling us not to forget we are individuals, not to forget our very own personal rhythm. We can march, dance even, to a different drummer; our drummer.
Rhythm of Life by Ambiguous Dance Company is at the Coronet Theatre, Notting Hill Gate, London to September 15, 2023.