Rosas: EXIT ABOVE – after the tempest/d’après la tempête/naar de storm

Sadler’s Wells, London
November 12, 2024

Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker, is a choreographer who can get it spectacularly right as she has in her iconic Fase or the complex beauty of Rain. She can also seem exasperatingly inconsequential when driving home an idea for a very long time. In EXIT ABOVE – after the tempest, she touches on both ends of the spectrum.

The concept of the piece, walking, is displayed in individual exceptionalism or group muscle by a diverse crowd of dancers with a range of skills. The subtext of the title refers to Shakespeare’s play and the work closes on Prospero’s final speech summing up the transitory nature of life. There is little unity between the two but thankfully the music is carried through magnificently by composer Jean-Marie Aerts, sound architect of TC Matic, guitarist Carlos Garbin and indie folk singer, Meskerem Mees.

Mees, of Ethiopian heritage has a voice of angelic purity that quietly and insistently gets her message across from her opening lines, “I go walking” from Walking Blues by legendary blues artist Robert Johnson, to her singing of Prospero’s speech and closing phrase, “carry me.”

The setting, by Michel François, is just right. Sadler’s stage is stripped literally to the bare bones with even the structural ribs of the fly tower visible, leaving us to focus on a cloud of white cloth that billows in the wind stream, its shiny transparency creating a magical effect. A single dancer flies and falls in the slip stream, blown off his feet, tumbling like an autumn leaf.

The group of twelve dancers appear on stage and the opening is strong with bursts of rhythm amplified in their bodies, cleverly orchestrated pauses and silence to build tension. The street dance skills are well in evidence as individuals strut their stuff to brilliant effect. Moments when the dancers work together in rhythmic unison are rare but add power. Most often it is loosely structured or, as in the very long final dance party, a chaotic rave. This compares to the moment when you are the only sober person at a gathering of very drunk people who don’t know when enough is enough. However, as Shakespeare notes, “this insubstantial pageant” must, thankfully, end.

The dancers get up close to the audience at several times. Flopping over the edge of the stage and almost retching into the laps of the front row. They strip off upper garments and throw them over the edge, one scampering back at the curtain call to retrieve a piece of her costume. However, the attitude is more often bolshie, bristling with absolute awareness. Mees is a little different, a serene presence that draws the audience in like a magnet. Her emotional power is contained in a voice, always audible but never raised and making you feel the message is just for you.

EXIT ABOVE is a theatrical happening but it is the sounds that linger rather than the movements.