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Photos - John Sones

There was a real buzz in the audience on Saturday night at the second of three performances of come, been and gone from the Michael Clark Company. Anticipation was in the air - it was more than just the idea of seeing contemporary dance though; this was the promise of David Bowie, Velvet Underground and Kraftwerk...and the fact that Michael Clark is known as a bad boy of dance. The Royal Ballet trained choreographer has a colorful past - combining his classical roots with gay camp, a love of punk music and a pop art aesthetic, not to mention a drug addiction that kept him out of the spotlight for nearly a decade.

Opening with Swamp, a piece over 20 years old and originally made for Rambert Dance Company (which Clark joined in 1979 when it was still called Ballet Rambert), the night didn’t start out particularly promising - at least not enough to justify the hype. Swamp is essentially a piece that shows off technique, pure and simple. In tight blue, velvety unitards (by BodyMap) the dancers couldn’t hide. The movement was ballet lines, drawn out, suspended, but not quite pushed far enough to the limits, all to the grating, distorted sounds of Bruce Gilbert & Wire. With no set - only a vertical shaft of light slowly making its way across the backstage, it was cold and severe, the dancers more automatons than flesh and blood humans. For this piece to still have legs, it needed technical perfection; it needed the dancers to pull the lines further and to balance a little stronger. They just didn’t quite get there.

Luckily, the night was saved by Bowie and friends, not to mention the phenomenal costumes by Stevie Stewart, Clark and Richard Terry that took the tryptic of come, been and gone into a totally different echelon than Swamp. It was awesome and electric - the severe washes of light in greens and oranges by Charles Atlas, the bold, outrageous outfits like the hooded body suit made out of disco balls that are art works unto themselves and the gusto with which the dancers embraced the visual elements. The piece, in all its different sections, brought together such fabulous design that it became greater than the sum of its parts. From the early set up of microphone stand against a purple wash with a black-winged dancer down stage, through to the film footage of Bowie singing Heroes and even the heavy handed, video montage of billboard images mixing pornography with pop culture, come, been and gone was a superbly seductive creation.  

Which was a good thing because on a purely choreographic level it relied too much on the same patterns - balletic footwork teamed with opposition in the torso, static angular arms against an active lower body, traveling diagonal lines of bodies and repeated use of the same phrases. Clark slowed down movement so a position was suspended for what felt like forever and than quickly transformed into a new shape. It was technically demanding stuff - especially all the frenetic leg beats and crisp side splits that hovered in the air for several moments. When the technique was not exactly spot-on, it lost its power quickly.

At times the abstracted movement gave way to an overt literalness that Clark managed to pull off, probably because the whole concept of come, been and gone was all so over-the-top. A solo to Velvet Underground’s Heroin, had Kate Coyne in a nude jumpsuit with syringes poking out of it in all directions. A manic ballerina, she did lots of tight spins and melodramatic falls to the floor, clutching her stomach in pain, at one point lying huddled on the floor, her bottom at the audience. It’s a literal dance of insanity and dying and, in lesser hands, would be cringeworthy, but here in this context, it worked.

come, been and gone wooed with its boldness, its nod to rebellion and its fabulously on-the-money combination of elements. Shocking no, but it did evoke a certain, dated era and brought it ferociously to life while hitting a home run in the style stakes. As soon as the evening waded out of the Swamp, it sure was fun.   


2010 Melbourne International Arts Festival
come, been and gone
Michael Clark Company

Venue: the Arts Centre, State Theatre
Dates: Fri 8 & Sat 9 Oct at 7.30pm, Sun 10 Oct at 5pm
Duration: 2hr with intervals
Tickets: $97.50 - $25
Bookings: the Arts Centre 1300 182 183 | www.theartscentre.com.au | Ticketmaster 1300 723 038 | www.melbournefestival.com.au