The 25th Anniversary Performance of “KyLin’s Garden,” by Kun-Yang Lin and signature ensemble piece, “Traces of Brush.”
It traces back through all the sketches since 2016, in watching KYL/D 25th Anniversary performance.
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In the 25th Anniversary Home Season KYL/D is searching for the center between multiple modes of representation. In the dance between the literary forms, and the sculptural.
The comparison of a number of performances from 2021- 2023 were leading to discoveries in coalescing representations of solos and duets, or excerpts from Kun-Yang’s repertoire for total art with this 2023 ensemble of dance artists. Not to mention virtual performances happening worldwide, and the tension and limitations of social distancing on stage. In “KyLin’s Garden,” a Philadelphia Premiere from 1997, it is most hypnotizing, because it is saturated with an allusion to the 2022 World Premiere of “Fish & Girl.” The implementation of artifacts in Kun-Yang Lin’s choreography is most satisfying when the work is self-referential.
The intensity can be driven by watching multiple views of the dancers, like connecting the dots, each dancer is their own constellation within the piece. The deep exploration into musicality, physicality, and philosophy are starting points. Evalina ‘Wally’ Carbonell created a siren-like sound with her choreography for the company called, “Shrill.” In a tri-part collaboration with fellow dancer, Weiwei Ma, and a Taiwanese sculptor, Yuyu Yang whose piece in the Grounds for Sculpture features the impetus for KYL/D, “Dragon’s Shrill in the Cosmic Void.”
The set for “Shrill,” is a projection of a wade in the water. It created a wake in the waters with swirls of orange on the blue surface. My imagination wants to explore these possibilities for the reflection on “Ocean Waves” choreographed by Kun-Yang from 2021, and going as far back as Wally’s 2017 Philadelphia Fringe Festival production, “MILK” exploring the nature of the dancer’s maternity, and the sustenance between mother and child. The deep cerulean blue washes over dramatically in suspense, the dancers dive right into this environmental art.
Fast forward to the path that brought many dance artists under the same teacher. Kun-Yang Lin celebrates the 25th Anniversary Home Season with a large KYL/D family of supportors, and friends. Design for “KyLin’s Garden,” insinuates taking in our surroundings and bringing together community. The relationship of many artists that helped evolve the company shows tremendous reach and impact from the choreography of Kun-Yang. In the establishment of KyLin’s Garden, (K)un-(y)ang-Lin or 麒麟 is a mythical creature from ancient Chinese folklore) and this is also Kun-Yang’s initials. Motivation to share modern Chinese contemporary dance and bridge Eastern and Western philosophies. The unicorn or kylin begins to tell Lin’s story. Bringing the company to Philadelphia, and specifically South Philly to explore the themes that founded this asian american modern dance company. That being the difficulties that carry the socio-reality for most immigrants in the U.S today. This shared critique on culture brings with it reform entrenched in how we identify with the language, landscape, and personal family structures.
In the program, Lin gives us the unicorn, as an abbreviation of his name, and the foundation for the company. The program welcomed the reflection of past performances wonderfully. Revisions for 2023 dancers, each of whom in their own right showed personally a part of this mythical creature. In peeling the many layers of the dance, the struggles bring joy for envisioning an event of tending, sharing, and imagination.
The unicorn just happens to be one of the most intricate designs in the history of human invention, half-beast,half-beauty. “KyLin’s Garden,” performed by Evalina “Wally” Carbonell, calculated, a pristine, short piece. For the duration of which, we hear a voice, and where is it coming from, we wonder. “Wake up in your dream, and you’re in a waking dream,” the voice continues on about walking on water. We meditate on the creature, a worldly beauty, and almost hypnotized.
A phenomenal piece in perspective with a rich cultural exchange across many lands. The “Love Song” is presented with Sophie Malin and Robert Burden for a 2023 revision for the first time with a male-female duet. Interpolated as discovering one’s own sexuality, the dancers appear to be inseparable.
The experimental composition of the next piece created for KYL/D’s senior dance artists in 2022, “Wind 2,” comes to fruition with the help of three choreographers working together. Gus Solomon Jr., and Pallabi Chakravorty during the pandemic with Lin, that gave one another tasks in conversations with their bodies, “Where Is My B-O-D-Y.” The body was about change, and gestures emerging as dance.These fellow artists working with physical limitations and aging bodies discovered the epitome which became “Wind,” a very immersive dance piece. Granted, in 2021 the premiere of Wind performed by Kun-Yang Lin, shared virtually to an empty auditorium, a modern proscenium theatre that seats 936, that evening KYL/D and stage crew were the only inhabitants. The epitomical lighting switch on March 10th, 2023 was equally effective when the lights in the Mandell Theatre shined on the audience creating unusual shadows, and bright highlights.
Reconvening with Weiwei Ma’s “Dragon” the sister project to “Shrill.” These two pieces showcased the impact of continual rehearsing of modern dance in Philadelphia.The connection to an earlier work by Wally and Weiwei, called “BLOOD,” from 2022 shows striking similarities of grit, and grounded in ritual. The women’s perspective collectively coincides with working over the stimulus of bodily fluids. If extrapolating meaning from these three dances were to make a kind of trilogy, the elements given precedence are, water, blood, and milk. These are modern concepts that break away from the classical form with a refreshed sense of femininity.
Naturally, KYL/D remix choreography, observations, and an embodiment of spirals into the theme. “Traces of Brush,” follows up with a reading of spoken word by Ken Metzner of a poem from Myrna Patterson. The didactic essence of life’s journey, mythmaking, multiculturalism, and giving form to our wildest dreams comes with the transfer of energy. In the ancient art form of Chinese Calligraphy, characters in ink dance across the page. “Gestures surface. Dancers lean, reach, dip, thrust.” Poetry created after witnessing a dance choreographed by Lin.
In the signature ensemble work, “Traces of Brush,” (2004) redirects our attention to imagine, the wielding of a fan dance by Weiwei, and insinuating this act of creation by the ensemble. The nature of the piece summons the 2018 Fall Home Season, as well, called mask (MianJu) performed by Lui Mo. This piece integrated Chinese calligraphy as well as in the 2018 commissioned piece for Lui Mo. The faculties of speech and calligraphy become larger movements on a dance stage. Following Lin’s aesthetic choices through the years reveals the change that influences his movement and form.
