FLY ME Ana Lopez and Ben Wardell duet to it.
Photo: Todd Rosenberg
“I’m not one of those artistic director-choreographers who needs to make two works a year to keep up an image of some kind,” says Hubbard Street Dance Chicago artistic director Jim Vincent. “I make a piece when I’m inspired to make a piece.” On the brink of his departure, he may have created his strongest work of choreography for the company to date. Slipstream, a piece for ten dancers to Benjamin Britten’s Variations on a Theme of Frank Bridge, premieres Thursday 9 at Symphony Center, in a collaborative event with the Chicago Symphony Orchestra. In September, Vincent will start a new job as artistic director of Nederlands Dans Theater in Holland.
As artistic head of HSDC since 2000, Vincent has made only three works so far: counter/part (2002), Uniformity (2005) and Palladio (2007). This time, he seems to have been more than just inspired. As Vincent describes it, this work represents a new maturity in his creative life. “There comes a time when you just trust,” he says. “This is the first time I walked in [the studio] and just let it happen. I just relaxed and enjoyed the process.”
It’s possible that the appointment with NDT set him free and eased his creative spirit—after all, he has nothing left to prove in Chicago. In his nine years with HSDC, he’s overseen many positive developments, including the propitious partnership with the CSO that enables Slipstream.
It probably also helps that the Frank Bridge score is beloved by Vincent. “I’ve been listening to it for the last 20 or 25 years. It’s rather frightening to say that about anything!” he says. “But it is an intricate and emotional piece, with short, succinct, rich passages. It transports us through different environments, yet the theme stays wonderfully clear and tangible.”
At 25 minutes, Slipstream is also the longest dance Vincent has ever made. Choreographed for five couples, the work includes “a lot of duets that are almost like dialogues,” Vincent says. “The music led us through a series of brief encounters—some sections are just over a minute long.” He’s especially proud of the “unlikely pairing” made by dancers Meredith Dincolo and Alejandro Piris-Niño: “It’s catalyzing, a very interesting relationship physically,” he says.
Another layer in the piece is the “slipstream” idea, which led to specific movement research in rehearsals. “It’s like that area behind a truck going down the highway,” Vincent says. “When something large is being pushed through space, we have the ability to use that void [behind it]; there’s energy, space, resistance.” Vincent explored ways to maintain a connection even without touching. “We asked, How does one slide into the space behind another body?” Vincent says. “We found it often takes the form of a curve.”
Vincent emphasizes that the dance is not just an exploration of physics, but includes a human, emotional subtext. “We’re always slipping in and out of one another, to get the tenderness we need,” he explains. “We don’t always give or receive an embrace directly.”
At this moment of professional transition, it is fitting that Vincent’s new work places a lens on the ephemeral nature of relationships. People come and go. As for HSDC, Vincent hopes his departure doesn’t create too much of a, well, slipstream: “I’m hoping that everyone who is there now will stick with it and see it through. The company is in a great place.”
HSDC performs with the CSO at Symphony Center starting Thursday 9.
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