A Poignant Depiction of Self Discovery
Transit Dance Company
Reviewed by Brendan Daynes
Before You Forget Me is a poignant depiction of self discovery, the journey of life and the preciousness of memories.
Transit Dance Company always delivers amazing work and the haunting but heartfelt spoken words that open Before You Forget Me, which premiered in Melbourne on 13th May, set the tone for an emotional journey the dancers are about to share.
Director and Choreographer Paul Malek, in collaboration with the dancers, Kristen Cafari, Jack Birdseye and Angelica Menta have created a visually stunning piece. Clever lightning design by Jayden Hicks focusses the audiences attention on the movement and the emotional response felt is intensified by the beautiful classical music accompaniment by Rafael Krux & David Krulic. The whole creative team, including costume co-ordination by Lachlan Hall & Chris Curran, with rehearsal direction by Bradley Chatfield, have created a piece full of emotional depth that is thoroughly captivating.
Language is used throughout the piece as a way to communicate and connect. Opening the piece with spoken word and featuring this throughout highlights how powerful words can be. The work has been created on a series of poems, notes and memories of a time gone by and the spoken word, which is delivered during moments of stillness, accentuates how vivid and powerful memories can be.
The choreography, or use of movement as language, is executed with the same passion as the spoken word. The commitment to the range of emotions felt by the dancers as they move around the stage radiates. The choreography demonstrates how movement can be a physical depiction of memories, some warm, sentimental, heartfelt and soulful and others heart-wrenching, painful, and distressing, and how humans cling to these as a way to reminisce times gone by.
Before You Forget Me is a beautiful, poignant and touching creation that harnesses the power of language in all of its forms. The movement, the spoken word and the whole visual experience are the vocabulary demonstrating how the mind cherishes a life full of experiences. The power of memories, ideas of loss, the relationship with oneself, and acceptance can be expressed and felt over and again using beautiful and powerful language.
Transit Dance Company presents Before You Forget Me played at Transit Dance in Brunswick, Victoria from 13-25 May 2022.
