An Unrestricted Arty Affair at danceGATHERING Festival

An Unrestricted Arty Affair at danceGATHERING Festival

Iyke Bede

After the COVID-19 pandemic pushed danceGATHERING festival — a performance lab and anti-disciplinary convention for creatives from diverse backgrounds that cut across performance and visual arts — to the virtual world, it returned this year to a live audience.

The week-long festival welcomed creative minds to partake in its masterclasses and gain the basics of different art forms such as dance, drumming and painting while creating opportunities for collaborations.

The series of events culminated in a final day of live performances and visual art exhibitions pooled from over 35 creatives who trooped into Lagos from Enugu, Asaba, Benin, Jos, Kaduna, and Abuja, to showcase their unique art expressions on Lagos’ foremost business district, Broad Street, Lagos Island.

Kicking off at 3pm on Sunday, August 15, a sizable portion of the street was laid siege by these artistic rebels, who expressed themselves in the most eccentric but highly engaging manner.

As the sun stood still, glowing with bright embers, performers took turns harnessing available spaces for performances. Certainly, there was no definite stage. The fluidity this arrangement provided became a standout feature of the festival experience. Its unrestrictive nature allowed for both performers and the audience to actively partake in the various activities. At that moment, each person became a performer in their own right.

To experience the different performances, the audience and performing acts moved to an entirely different stage each time, following cues at the end of each presentation. This relocation was done in an almost choreographed manner. As the sun went to sleep that evening, the crowd came alive, echoing chants in support of their choice performers.

A skateboarder traversing the stretch, girls dressed in the latest fashion adorned in colourful head ties (gele), and dozens of influencers documenting the event in real-time on socials, one dance group to another mounted and disembarked the stage rendering a combination of dance moves dipped in different genres such as ballet, contemporary, hip hop, breakdance, sabar and so forth.

One of the evening’s top performances came from the night’s closing act, Reincarnation. Performing for close to a score minute, the two dozen dancers rendered a tribal performance punctuated by their all-black ensemble accentuated with headgears that projected massive horns. From this writer’s interpretation, their entire presentation was an expression and acceptance of self in a way that defies the norm. It was a conglomeration of rejects who found a voice in commonalities. It also was an expression of sexuality through dance moves ingeniously included with subtlety in mind.

Although Reincarnation’s performance ended the event, memorable moments in the form of folk music reimagined to evince a contemporary outlook, dotted the fifth edition of the festival.

danceGATHERING, a concept of QDanceCenter reminded the entire Lagos metropolis of the might art still wields. Indeed, a sixth edition is a welcomed idea.

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