REFERENCING/RE-BIRTHING/RE-HATCHING
By Tammy Ballantyne Webber
“Mama” Mamela Nyamza re-visits her historic solo “Hatched” (2007) with a new take, birthing a work filled with resonances of the original. This year’s JOMBA! Legacy artist (the first female SA choreographer to be honoured in this way), looks back to move forward, and maintains her (often painful) link to the discipline of ballet, continuing her deft dismantling of the classical technique and the myths surrounding it.
She places ballet at the centre of an Afrocentric dynamic: with a flick of hips, a twitch of pelvis, a judder of shoulders, her ballet bourrées shiver with an African rhythm. The click/clack of the wooden pegs clinging to the tulle provide a cadence to the multi-tonal phrasing, as singer Litho Nqai croons sublimely, alternating operatic sequences with African hymns and soft humming.
Here, 9 ballet-trained dancers (all hand-picked from around the country, including two men and Amohelang Rooiland who was taught by Nyamza at her alma-mater Arlene Westergaard’s Zama Dance School in Gugulethu), Nqai and instrumentalist Azah Mphago, unfold a visually rich work, layer by layer — from the bare-chested dancers in long tutus clamped by hundreds of pegs; to the real “platteland” references of the wire props (windmills, chickens, cows, trees and proteas); to the cow bell clanging mournfully throughout the first section over the repeated music from “The Dying Swan”; to the inflections and percussive playing of the mbira, mouth flute, bells and shakers; to the blood red of the tutus and jackets wo(man)-handled onto the wash line — the space is awash with contrasting images, all beautifully lit by Wilhelm Disbergen.
The inter-generational cast begin the work quietly, almost shyly, until we hear them repeating their names and by the end they are in full voice, singing, echoing, responding, allowing the rhythms to carry them in full-throated, spirited canon. This is in direct contrast to the outdated notion that dancers must be silent and suffer in silence to serve the fairytale of effortlessness.
Nyamza’s corps de ballet is cheeky, expressive, playful, sometimes coy, as the dancers pout with exaggerated, white-painted lips and red bedazzled eyelids. Nyamza’s own unpacking and examination of gender and cultural identity in previous works reaches full throttle in “HATCHED ENSEMBLE”, as does her acceptance of her role as mother, mentor and guide.
In the final section (perhaps in need of editing), their feet are freed with hurried alacrity from stifling pointe shoes to revel in barefoot rebellion with heel pumps, foot shuffles, toe slams and an all-round jive party (some of it joyously performed on their bums), pointe shoes now brandished in their hands rat-a-tatting out a beat, rooted to the earth, tradition and a deep African impulse.
“HATCHED ENSEMBLE” will be performed on September 15 as part of JOMBA! @The Market Theatre programme in Johannesburg.
