Review: RED SKY PERFORMANCE: MIIGIS: UNDERWATER PANTHER at Kennedy Center

It's a little surprising that the Red Sky Performance company of Canada is just now making its debut at the Kennedy Center for Performing Arts. The striking group of contemporary indigenous dance has been around for 22 years, performing in 21 countries and performing at two Cultural Olympiads. And the Kennedy Center, of course, has maintained a distinguished dance series over the years.

Still, its appearance this week of "Miigis: Underwater Panther" comes a few weeks earlier than the Kennedy Center's own month-long cultural celebration of waterways, "River Run: Arts Nature Impact" slated to begin March 22.

Red Sky's performance is a good harbinger for that effort though, blending dance, music and video into a timeless tale of the Anishinaabe about a prophetic advice that echoed that phrase attributed to Horace Greeley, "Go West, young man."

This admonition came several generations earlier, however, and involved westward migration from the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes, a move that meant adaptation from salt to fresh water.

It's an artistic interpretation, however, that begins with the six-member troupe tucked inside the wooden slats of a rounded structure, before venturing from this cocoon like pod to first peek out and then to venture out into the wider world - like ocean-dwelling creatures growing, expanding and extending reach.

At the Kennedy Center's more intimate Terrace Theatre, the troupe of Mio Sakamoto, Jason Martin, Moira Humana-Blaise, Eddie Elliott, Kristin DeAmorim and Daniela Carmona, under the choreography and direction of Sandra Laronde has the precision, fluid movements of a disciplined dance troupe, but also an athleticism and quickness that are bold and dynamic, quite a contrast to the more fragile world of classical dance.

Sometimes it's so athletic you have stop to think: Did that really happen? Did one dancer pull the other up from the floor with her arms and flip her up to his shoulders?

Working together to create imaginative, multi-armed creatures, in the manner of the dance company Pilobolus, or in individual spotlights that are exuberant expressions, it all builds to tell a story of change, shifts and adaptation.

That kind of adaptation happens to set designer Julia Tribe's slatted pod structure too, which is upended to become a boat, and then the understructure of the hoop gown of a silly colonialist (otherwise the costumes from designer Lesley Hampton are sleek and functional athletic wear).

The movement effective, sometimes startling work of four musicians along one side of the stage of the Kennedy Center's more intimate Terrace Theatre.

Providing the effective, sometimes startling musical accompaniament, Rick Sacks is the composer and sound designer, who sits on the side of the stage as percussionist alongside Ian De Souza on bass and stringed instruments, Ora Barlow-Tukaki on some evocative wind instruments when she wasn't singing. Alongside her, Marie Gaudet, a member of the Wikwemikong First Nation of Manitoulin Island in northern Ontario, soared with stirring songs of the Anishaabe.

Further enhancing the movement and music and helping tie it all together is the subtle and effective video projections from Febby Tan (with lighting by Matt Eckenweiler) that slowly moves from celestial bodies to a horizon and then moves underwater.

"Miigis: Underwater Panther" is a short work of only an hour, which only adds to its impact. The excitement the company brings to D.C., and the fact they're here for the first time, would have made an additional piece welcome.

Running Time: 60 minutes, no intermission.

Photo Credit: Dancers in Red Sky Performance production of "Miigis: Underwater Panther." Photo by David Hou.

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