0g (Zero Gram) by Melancholy Dance Company
Choreographer: Cheoi-in Jeong
Shinsagae by Ji-Hye Chung
A well-established staple of the dance calendar, A Festival of Korean Dance, the international dance festival, returns to The Place for its eighth year. In case you hadn’t noticed, anything with a K in it is super cool right now, or should that be kool? Hence, the liberal scattering of Ks in the title of this double bill. Korean dance is krucial, kontemporary and don’t you forget it.
While this double bill promotes the dances in one order, they appear in reverse order, which is to the advantage of the programme, allowing the energy in the room to build rather than diminish. First up, Shinseagae, which means ‘new world’ in Korean. This one-woman ‘lecture-style’ performance is largely that. You would be mistaken for thinking you’ve walked into a PHD viva situation. The choreographer and performer, Ji-Hye Chung, sits on the ground, her laptop screen projected as she talks to the audience in both Korean and English (with subtitles). She controls the limbs of the onscreen character’s movement – an athlete on a running track – through her keyboard, which is clearly not easy, as we watch him repeatedly crumble and crash, insubordinate limbs flailing.
This half of the double bill – on the practice of walking is somewhat bemusing, and not really what you can describe as dance. However, it does what it sets out to do, which is to impel the audience to consider this most basic of movements that most of us take for granted. Through the video presentation, a doll that’s disassembled and reassembled, and finally, through her own experiments with walking, using all four limbs, we start to reflect on walking: philosophically, personally, and evolutionarily. The direction the audience is given, if a little dry and laboured, takes us back to first steps, walking after an illness, operation, or childbirth, as we consider the many ways of moving from A to B. Walking is not only a daily miracle, but it can also be an act of creative performance. Is the lecture over now?
After the interval (this is a 95-minute show including the break), the energy picks up with the outstanding Melancholy Dance Company, founded in 2016. Their piece 0g (Zero Gram) was the winner of the 2020 Dance Arts Award by Chum, a Korean dance magazine. Why they are called Melancholy Dance Company is baffling, as they absolutely are not. Five men: Ji-sooo, Ryu, Gyung-jae Mun, Cheoi-in Jeong, Young-sang Ju and Joong-keun Jeon, all with short haircuts and grey contemporary sweatpants, shirts and T-shirts, are joyful, dynamic, and experimental. After the ponderous pontification of the first act, where some sighs could be heard in the audience, there is laughter and gasps of delight as the five play with ideas of weight and gravity, lifting, and supporting each other. Inspired by the repetitive and seemingly pointless actions of Sisyphus, limbs become weightless – 0g – zero grams – or as heavy as a sack of potatoes. The skill and creativity are outstanding and mesmerising. In unity, they bring to mind the intricate mechanisms inside a watch or one of those stainless-steel desk ornaments so loved by 1970s executives. A dazzling performance of choreographed physical balance, speed and skill closes the night; poetic, playful and sometimes jaw-dropping. Now that is kool.
Reviewed on 13 May and plays at Dance City, Newcastle on 15 May 2025
