WOMEN AFAR OFF (1990)

Choreography: Dr Ross McKim

Restaged by: Siân Hopkins

Dancers: Maggie Ball, Klarisa Chila

Music:

Composer:

Lighting: Mikkel Svak

Costume: Aylin Altinelli

Length: 7 mins

Photography: John Pridmore - Moving Visions Dance Theatre at Norwich Cathedral


Women Afar Off (1990) - an extract

This piece explores women represented in the Bible who followed Christ and their experience of witnessing the crucifixion.
This extract will present the THIRD movement, then the SECOND movement. The work has been adapted in this way to perform as a duet. Many iterations of the piece have had between 5-16 dancers, and the choice of material used felt most suitable to embody and express the themes of the work for two dancers. (Full piece information in next section)

The Third Movement:
The male disciples and other male followers had run away from Golgotha where the crucifixion took place.  Association with Christ was dangerous as he was considered a criminal.
Only a group of women stayed “afar off”.  They witnessed the crucifixion and could be seen to do so.  The dance concerns how this act of witnessing might have transformed them.

The Second Movement:
Magdalene goes to the tomb, in a “garden” where the stone blocking the entrance had been rolled back.  There was no body within.  A man comes up behind her and asks why she is crying.  It was early in the day and she cannot see him well.  Taking him for the garden keeper, she asked where the body had been laid. He said “Mary” and she knew him to be Christ.  He said “don’t hold on to me”.

DIRECTOR

Siân Hopkins, BA Dance Programme Leader at Middlesex University, is a performer, creator and teacher. She was principal artist and rehearsal director for Moving Visions Dance Theatre (2006-2018), and has danced with Inland Pacific Ballet in California, Peter McCoy Dance Company in Munich and various other projects and independent artists near and far. Siân has taught at dance institutions around the UK as well as in Japan, SIngapore, Vietnam and Canada. She is currently Contemporary Lead Lecturer for the ISTD. Choreographic commissions include site-specific and cathedral-based projects, Cantata Dramatica's choral dramatisations and collaborative screendance and theatre productions.

REPERTOIRE RESTAGING

– adapting existing work

The director of the repertoire piece, Siân Hopkins, is a former dancer and rehearsal director with Moving Visions Dance Theatre. She performed variations of 'Women Afar Off' between 2005-2016. This duet version seeks to embody the essence of the original work through a selected extract.

Costumes have been chosen by Aylin Altinelli to reflect the original Moving Visions Dance Theatre style. Lighting has been designed my Mikkel Svak who has worked on many performances of McKim's choreographies, reflecting and enhancing how we interpret this piece would be staged in a theatre. The original location for many of the Moving Visions works was cathedrals and other sacred spaces, including outdoor locations. Therefore, lighting was always minimal and often relied on natural lighting available at each location.

In 2019, 16 MDX graduating dancers performed the work and Dr Ross McKim created a new section to open the piece in collaboration with the cast, which became 'Part One'. The aim was to give the opportunity for the cast to explore, experience and make visible numinous revelation, by exploring the themes through creating new material with the choreographer. For the duet, we have concentrated on 'Part Two' - the original work.

'Women Afar Off: Part One' (2019)
Christ seems to have been a popular religious genius.  The few times women are mentioned in the Gospels, they seem of deep concern to him.  There must have been many women among his people.  Yet, they were not, as the male disciples were, developed as characters, or (for the most part) even given names by the evangelists.

'Women Afar Off: Part Two' (1990)
The First Movement:
The gospel conflates, perhaps with intent, Mary the Mother, Mary the sister of Martha and Mary Magdalene. She becomes Gaia or the Mother Goddess who wakes or gives birth to the world.

The Second Movement:
Magdalene goes to the tomb, in a “garden” where the stone blocking the entrance had been rolled back.  There was no body within.  A man comes up behind her and asks why she is crying.  It was early in the day and she cannot see him well.  Taking him for the garden keeper, she asked where the body had been laid. He said “Mary” and she knew him.  He said “don’t hold on to me”.

The Third Movement:
The male disciples and other male followers had run away from Golgotha where the crucifixion took place.  Association with Christ was dangerous as he was considered a criminal.
Only a group of women stayed “afar off”.  They witnessed the crucifixion and could be seen to do so.  The dance concerns how this act of witnessing might have transformed them.

CAST