The Stage

Quimeras

Published Wednesday 8 September 2010 at 17:46 by Thom Dibdin

Lifting his eye from the dance floor and fret board for a moment, Paco Pena uses the natural progressions between Flamenco and African dance forms to explore the experiences of immigrants between Spain and Africa and the mixing of the two cultures.

It is a programme that is first and foremost grounded in dance and music. The first half is about cross fertilisation, as the loose fluidity of African dance forms, trades steps and ideas with the upper-body stillness of flamenco. The music is an intoxicating mixture of guitar, African drums and singing. Together, it is a big, joyous celebration of exuberant dance in which the four flamenco dancers end up silently framing the three African dancers.

If there is little to interpret beyond joyous celebration before the interval, the second half is presented in such a manner as to make it uncomfortable to watch.

This time, the opening sequence sees the Spanish members of the company being waited on by the silent African members. If the servants are invisible to the characters the Spanish performers are portraying, they are not invisible to the audience, and their unremarked-upon presence just intensifies.

The Spanish company are in particularly brilliant form - with Angel Munoz oozing testosterone as he dances a bull fight and Marco Flores on fire as weaves sensuality, calm, and passion into his moves. Then the inability of the passive, penguin-suited waiters to participate is unsettling.

With a precisely executed lighting scheme from Aideen Malone and the occasional sound clips of border patrols and bigots talking disparagingly of immigrants, floated into the music, this is a production which speaks - loudly and proudly - of the benefits of a diverse society.