Dance company reveals inherent beauty of walking

By GILBERT WONG arts editor

Here's Lusi - Lusi Faiva that is. She's a dancer and much more than that. Cerebral palsy confines Faiva to a motorised wheelchair, but she moves deftly with little touches of a joystick.

So there is something miraculous in watching her rise and take hesitant steps. Her effort and concentration focus the watcher's mind on the intricacy and commonplace beauty of the everyday act of walking.

In St David's Church Hall in Khyber Pass, the Touch Compass Dance Company was last week perfecting another sequence for its performance at the Auckland Dance Festival's three-course centrepiece 3D at the Maidment Theatre. For three nights from Thursday the Touch Compass dancers will share the stage with the Auckland Dance Company and Curve.

Their work, called Lusi's Eden, marks a departure for the company. Theatre practitioner Christian Penny, of the now-deceased company Theatre at Large, has co-created the work with Touch Compass founder and choreographer Catherine Chappell.

"Catherine's experience is in improvisation in dance, mine in theatre," says Penny. "It's worked fine."

Chappell adds: "I don't start with music. I start with an idea and improvise scenarios. Before, I've used text and narrative so I'm comfortable with improvising."

The pair began with the dancers exploring their idea of rooms - bedrooms, rooms they had shared or stayed in - to find stories that would serve as a trigger for movement and storytelling.

"The idea was that, depending on circumstances, your room can be heaven and hell, sanctuary and the cell," says Penny.

The resulting 40-minute work is accompanied by music that ranges from the slinky jazz of Paris Combo to tracks from chart- toppers Cold Play.

For Chappell it has been fun and a relief. The solo burden of producer and choreographer has lifted.

"It's been great to have another set of eyes and experiences to add to the situation. I felt that it was time for the company to move to another level and produce a more layered and mature work. With Christian we've been able to do that."

Penny's involvement began after he attended a workshop Chappell and the company held for disabled children.

"It was really moving because of the quality of humanity in the room. In my theatre work I'm always seeking to unearth more humanity in the actors. And my theatre work has had a physical and movement base. Watching all these people move in all these different ways I got curious."

Chappell founded Touch Compass Trust in 1995 with a group of untrained disabled people who shared a desire to perform. Faiva was one of the first to join.

Chappell says Faiva's degree of disability had her confounded at first. She started her student off with hand dances. "She was confined to her wheelchair, but today her confidence has grown, she can take people's weight, walk a little."

Penny says the company brings out a lot of generosity in people. "They are touched by the courage of what they [company members] do."

Since the demise of Theatre at Large in 1999 Penny has been a director for hire, working on productions with John Bolton and the Books in Homes project. He was part of a Foreign Affairs aid project that taught villagers in Kiribati to use playback theatre as a community-building technique. And he has been active in the initiative for a new theatre in Auckland, leading workshops on a possible work about Bastion Pt.

"My interest remains in developing character through improvisational work with actors. I'd like to work the same way [film director] Mike Leigh does, using actors from the very start to develop character and then to tell stories about New Zealand from there."

* The Auckland Dance Festival runs throughout April. It will include professional performances by the Footnote Dance Company, the Atamira Dance Collective and others, along with free workshops. The festival culminates with International Dance Day on April 29. Details from Danznet or (09) 476 4691.

*On April 12-14 Creative New Zealand and Dance Aotearoa hold Future Moves 2001, a series of workshops and seminars aimed at professional development in dance.