Factory International Hosts Crystal Pite and Simon McBurney

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Nederlands Dans Theater and Complicité  Figures in Extinction  Aviva Studios, Factory International, Manchester 21 Feb 2025, 19:30

I had been looking forward to a show like Nederlands Dans Theater's Figures in Extinction in Manchester's Factory International ever since 7 Dec 2014, when George Osborn announced a £78 million investment in a new arts venue for Manchester as part of the Coalition Government's Northern Powerhouse initiative (see Factory To Go Ahead  13 Jan 2017 and the posts linked to that article).   I had high hopes on 11 Dec 2014 when I wrote  Let's bring the Royal Ballet to The Factory, Manchester.  They were exceeded by the premiere of Requiem, the third part of Crystal Pite and Simon McBurney's collaboration at Factory International's Aviva Studios on 19 Feb 2025.

I attended the evening performance of Figures in Extinction on 21 Feb 2025.   It was my first visit to Factory International. According to Wikipedia, the venue can accommodate up to 7,000 people in its "5,000 flexible 'warehouse' space" and 2,000-seat auditorium.  There is no shortage of bars, merchandise outlets and other attractions to explore during intervals.  The show took place in the Avviva Studios auditorium.  Although I was in the back row, I had an excellent view of the stage, and the acoustics were excellent.   Even though my mobility is limited, I had no trouble accessing my seat.  There were plenty of lifts and escalators as well as helpful and courteous ushers.

Figures in Extinction started with the list or [1.0].  There was a dialogue on a screen between "Simon" and "Crystal", though I did not recognize the voices as those of McBurney and Pite. Dancers represented the animals, plants and glaciers that have disappeared as a result of climate change.  The animal that has stuck in my memory is the Pyrenean ibex with its distinctive curved horns.  The top photograph in  An Introduction to Figures in Extinction shows how the species was represented on stage.  A child asked plaintively whether the animals had gone away and whether any were ever coming back.   According to the online programme, the text was taken from Why Look at Animals? by John Berger.  The score was composed by Owen Belton, who has collaborated with Pite for many years.  There were also excerpts from Perfume Genius's Normal Song and Blick Bassy's Aké.   A flavour of the work can be savoured from NDT's YouTube video Figures in Extinction [1.0] - by Crystal Pite with Simon McBurney (NDT 1 | Dreams 360).

Figures in Extinction [2.0] but then it comes to the humans explored the possibility of the extinction of our species.  Suuited human beings in their offices were scrutinized just like the disappearing species in the list.   The music was by Benjamin Grant with fragments of Claude Debussy's La Mer, Dmitri Shostakovich's Tenth Symphony, Johan Sebastian Bach's Concerto for 2 Violins in D Minor, Nils Frahm's Less, Alfred Schnittke's Cello Sonata No. 1: I Largo, II Presto, Jim Perkins's The North Wind, Owen Belton's Extinction Crescendo and additional music by Josh Sneesby.   The work was inspired by Iain McGilchrist's The Divided Brain and the Making of the Western World, extracts of which were read during the performance.  Some idea of this part of the show can be obtained from the video Figures in Extinction [2.0] but then you come to the humans - Simon McBurney with Crystal Pite

For me, the most disturbing part of the show was Requiem.   A voice spoke about space and time and the relationship between the living and the dead.  It continued that the dead surround the living.   The dead experience timelessness, though, sometimes, so do the living in extreme circumstances, one of which could be dying.  There was a scene of a patient wired up on monitors.  A staff nurse and trainee changed the patient's bedding, almost manhandling him.  A family entered the patient's hospital room, squabbling with each other.  Somehow lifted the mood of an otherwise depressing theme was lifted by a luminous backdrop, a photograph of which appears in the online programme.   The score was by Owen Belton with fragments of Fauré and Mozart's Requiems as well as other works.   A sample of the piece is contained in Figures in Extinction [3.0] requiem,

This is a profound, multi-layered work which cannot be appreciated properly by watching a single performance  (if, indeed, any worthwhile show can).  Figures in Extinction will be performed at the Internationaal Theater in Amsterdam tonight, tomorrow and Saturday before proceeding to Helsinki in April and Luxembourg in June.  It is well worth seeing.

Dawson's "Requiem"

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Dutch National Ballet Requirem Music Theatre (Stopera) Amsterdam, 27 Feb 2019, 20:15

David Dawson's Requiem is a double bill of two of that choreographer's recent works: Citizen Nowhere which was first staged in 2017 and Requiem which was premiered on 12 Feb 2019.  These are formidable works which were performed to a packed house that gave them a standing ovation.

The first of those works was Citizen Nowhere.  I am not sure whether to describe it as a solo or a duet.  There was only one artist on stage, namely Joseph Massarelli but an outside image of Sasha Mukhamedov appeared on screen and there was certainly a dialogue between Massarelli and the screen throughout the show. According to the programme notes, one of Dawson's sources of inspiration was Antoine de Saint-Exupéry Le Petit Prince.  However, in the weeks before my nation is dragged with at least half our population including me kicking and screaming out of the European Union against our will, I could not occlude from my mind the shameful speech of our Prime Minister to the 2016 Tory party conference that a citizen of the world is a citizen of nowhere.  The programme hints that that speech may have been in the choreographer's mind:

"For Dawson, an Englishman by birth who has been living and working in Europe for a long time, this famous story has gained extra meaning because of some of the political issues the world faces today due to nationalism, the building of walls, and the displacement of people who find themselves far from home."

It was clear from the guffaw that May's speech was in the mind of my audience when I invited my audience for my talk on developments on English law at C5's Pharma & Biotech Patent Litigation to follow we down to the Stopera to see this double bill by one of the world's greatest dance companies.

Though a very short work Citizen Nowhere was demanding both for artist and audience.  Massarelli, stripped to the waist, circled the stage like a colt stallion. Powerful but constrained by the screen much like Winston Smith in Orwell's 1984.  On to the screen bounced letters which gathered and were swept away like autumn leaves. Occasionally quotations from Saint-Exupery's book appeared like "One sees clearly only with the heart. The essential is invisible to the eye" from Fox.  "Why in English?" I asked myself.  If people here read Saint-Exupery at all it would be in Dutch or perhaps in the original French which most schoolchildren in the Netherlands master at the same time as they as they study English and German.  Be that as it may, it was spectacular and breathtaking as was  Szymon Brzóska's score with Matthew Rowe's interpretation.  Congratulations to Altin Kaftira who made the film and indeed all who collaborated on this multidimensional and absorbing creation.

Requiem is more than a work of art.  It is an act of worship.  Surprisingly, perhaps, in this day and age. Living, as I do, close to Huddersfield with its famous Choral, I related immediately to this work. Especially to the Kyrie and Agnus Dei. This is a choral work upon which I felt dance was but a commentary.  I loved Gavin Bryars's music and even though one of my very, very, very, very special and very favourite ballerinas, Mukhamedov, was performing ethereally before my eyes I felt them closing as I focused on the sound.  "How could I do that?" I kept saying to myself for it was not just Mukhamedov that I was missing but also other favourites such as Floor Eimers, Yuanyuan Zhang, Riho Sakamoto, Nancy Burer, Clara Superfine, Thomas van Damme and Nathan Brhane whose careers I follow closely and whom I greatly admire.  There was just so much to see, so much to hear, so much for intellect and spirit to absorb that I felt overwhelmed.  This is a work that requires multiple visits to understand and, alas, this is my only opportunity to see it this season.

This double bill is the sort of programme that makes the Dutch National Ballet special.  Perhaps Hampson's Scottish Ballet could do it too but I can think of few other companies in the world who would do it justice and even fewer audiences who would value it as much as those in the Stopera who stood and cheered.