Best of
the Twin Cities
Morgan Thorson's Still Life, part of the "Local Time" exhibition on view at the Weisman Art Museum last summer, took a rotating cast of 19 dancers through several five-hour marathons. Observers had the freedom to come and go, sit in chairs around the perimeter, or just catch a glimpse from the gallery entrance. Part installation, part ordeal, part meditation on time, decay, and extinction, Still Life created a world in which carefully detailed dance figures tumbled into something else entirely. Abstract formality mingled shamelessly with pedestrian moves as somber processions got tangled up through space, or dancers flipped out of dramatic poses with a "we're-done-here" attitude. The excellent performers became looser and more courageous as they coped with fatigue. Thorson built suspense, interwove calibrated dance with serious fun, and gave urgent animation to the still life of a museum.
