Dominic Corr posted: " Scenography and Composition by Wannes Deneer Dramaturgy by Marie Peeters ★★★★ Here's the not-so-subtle secret about putting on a show: it's expensive. So Belgian choreographer Ugo Dehaes, forced into a corner by pa" Corr Blimey
Here's the not-so-subtle secret about putting on a show: it's expensive.
So Belgian choreographer UgoDehaes, forced into a corner by paying their dancers a living and deserving wage as part of his company KwaadBloed, instead seeks to remove the human element from their future dance performances and instead do what the greatest minds of the 21st century seem to be doing: trusting robots, sacking employees.
But rather than fall into the similar traps that Amazon, Supermarket self-service, or automobile assembly giants have fallen into, Dehaes isn't merely shipping in the robots to form a new troupe de ballet, but instead growing and nurturing them from micro-chip to motherboard. More ingeniously, is looking to audiences to develop their movement and 'choreography' to learn and adapt with what audiences find pleasing to watch and form routines from the results. The more engaging SimpleMachines becomes, the more technically brilliant its ambitions grow.
Gathered at the table, Dehaes offers a pre-amble to the current state of play - where the rising costs of living have taken a heavy toll on their work output, with dancers cruelly demanding to be paid fairly, and the time away from their family through endless rehearsals becoming a bit of a drag. Audiences are slowly introduced to a variety of performing robots in various stages of 'growth': from latex lumps of flesh to matted-hair teenagers and eventual skeletal ribcages and multi-articulated tendrils.
Not so subtlety beneath the circuitry, SimpleMachines' perverse (though accurate) observations of our technologically advanced world and apathy become clear as the clunking, staggering mechanoids hobble into something which resembles some semblance of dance, but to the audiences' amazement eventually erupts into a strikingly impressive and enthralling culmination of a mechanised SwanLake. With an unfolding table of tricks and amazements, a new-age form of magic and sorcery at work throughout Dehar's show as Wannes Deneer's composition keeps the audience on their toes to just how safe they might be – though we seem to be a few years away from a rise of the machine's scenario here, at worst they could manage a sudden plié.
Back to the concept of the audience influence on the artificial intelligence of SimpleMachines, the concluding moments, actually away from the performance area, find the Fruitmarket Warehouse space transformed into a mad-scientists laboratory with several contained robots in various states of 'learning' – each some interactive with the audiences as they stroke feathered limbs which react to touch, or articulated tendrils which learn what forms and movements are the most pleasing to the audience.
With the influence of ChatGPT, cheaper robotic labour, and the age of immediacy with our content, the value of artistic expression is always at a feared precipice. But if the future looks anything like the ballet-tight-clad robotics of SimpleMachines? Sign us up for the mechanical revolution. Humorous, insightful, and anything but simple – Dehaes illustrates the value of their choreographed work with little issue while entertaining audiences with this truly unique piece of visual theatre and dance.
Anything But Simple
Simple Machines runs at Fruitmarket, Edinburgh, until February 4th. Running time - Forty-five minutes without interval. Photo credit - Arne Lievens
Review by Dominic Corr
Editor for Corr Blimey, and a freelance critic for Scottish publications, Dominic has been writing freelance for several established and respected publications such as The Skinny, Edinburgh Festival Magazine, The Reviews Hub, In Their Own League The Wee Review and Edinburgh Guide. As of 2023, he is a panel member and judge of the Critic's Award for Theatre Scotland and a member of the UK Film Critics.
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