Seeing Lucky Plush at the Steppenwolf 1700 Theatre, an intimate new black box tucked behind the prestigious theater’s next-door bar and café, is like watching an endangered species in its natural habitat. The dance theater ensemble has moved increasingly toward presenting work at larger venues, which necessarily tugs the work in a slightly different direction. Not that evolution is a bad thing – in fact last year’s “Rooming House,” also presented at Steppenwolf 1700, shares much in common with the revival of “The Better Half,” running through Nov. 18 at the Lincoln Park venue.

Entering the Dance Center Thursday night, a tableau was already in motion on stage. A black and white color pallet tinted with metallic shades of gray is seen in topographic images cast across a series of five freestanding projection screens. Surrounding them, human sculptures slowly undulate as if doing t’ai chi, wearing headdresses and other adornments which, to me, looked like the ductwork of an HVAC system, architectural interests like soffits or moldings, and what could have been stylish IKEA chandeliers.

Bodies are complicated. Our bodies are strong, but they’re also fragile. They’re private, but increasingly part of public debate. The policing of women’s bodies, the rights of transgender people to use public bathrooms, or stereotypes surrounding how black and brown bodies are perceived by a white minority which still holds the power in this country – these are not new social issues for us, but they’re urgently bubbling over in an inflammatory and polarized political climate. For many Americans, their bodies are on the ballot next Tuesday.

Chicago audiences can give thanks the whole month of November for the bountiful dance feast from companies and choreographers near and far. Enjoy a cornucopia of traditional ballet, jazz, culturally specific dance, contemporary and interdisciplinary performance art in both small and large venues throughout the city and suburbs.

NOVEMBER HIGHLIGHTS:

Every so often, Ballet 5:8 ventures into Chicago, sharing what might be the suburbs’ best kept dance secret. But it won’t be long until Ballet 5:8 is a secret to no one. The seven-year-old, faith-based professional ballet company is a decidedly robust operation serving dance fans and students across the south suburbs of Frankfort, Palos Heights and Beverly, and in Valparaiso, IN. 

Snazzy, jazzy, sleek and chic, Giordano Dance Chicago (GDC) opened its fall season last night (7:30 PM, Harris Theater, through Saturday, October 27) with its trademark pizzaz in a slam-dunk program of repertory favorites and a brand new show-stopper. 

 Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre’s (CRDT) special blend of incisive concert dance, original, live music, and visual art makes you sit up and pay attention to the immigrant experience.

Everything about Kelly Anderson’s work for her eponymous dance company is fun. Hers is a different kind of dance theater than the brand we’re used to seeing in Chicago, if only because, refreshingly, she refuses to take herself too seriously. 

While Chicago’s 1893 World’s Columbian Exposition is an indisputably bright moment in the history of our city, the world today rightly looks unfavorably at its exploitation of otherness. Relegated to the Midway on the outskirts of the White City, featured among a menagerie of animals and unusual artifacts, people representing faraway cultures were put on display to quench fairgoers’ fascination with exoticism.