Yaseen Manuel, a Cape Town dance artist and the University of KwaZulu-Natal’s 2021 Mellon Foundation Artist in Residence, premiered two dance films for the 23rd JOMBA! Contemporary Dance Experience: “Al-Kitab” and “UNHINGED.” Both films, brought to life by filmmaker Kieshia Solomon, shifted JOMBA!’s curatorial provocation of “Border Crossings” to the terrain of the self: in mind and matter.
“Al-Kitab” looks at Manuel’s life as a contemporary South African Islamic dancer, as he traverses realms between his religion and his art in search of common ground.
“I serve You.”
“I serve happiness through You.”
“How can I choose one?”
“When I am both.”
Manuel, kneeling in his home, gently slides his fingertips forward and lowers his forehead to meet the surface below. The image dissolves into the next: Manuel, kneeling on a beach, slides his fingertips forward once more, this time weaving them past one another, causing his forearms to cross and eventually fold into one another; they create a cradle for his head to rest. Manuel’s palm scoops his head up, guiding it through a half-circle before reversing the trajectory and dipping his face back down towards the sand. He repeats the original arc, this time completing the circle toward the breathing shoreline on his left. Manuel releases his head from his hand. His chin drops and his fingers clasp in a forward extension of the arms.
As Manuel’s prayer (or perhaps meditation?) continues, he turbulently fluctuates between his religious and dancing selves as he travels back and forth from the fixed enclosure of his home and to boundless landscapes in nature. Eventually, the two embodiments overlap in a single frame. Manuel steps backwards into himself with his chin lifted, heart open. The visual layering of environments fade. Their borders melt.
Manuel continues in motion, conjuring a final overlaying image of whirling dervishes, a ritual form developed from the ideas of Rumi, a 13th century Muslim poet and Sufi mystic, who believed passionately in the use of music, poetry and dance as a path to reach God. Within this context, Manuel points to a practice that is both rooted in Islam and dance. A possibility, a pathway, a crossing between his religion and his art that is neither linear nor fixed.
Tapping into the topic of mental health, “UNHINGED” features the seven dancers of Durban-based Flatfoot Dance Company—Sifiso Khumalo, Jabu Siphika, Zinhle Nzama, Mthoko Mkhwanazi, Siseko Duba, Sbonga Ndlovu, and Ndumiso ‘Digga’ Dube—in a cohesive narrative about schizophrenia. Manuel and Solomon communicate a slippage between reality and fantasy through cinematic crossfades, personification of shadow and material (namely a long-winding white fabric), and a dropping in and out of bodies from view that suggest an absence and imagining of company.
Toward the end of the film, several duets occur that emphasize touch. The hyper-sensitivity of these duets stuck with me. Specifically, the dancers’ tenderness as they carried, supported embraced, guided and protected each other’s weight. Although I understood these moments and relationships to be delusions, I wondered: What would it feel like to touch our ancestors? Our angels? Our demons? Our fears? Our dreams?
The white fabric returned as a veil over the dancers’ faces. This covering warped the performers’ vision as a deep fade-to-white digital transition did the same for the audience. Concluding gasps for air are heard against the detached white background before the screen cut to credits.
A single dance film cannot resolve all tensions between one’s religion and one’s art no more than it can mend societal issues around mental illness; but continuous provocation through dancing and dance making is vital to keep chipping away at both potential pathways to solutions and our collective, embodied consciousness. And that, Yaseen Manuel certainly does.
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The JOMBA! Contemporary Dance Experience took place from Aug. 24-Sept. 5. Performances will be accessible on the JOMBA! website until the end of September. For more information and to access the performances, visit jomba.ukzn.ac.za.
2021 Critical Dance Writing Fellow Sophie Allen is a Chicago-based dance artist and arts administrator. She pushes gender, playfulness and absurdity to the forefront of her creative work and is fascinated by acts of subversion, confrontation, confession and concealment in performance—specifically for the purpose of reimagining personal and collective histories. Sophie holds a dual degree from the University of Michigan, where she earned her BFA in Dance and BA in Philosophy, Politics and Economics (PPE). Her recent projects include: 2021 Artist-in-Residence with the Going Dutch Festival, production assistant for Jennifer Harge and dramaturg for Mira Göksel. Sophie is honored and excited to deepen her engagement with the field as a critical dance writing fellow with See Chicago Dance.