Four Told

Project Cube, Dublin

Four female dancers are lying in a diagonal, head to toe, ankles and wrists interwoven, a rhythmic sway to their movement, a symmetrical ease to their position.

This was just one of the many images of bonding dance which explored the theme of friendship and was presented by the quartet of Emma O'Kane, Katherine O'Malley, Lisa McLoughlin and Rebecca Reilly in association with Projects Arts Centre. And there were others. Arms raised in the familiar curved port de bras, echoing bygone shared routines of training. Or, hunkered together against unseen challenges, standing in line on tip-toe, or raising their legs aloft , extended towards infinite futures. Every movement seemed to make overt physical contact, with touching of heads, hands, shoulders, feet, even as whispered sounds triggered the connected memories flowing between them.

And there were other visuals too, a tad over-produced, but still engaging. The ever dissolving colourful, blurred shapes and figures in the framed picture, hanging on the stage wall or the miniature floor sculptures of Aedín Cosgrove's wonderful set and lighting design. Participating too was Ivan Birthistle's and Vincent Doherty's atmospheric design and composition allowed for separate sections which then merged into one another.

In tune with the permutations and particular phases of life that draw two or three of a group of friends together, we watched duets and trios unfold, the others not excluded but taking time out. The trust and intimacy of the seamless choreographic process, which created one work from their four distinctive voices, was underlined by the performers' honed instincts.

In the shouldering movements, the falls and lifts, encouragement, confidence and support was intimated in each gesture. These dancers, between them have in recent years graced almost every Irish dance company, but here, the sisters were doing it for themselves, in style.

– Seona Mac Réamoinn