Dance Double Bill review: Saoirse na mBan and Test 1 form a fortuitous diptych

Dance Double Bill: Saoirse na mBan and Test 1

Black Box, Smock Alley

★★★☆☆

Individually unique, these two dances form a fortuitous diptych when presented side by side.

In Saoirse na mBan, Ghaliah Conroy highlights women’s experience throughout history, admiring those whose confident individuality overcame stifling conformity and downright prejudice. Created in collaboration with the dancers Saoirse Lambkin O’Kane and Roberta Ceginskaite, it is described as a work in progress. Despite this, its ideas are already clearly articulated, and its breadth of ambition avoids conceptual sprawl.

In the opening, the three dancers are bound by long veils, gathered in a clump in the centre. As they slowly attempt to break these bonds their movement is gnarled and breathing heavy. By the end these bodies are transformed with youthful self-confidence, and in a final pumping unison dance set they defiantly dance back at any trace of societal disapproval.

Test 1, by Rosie Stebbing and Ornella Dufay-Miralles, addresses a more contemporary judgment. “You’re just too good to be true” croons the soundtrack, a neat summation of the perfection we aspire to in our online selves. Here the real person and avatar meet each other, and during this physical confrontation the vacuousness of the Instagram face and dopamine hit of the notification ping fall away, revealing a deeper test of our individuality. Test 1 eschews a slam-dunk conclusion, in deference to the complicated nature of self-identity, both real and virtual.