Clubs. Grub. Love. And world extinction.

Our current climate seems increasingly fragile, from peanut butter and polar bears to people power and political tweets. Right now, any sense of stability feels unattainable.

In a desire to find some sort of grounding, HERD looks to the social and anatomical evolution of Homo sapiens. By looking to our ancestors, can we regain a connection to our bodies and the earth we walk on? A contemporary work featuring live electronic music, four dancers trace their bones from dancefloors to desert. The world keeps dancing, but it’s lost its tune.

Premiere:
The Place, London, Resolution Festival, January 2020

Production Credits:
Choreographer and Text: Winona Guy
Live Music and Composition: Tom Parker (Barefoot)
Performers: Eloïse Mavronicholas, Louis Norman, Daisy Rimmer, Emily Robinson and Maisie Sadgrove

With thanks to: Erica Stanton and the University of Roehampton, OH Creative Space and Chisenhale Dance for providing us with space to dance, think and be.

Reviews
Winona Guy’s HERD was a thoughtful lament about the climate emergency, fuelled by Barefoot’s arresting live soundscape. Louis Norman was an enigmatic central figure alongside a female quartet, whose dancing was intimate, organic and – in the sensual exploration of touch – seductive. Here was a powerful, slick work with an urgent message that suggests a fascinating future journey for this innovative young choreographer.

GRAHAM WATTS

HERD, an ensemble of five dancers and a live musician, makes a statement of control and conformity. Heads shaking in a hypnotic, trance-like state, they begin a struggle of distorting spines, intended monotonous repetition and interlocking bodies. As the group separate, we witness a physical examination, a clinical contrast to the sentient, tactile bodies moving first as a synchronised whole. Louis Norman takes a microphone, listing various potentialities, such as ‘episodic memory, the knowledge that we will die’ whilst the dancers snake and spiral across the space in a dizzying, tight conglomeration. In a strong final image a dancer lies down and is sprinkled with soil, whilst dancers behind raise apples. It seems Winona Guy has cultivated something complex and intriguing.

BETH VEITCH