Jasmin Vardimon’s Freedom at Oxford Playhouse Monday 11th March 2013 – Eleanor Jones reviews

Freedom is in many ways an idea that can only really ever be expressed fully by dance – the sheer abandon of movement without restriction or concern for social protocols. In taking the concept of freedom as their inspiration, the Jasmin Vardimon Company bravely dived into a bottomless pit of human feeling, for what is more endless, and more important to the human soul than freedom? It is one of these things, much like control, that are only defined by their absence or felt in moments of restriction. Yet we spend a good deal of our time ignoring it, existing in the grey area between, plastering smiles upon our frustrated faces.

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Jasmin Vardimon’s Freedom at Oxford Playhouse, Monday 11th March 2013 – Dana Mills reviews

Man was born free, but everywhere he is in chains?

What does it mean to be free? Since the days of Plato until post-modernism thinkers and activists have offered competing interpretations of the concept of freedom. In a wonderfully turbulent sequence of lyrical scenes of movement Jasmin Vardimon shows how dance theatre can illuminate further the complexity of one of the most fundamental concepts in politics.

The power of this piece lies in the combination of movement that draws the spectator into the performers’ physicality; mesmerising sets that change with the mood and the energy of the piece, and allow the performers to enact their fantasies in a giant playground; a varied musical score that enables the shift from one definition of the concept of freedom to another; and a delicate presence of a non-narrative that combines all of the above into a coherent whole which does not require us, as spectators, to sign up to one definition of freedom but rather enables us to enjoy the complete spectrum of interpretations.

 

Dancin’ Oxford brings dance to the streets of Oxford 1st-11th March 2013

Dancin’ Oxford, 1 – 11 March 2013, has 6 fabulous free street dance events in addition to an exciting array of performances in the city’s venues. Participants are professional and amateur, choreographers and dancers mostly from Oxfordshire though with some notable exceptions.