There’s an array of things that I’d rather…not do on a Sunday, visiting Stanley Arts, who were in conjunction with Birdgang Ltd, coming together to host The Commons Battle, was appreciatively not one of them.
Stanley Arts is one of South London’s esteemed arts and performance venues, delivering to the local community an essential platform for cultural expression and discovery. BirdGang Ltd is the award-winning UK- grounded artistic company with Hip Hop dance art forms as the underpinning distinction of their DNA. They choreograph, perform, tutor, and create avant-garde dance content for stage, theatre, TV, film and live events., and whilst their creative roots lie in Hip Hop culture, what their dancers/students exampled. was effectively the sprinkling of a creativity, which allows the roots of a ‘culture to thrive, allowing for spectators such as myself to harvest the displays, and gather the spectacle I did.
Critiquing the event, it’s important to understand the dynamics of competition, of which is essentially a rivalry where two or more parties strive for a common goal which cannot be shared: where one's gain is the other's loss. There were no losers, and whilst there were Windmills, Jackhammers, Air Flares, and back flips that allowed a gaping mouth to be amazed, and one-handed handstands, of which made me question the credibility of my own flexibility, and strength, what was prominent. more then any of the dance moves displayed was the joy; pure, unadulterated, bouncing peppy joy.
Competition was fierce, in the sense that back flips has revolved with insistent rotation, and head spins were effected with poise and accuracy, and the downright complexity of dance sequences dazzled anybody who tried to count the steps, or even mimic the cascading rhythms, that and the B-boying (Breakdancing) the ‘Locking and Popping’ the Funk, the Up rock, the Liquid Dance and the ‘Boogaloo’, all expressed with a joy impossible not to talk about.
As far as the body-politic is concerned- ancient metaphor by which a state, society, institutions are conceived of as a biological (usually human) body- on this particular Sunday the body-politic was resonated with the movement, and the joy in which these dancers convened on the dance floor, nothing short of inspired. When venturing out, and taking in what the Arts has to offer, If you’re looking for character, as I was, from the glees as the perfection of moves not perfectly landed beamed zealously, it was easy to tell they smiled demonstrated that the joy was in the pursuit, and for the spectators, it was as if to draw inspiration from this particular joy, to feel rejuvenated with the aid of the energy, displayed, and in an exuberating manner that spoke to an enthusiasm; passion, zest, the essentials of dance more apparent in more ways than once.
