Garth Grimball
On August 29–30, gizeh muñiz performed Molino for Levitation as part of ODC Theater’s State of Play festival. The dance was painterly in its methods; like a Cy Twombly painting, the tension developed in subtraction and abstract trompe-l’oeil. The solo had three distinct sections, and while no claims to a lack of technique and rigor could be made of the dancing, describing the content of the dance is as simple and as imprecise as describing a Twombly painting: she entered in darkness, did floorwork, pulled a rope, danced standing and exited.
The sections developed as layers rather than inciting incidents. muñiz wore a sheer red top and skirt with sparkly heels and evening gloves as delicate as a whisper. She fumbled as if learning to walk to the sound of a marble rolling across the floor. Fumbling evolved into spidery crawling before dropping into the velvety floorwork muñiz is known for.
A rope, the kind called a “line” aboard a ship, dropped from the ceiling. The length of the rope was invisible to the audience. It fed through a pulley behind the backstage curtain. muñiz pulled on the rope. She sloughed her gloves and pulled on the rope. She abandoned her pumps and pulled on the rope. She pulled until she fell over. She pulled from above her head and below her waist. With each pull more of the rope doodled on the floor in curlicues and coils as if tracing the path she’d just danced.
Molino for Levitation was an hour long and easily half of it was pulling the rope. I admit my mind wandered and I looked at the faces in the audience to read their reactions. “Molino” translates to mill or grinder, and muñiz’s effort delivered a sense of material disintegration.
The rope finally reached its end. muñiz sat upstage. B Dean entered from behind the curtain revealing the solo to be a duet. Dean had been providing the resistance and slack to counter muñiz’s pulling. They gathered the rope while muñiz changed her outfit, with assistance, into an oversize structured blue ensemble (Sonya Gadet Molansky’s costume design was superb).
She retook the stage in spirals and weight shifts. She made it through the mill intact. Her movement quality expanded rather than atomized. She walked off the stage, past the audience and sat down staring at the empty stage. She rested her head on her chin. Her final look was one of boredom? Of resignation? Of departure? We were left to question her relationship to the performance as much as our own.
muñiz’s last performance at State of Play, fishblod, began with her rigged to the ceiling as if levitating. Whether Molino for Levitation is a reflection on past heights or not, she moves forward making work from a singular artistic voice.
Garth Grimball is a writer and dancer based in Oakland, CA. He is a contributor to Fjord Review, SF Examiner and Dance Media. He is the editor of ODC Dance Stories.
gizeh muñiz Pulls Through was originally published in ODC.dance.stories on Medium, where people are continuing the conversation by highlighting and responding to this story.