SeKret is the first solo work of Taiwanese dancer Wu Tsai-Lin and aims to show us the meta of Mother Earth in dances based on earth, fire, water and so on. This is a fairly cliché concept and when delivered with uninspired choreography is an extremely dull watch.
It was immediately clear that the choreography had not been created for, or properly adapted to, the performance space and within the first five minutes around 50% of the audience felt the need to move seats in order to properly see the dancer.
The choreography was also incredibly boring. There are of course advantages to repetition and motif, which can be very helpful in cementing recurring themes, however the extent of it led to dry, uninteresting work. There was no exciting or impressive movement in the piece and the dancer rarely left the floor. The fact that the majority of choreography focused on highly intricate movements left me longing for a leap or an arabesque. Wu Tsai-Lin is probably a very good dancer, but the choreography totally failed to showcase this.
Choice of costumes was quite strange, for example in the water section Ms Wu looked like a perspex porcupine. The costume was effective in dim light as it reflected the blue glow very well, but when the lights came up it was laughable. The red hair extensions worn to represent fire also looked tacky to the point of hilarity, despite their being the main feature which allowed me to identify this element. The wardrobe is perhaps owed some credit for providing some light relief from the drudgery of the choreography, but I am not sure it was intended to be ridiculous.
The set and lighting was a total mess and although allowances must be made as this was the first performance, the amount of errors was embarrassing. Stage hands frequently ran out twice or even three times to adjust the set and it was clear that it had not been properly explained to them. Lighting cues often came early, reverted to the previous light and then changed again. Much of the lighting actually failed to catch Wu Tsai-Lin at all, making it very hard to see what was happening on stage. A couple of technical errors would be understandable, but this piece was riddled with them, which looked very unprofessional. This said, the technical errors were honestly a breath of fresh air as they were probably the most interesting thing about this piece.
It does not surprise me that three people left this performance half way through; I wanted to leave too. Unimaginative and dull, SeKret could easily put you to sleep.
