Nelisiwe Xaba and Mocke J van Veuren’s preview of Uncles & Angels was bound to be fraught with last- minute challenges. If having to be prepared for the technological demands of this collaboration wasn’t enough, a flooded Goodman Gallery Project Space (the result of a late-afternoon Johannesburg thunderstorm) would prove to be their final hurdle before curtain call.
Xaba and Van Veuren’s performance relied on Xaba’s live interaction with projected programmed video manipulation and Âmontage. Without achieving a balance between these symbiotic elements, the performance’s success risked being undermined. Dancing in a Âconfined gallery setting was never going to be easy.
As the heavy black sheets were pulled back from the gallery’s side entrance, a fully transformed space was revealed. The former exhibition space had been painted black and was illuminated by a mysterious orange glow from the new lighting rig overhead. Audiences faced a large rectangular screen on a raised Âplatform that divided the room.
The technological mechanics Âdriving the digitised aspect of the performance were left exposed on purpose. Two cameras were placed on the makeshift stage, acting not only as witness to events but also awaiting commands from Van Veuren, who was stationed behind a table. A selection of props and costumes were meticulously laid out on the stage.
The performance commenced unceremoniously.
In anticipation
The screen displayed an image of yet another screen: that of a cellphone in which uncensored banter between friends was displayed. “Prudence” and the cellphone holder, known only as “Me”, hinted at their anticipation of the impending Reed Dance in their exchange.
Xaba’s choreography for Uncles & Angels could be described as sampling. She presented the audience with recognisable dances, all of which relied on her multiplied projected self on the screen behind: a Venda Domba Snake Dance, a drum majorette march, as well as an allusion to old Hollywood musicals with their ascending staircases.
She used the screen as a backstage from which she would emerge and disappear, a screen on which her shadow was visible, as well as the surface on to which she was digitally multiplied in projected form.
In one notable sequence Xaba emerged and disappeared with increasing speed, while the projection behind her accumulated the history of her movements. The result was a crowd of figures engaged in an unnerving fight in which she posed as both the assaulters and the Âvictims.
Xaba performed to the audience and to the camera, her movements projected and multiplied, which she layered through interaction. The cumulative effect of the technology cunningly allowed her to negotiate a solo that could be read as a group performance. Her disappearance behind the screen also divided the set of sequences she presented, each marked by a change or subtle shift in costume, which were created by fashion label Strangelove.
Unpredictable rhythms
The garments boasted many idiosyncratic as well as more traditional cultural references: a single white high heel and yellow ankle sock were teamed up with other inventive combinations, such as a furry pink wrap that transformed into a headdress. In this way different female roles were integrated. Her embodiment of these figures verged on parody.
The musical accompaniment to Uncles & Angels was as unpredictable as the sequences that Xaba and Van Veuren wove together. The sound of chickens, Barry White, giddy girls, motorbikes, pianos, rhythmic clapping and drumbeats followed on from one another.
During one sequence Xaba spoke, interacting with her projected self in a more conventional dramatic manner. This sequence saw Xaba act out the invasive procedure of testing the virginity of a succession of young women, whose movements she acted out before interacting with their projection as an older woman who ordered them to “hold still” or to widen their legs
Uncles & Angels was notably short. Xaba and Van Veuren served up a performance that allowed for easy consumption. Digesting the performance afterwards proved more difficult. The nonlinear narrative is as seemingly straightforward as it is elusive.
According to the programme, it was engineered to explore “questions around chastity, virginity testing, purity and tradition, while at the same time casting a wry glance at the power relations encoded in the interaction of body and projections on stage”.
It was unclear what questions they were posing despite the clarity of the references they presented. The duo made consistent use of humour. In Uncles & Angels laughter is not merely a vehicle to lighten the load of the themes; it opened up an uncomfortable zone for uncertainty and vulnerability that worked at destabilising our preconceptions.