Migrations at Santa Clara University

A small, contemplative crowd gathered outside at Santa Clara University this past Sunday, curiously following a wandering, colorfully dressed ‘bag lady’ and her intriguing worldly soundtrack from the Mission Church Gardens to the Library Commons, and finally to the north side of the university campus.

The wanderer figure, performed by Sally Mitchell

At each of the locations, the wandering woman summoned a group of dancers to perform works based on “intersecting motion of migrating humans and animals”, or, at least this is the recount of choreographer David J. Popalisky, SCU Director of Dance and creator of this outdoor dance experience titled Migrations.

David Popalisky thanks Sunday's appreciative audience

Including transit time between each piece, the performance lasted around an hour, snaking its way through the university campus and taking the audience through three movements, each seeming to sight some aspect of duality or juxtaposition of opposing forces, illustrating the beautiful yet often uncertain conundrum that is our existence. That’s some heavy material for a 90+ degree Sunday afternoon, but the crowd never dwindled, and in fact picked up a few curious bystanders along the way.

They were entertained with three dance movements which, while connected in theme, varied in story line. The first two pitted issues of environmental beauty against the danger which inevitably lurks amongst that beauty, posing humans as both cautious hunters and as prey. The third and last dance work offered the audience a completely different — and more personal — tone to the theme of migration, injecting a sobering narrative recounting of a family’s decision to flee from Peru to the U.S.

Mid-way through the wandering performance, the line “The earth turns, we are all passengers” was spoken repeatedly by the wanderer figure, performed by Sally Mitchell. From my view — atop a grassy hill on a scorching hot day, under a barely adequate sliver of shade from one of the newly planted trees at SCU — this line summed up the theme of the show well.

Dancers perform David Popalisky's "Migrations" at Santa Clara University

To an extent, we are all passengers here. Of course, we all make different daily decisions based on our lifestyle and our situational needs at the present time and place, but pulling the microscope away from our face and stepping back a little further for a top-down view, Popalisky pushes us to see a few additional similarities between ourselves, our neighbors, and the wildlife which surround us.

You may have to trick your eyes and ears a bit — and Popalisky can help you there — but from this view, homogeneity can be seen across species and more in terms of simple, unifying core responsibilities (such as migrational patterns). In the right light, on the right day, with the right music, dance, and a barely adequate sliver of shade on your back, it almost seems as if we are all headed in the same direction.

Now, if only I could figure out which direction that was… anyone have an iPhone with the compass app?

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David Popalisky’s Migrations will visit five Silicon Valley schools to provide performances and dance classes. For more information on Migrations, visit http://webpages.scu.edu/migrations

Migrations Slideshow

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