Review: Destruction Song II

The elegant union of strong movement and the color black

A choreographer rarely gets the opportunity to rework his work. This is what happened to Kenneth Kvarnström when he started working on his Destruction Song for three dancers two years ago for five dancers in the Helsinki City Theatre’s dance group. The performance of two women and one man was supposed to be a new version for four men and one woman.

At least this was not quite the case at the premiere, as due to an illness, Destruction Song II was performed with four dancers and the duet at the end was visited by Sofia Karlsson, who was involved in the original version.

I saw the original version when it visited the Helsinki Festival last year. After one viewing, I can’t say that I remember the work completely, but I noticed that I now pay attention to partly different things than the first time. Also, the mood of destruction and the end of everything was not nearly as strong as before.


Attention to the hands

Kvarnström is known above all for her strong, polished and holistic abstract movement, which flows through the work in a delicately sensual and sharply cutting way at the same time. All of this still had an impact on the performance, but now the dancers’ fingers and palms stood out both in terms of movement and visuals. They were highlighted as the only light points against the dancers’ all-black outfits and added to the insect-like impression of the costumes designed by Helena Hörstedt as they moved in a spider-like manner.

Since the dancers, especially in the early part of the work, mostly moved as a group separately from each other in unison, even brief contacts were very important. That is why the two duets of the work also became central parts of the performance.

The first of them, the tenacious duel by Janne Marja-aho and Jenni-Elina Lehto , was like the viewer’s preparation for the beautiful farewell duet at the end, which Marja-aho and Karlsson performed very touchingly, but still in such a neutral way that the viewer could decide for themselves what ended and why.

Although the work was very dark and black was the starting point of the performance in every way, it was not gloomy. It was way too stylish for that. Jenz Setzhman’s play with black and white light and Jukka Rintamäki’s dark musical avalanche created a futuristic atmosphere of destruction that was both impressive and distancing at the same time.

In addition to Marja-aho and Lehto, Valtteri Raekallio and Kenneth Bruun Carlson also did a rigorous and precise job. The whole foursome executed the performance so confidently and with such precision that there is nothing to add to it.