Alice Vol. 4 No. 2

By Cora Kangas
The stage is dark, abnormally so for
the beginning of a dance show. Then the
lights come on in the form of phone lights,
aided by minimal stage lighting. The
dancers look down like people do on The
University of Alabama’s campus on any
given Friday, phone in hand, not paying
attention to the world — even though they
are halfway across it, in Scotland.
Yonder Contemporary Dance
Company, a student dance group
from UA’s campus, explores themes
of technological distractions in today’s
society through a carefully-choreographed
routine presented across the globe.
The interactive performance featured
dancers performing different scenes,
all while drawn to their phone. The
relationships people have with technology
became the central focus for dancers
and audience members, who were
encouraged to use their phones during the
performance.
“[IRL found the] sweet spot between
interactivity, playfulness and profundity,”
said critic Jim Ralley in his four-star
review on BroadwayBaby.com. “...The
interplay between focus and distraction,
togetherness and separation, was neatly
executed time and time again.”
Students choreographed the entirety of
IRL. Drew Martin, a junior studying dance
and chemical engineering, spent countless
hours with his team perfecting the theme,
storyline and steps.
“I started to question how much I used
my phone and observed how much other
people were,” Martin said. “I also began
to notice how easy it is to be sucked into
trends because of social media and the
internet.”
When deciding what to do for the
choreography, he wanted to show how
much easier it is to be controlled by trends
because of social media.
These ideas then had to be translated
into a show. But communication varies in
all settings — no two people are going to
hear or say something the same way. So
in order to make the dances and the show
flow, everyone had to be understanding of
everyone else.
“Everyone had to collaborate on how to
make clear transitions,” Martin said.
Dancer Maddie Arancibia, a student at
The University of Alabama, performed in
IRL. She explained that the team worked
with two different choreographers: one
who wanted to start from nothing and see
how the dance developed, while the other
had a set vision from the start.
“Both let us create our own phrases
and incorporate our own ideas,” Arancibia
said. “The entire time, it just felt like an
open space to be creative.”
Martin and Kendra Giles, a UA dance
major, both danced in the show and had
a similar experience working with the
choreographers. They said the pieces were
a collaborative effort while retaining the
original ideas from the choreographers,
making the show more personal.
“There were no boundaries to what we
could make,” Giles said.
Yonder Contemporary Dance Company
took this show around the South, from
Alabama, Tennessee, and Georgia, then,
across the Atlantic to Edinburgh, Scotland.
They used audience feedback to mold the
show so that when they went to Scotland,
it would be as near to perfect as possible.
“This offered a very personal experience
for both the performers and the audience,
since no two shows were exactly the same,”
Giles said.
Alice Spring 2019 85