Rhino Dance Marathon: 30 years of modern dance history condensed into an explosive party

Performing the first bars of Bach's St Matthew on a substantially amplified electric piano, something happens in the hall. The ominous notes sound in a large hall with a low ceiling, and then dancers come on and throw a bundle of energy against it from which you would be pressed deep into your chair. If you had a chair. But during this spectacle in ICK Amsterdam's rehearsal halls, you don't have a chair. You sit, stand, hang on wooden benches, and that keeps you active. As if that were necessary, because the power those unique dancers convey is enough.

ICK Amsterdam, Amsterdam's urban modern dance company, led by Pieter C Scholten and Emio Greco, is celebrating its 30th anniversary and they are celebrating with a rather unique (free to attend) party. It started Thursday night, 10 July, with a joyous act featuring a rhinoceros and from then on it thundered on into the night on Friday night. I experienced the first 2 hours and came away from it happy, refreshed, and full of energy.

No review

So not a review by a seasoned dance critic, but a highly personal diary entry by an overwhelmed reporter. Grateful for an intense evening. 

The company has chosen to fill the party with dance only. The programme these days consists mainly of dance. In chunks of between 45 minutes and an hour, dancers will perform a compilation of highlights from performances of the past 30 years. The result is pure dance and an ode to the bodies and especially the inspiration of all those unique dancers.  

The ensemble performing the first two parts of the feast is an assemblage of unique people, by no means everyone is classically trained. Nor would the bodies always pass the selection of a classical ballet company, but that is precisely what makes it all so human. The excerpt from the 2011 performance 'Le Corps du Ballet' that passes in the festival says it all. Here, no cadaver aesthetics of splashily drilled ballet bodies, but the typical ballet movements performed by people who all express their own thing with it, who radiate pleasure and who show emotions. 

Do not clap

ICK Amsterdam has it all: the eloquence and energy that can make dance so addictive to watch. It's top-class sport, but performed by people with a heart and soul. It is also a strange evening, because while we are allowed to clap, the dancers do not come to applause. At the end of their part, a towel goes over their sweaty bodies, a bottle of water down their dry throats and they are ready for the next round, with new audiences. Leaving us pleasantly exhausted. 

There is nothing to complain about this programme, or it had to be the clunky checkout system with qr codes for the drinks in between. Hopefully, on the next occasion, they will have remembered to spend a couple of tenner on a pin machine. But hey, we obviously didn't come for the drinks. No time for that. On to the next round. It's still possible - today.