Treading by Elisa Monte. Photograph by Melissa Sherwood. Martha Graham Dance Co.


MARTHA GRAHAM DANCE COMPANY. Review by Nicole Duffy Robertson.


The biggest surprise of the evening for me was Treading, a duet created by Elisa Monte for the Graham company in 1979, to music by Steve Reich. An image of amorphous life grows into the full-bodied, sinewy Lloyd Knight, moving with stealth motion and bird-like arms. As he receded, Marzia Memoli replaced him centerstage and executed her own unhurried, gorgeous solo floor work, her articulate torso going from extreme contraction to extended arms back like a balletic swan. Costumed in skin-colored unitards with smudges, the two reunited in a series of gorgeous shapes and seamless partnering from some natural world, a slow, deliberate mating dance, unlike nature, a union with stunning control.

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