There’s a lot of “stuff” in life, most of it not visible or, frankly, understandable. But you feel its force anyway, like it or not. As in life, so in Kids, a trio by Kuan Hsiang Liu and Ching-Ying Chien backed by recordings of conversations between Liu and his dying mother. That, at least, is what the programme note says; the experience itself is both more baffling and more bruising. Liu is initially the stalking onlooker, shining a lamp onto the thrashing figures of two women. The younger one turns contortionist, legs splayed to wince-inducing extremes to expose her crotch. They all clump into a grotesque, composite creature of strained torsos and overloaded limbs. Liu twists into a tight knot and bangs his head against the floor. Why? The meanings are murky, but images of painful extremes and chants of children’s voices are unsettlingly primal in power.
Kuan-Hsiang Liu and Ching-Ying Chien: Kids
In life… in death… in dance. A Taiwanese choreographer gives a painfully primal response to the death of his mother