Dance review weighs a spa ode to women against a Greek epic

Two works at the Independent Dance Festival had strong ideas but uneven execution, ERR culture writer Grete Liina Tuuksam writes in her review. The performances, “Femme Physique” and “Glorious Epic”, followed a strong festival opening and Jefta van Dinther’s “Unearth” on Saturday, she says, but the next two days were less compelling.

On Sunday, the festival took audiences to Meriton Sport Spa and Sauna Centre for “Femme Physique” by Icelandic artist duo Forget-Me-Not, Snædís Lilja Ingadóttir and Sigríður Ásta Olgeirsdóttir. The work turned the spa’s café and lobby into a juice-party setting, with warm waffles and coffee with milk in place of Sunday pancakes. Waffle-making performers danced as music played, while a crowd chatted in the room. The atmosphere was like an ordinary theatre café, but with air that was a little sweeter and more chlorinated.

The Sireen chamber choir quieted the conversations as it led the audience through the changing rooms and into the spa. Though spas are associated with relaxation, having to expose parts of the body there can make some people uncomfortable, Tuuksam writes. For 45 minutes, “Femme Physique” eased that tension. The performers exercised, swam and moved as they pleased, accompanied by Sireen. The performance ended with the choir singing Cyndi Lauper’s “Girls Just Want to Have Fun” and jumping into the water.

Tuuksam describes the work as both powerful and heartwarming, but somewhat superficial. She writes that the unapologetic depiction of women’s bodies deserves attention, yet the treatment of the subject felt familiar and could have explored its complexities more deeply. The female body, she notes, is seen as powerful, fragile and beautiful, while also being a target of constant criticism in a patriarchal society. Still, the performance’s concise approach suited the rainy Sunday and offered what she calls “wholesome empowerment”.

On Monday, the festival returned to STL for Greek choreographer Sofia Mavragani’s “Glorious Epic”, which brought Greek folklore together with contemporary dance. The two dancers, Efthimios Moschopoulos and Maria Bregianni, moved between synchrony and asynchrony. The 35-minute work relied mainly on jumps and repeated movement sequences. Combined with dim pink lighting and techno beats, the repetition became hypnotic, though some sections broke from the pattern and shifted the steady rhythm. In one moment, a kiss flowed into a position associated with Greco-Roman wrestling, illustrating the work’s tension between heroism and vulnerability.

A discussion with Mavragani after the performance, led by dance and film artist Rūta Ronja Pakalne, helped unpack the work’s ideas, including the weight of ancient Greek heritage that Greek artists carry and the different relationship “Glorious Epic” sought to establish with it. Mavragani said the movement did not conceal a deeper meaning: she wanted to create a work focused on the audience’s sensory experience rather than on the creation of meaning.