No young queer about town in the late eighties or early nineties could fail to have noticed the cherubic presence (a very, very naughty cherub mind you) of Michael Clark on the cultural landscape. The outlandish costumes (crotchless, latex or sleek and hypermodern creations) alongside daring collaborations (Leigh Bowery/Derek Jarman/Sarah Lucas/Alexander McQueen/Vivienne Westwood/The Falll) were always going to stand out as cultural dynamite.
The exhibition notes tell us: “Michael Clark was born in Scotland in 1962 and began with traditional Scottish dancing but at the tender age of fourteen he left home in Aberdeen to study at the Royal Ballet School in London before joining Ballet Rambert in 1979. Michael Clark & Company was launched in 1984 when he was only 22.
His work continues to be marked by a mixture of technical rigour and experimentation, fine-tuned choreography and subcultural influences. Clark has always been drawn to artists who have challenged the boundaries of gender and normative representations of sexuality”.
The exhibition begins with a large scale, multi-screen installation called A Prune Twin (2020) by Clark’s long-term collaborator Charles Atlas, spanning across nine hanging screens and four monitors. It is conceived as an immersive collage of sound and moving image, a mash up to two existing films (New Puritan (1986) and Because We Must (1989)). This gives the visitor the very best idea of the strange counter intuitive but very beautiful choreography Clark has made his own, with motifs in counterpoint then synchronous, with pelvis’s sliding around and feet defiantly turned out in direct opposition to the en pointe of classical ballet.
The other stand out exhibit is the set for ‘I Am Curious Orange’ production. The music was by The Fall, costumes by Leigh Bowery and BodyMap. The set was designed by Clark himself and is displayed here with all its funny, trashy, Pop-art imagery. Combining a backdrop of the Houses of Parliament with oversized props of fast-food culture and consumerism, the large-scale spectacle created an abundance that railed against Thatcher’s austerity measures of the time.
The exhibition also showcases a rare collection of Leigh Bowery’s provocative costumes which proved integral to Clark’s vision and radically disrupted the traditions of the dance world. These include the iconic bottomless leotards from New Puritans (1984) whose choreography was in turn inspired by The Fall’s post-punk compositions and grotesque world”. These rooms are interesting but fall strangely flat – quite literally in one instance – where the extraordinary sequined and embroidered costumes for Leigh Bowery are pinned to the wall behind Perspex rather than on a mannequin in all its three dimensional sparkly glory.
Michael Clark was exquisitely beautiful at twenty-two (Richard Alston talks about his extraordinary long limb length and low centre of gravity). There is a moment in a video where Clark puts on a tutu and starts dancing in a branch of Woolworths. The footage is not fake like today’s social media content – the look of shock and alarm alternating with joy and disgust on the faces of the shoppers is utterly real and authentic and painfully reminiscent of the 80’s.
What has always set the bold and the beautiful Michael Clark apart was his technical virtuosity combined with a provocative and anarchic punk sensibility that would produce works of such excitement and thrill it felt like dance itself was being challenged and the future was here if we could but hang on for the ride.
Michael Clark Cosmic Dancer Wed 7 Oct 2020—Sun 3 Jan 2021, Barbican Art Gallery
REVIEW : JONNY WARDJonny Ward, Queerguru Contributing EDITOR is a drama graduate but has worked backstage for many years at venues such as The ROYAL ALBERT Hall, The 02, Southbank Centre and is currently at The NATIONAL THEATRE. He lives in Hoxton, London and is delighted to check out the latest, the hottest and the downright dodgy in queer culture for Queerguru. (P.S. He is currently single) @JonnyWard360
