The murmur of the audience, settling into the historic Manoel Theatre – Malta’s architectural gem and a home for the arts – felt akin to an orchestra tuning its instruments. The house lights were subdued, revealing not a curtained stage, but a starkly beautiful tableau: a bare expanse, a solitary, dimly lit bulb offering just enough illumination to discern a central chandelier, its form echoed by smaller light bulbs suspended sporadically around it. Even as the audience found their seats, the pervading ambience suggested the performance had, in a subtle sense, already commenced.
A delicate haze of smoke began to envelop the auditorium, the collective whisper of the audience gradually subsiding as the lights dimmed to a profound blackout. Sita Ostheimer’s “Mortal Heroes” thus began, not with a singular overture, but through staccato bursts of light and shadow, introducing the ŻfinMalta dancers as a sequence of fleeting, enigmatic silhouettes. One was immediately drawn into the intricate soundscape and the dancers’ creature-like articulations; the performance possessed an instant, immersive power. An undeniable eeriness permeated these initial segments, the spectral figures flitting in and out of visibility, cultivating a compelling desire to see and understand more.
This captivating opening laid the groundwork for Ostheimer’s signature choreographic language. Her style, which resonates with echoes of influential contemporaries, such as Hofesh Schechter and Crystal Pite, carves its distinct path, is often lauded as expressive, fluent, sensual, and deeply grounded. True to form, “Mortal Heroes” delves into the complex interplay between mind and body, with Ostheimer masterfully employing her characteristic “images, situations, feelings, rhythms” to construct this particular choreographic universe. The work’s thematic core – announced as “a journey in search of the ‘Other’,” and a “love letter to resilience, to the human capacity for survival, renewal, and transformation” – provides exceptionally fertile territory for her approach. The inherent dichotomies, such as “explosive yet delicate, aggressive yet tender”, manifest as a nuanced, deeply physical investigation of human duality. Indeed, the very title, ‘Mortal Heroes’, seems to invite a profound deconstruction of heroism itself, stripping it of conventional trappings to locate it instead within the raw vulnerability, unyielding courage, and the elemental will to endure, all expressed through potent, ephemeral moments.
Holly Knowles’s costume design served the choreography with intelligent subtlety, the flowing garments moving as an extension of the dancers, further accentuating the fluidity of their wave-like movement. Adrien Casalis, the composer, curated a soundscape that was nothing short of integral to the piece’s impact. From visceral, bass-heavy moments that resonated physically within the audience to the delicate incorporation of natural sounds, childlike voices, and ritualistic chants that sculpted a softer, more introspective ambience, the music was a current carrying the performance forward. It was a soundscape wholly embraced by the dancers, who transitioned with seamless grace between solos, duets, and powerful group unisons, their movements intrinsically linked to Casalis’s sonic architecture. This profound synergy between sound and movement palpably pushed ŻfinMalta’s dancers towards the extremities of their physical and expressive capacities. Moments where the ensemble employed their bodily rhythms – percussive claps, the audible rush of breath – melded indivisibly with Casalis’s score, effectively forging the ‘pulsating and tense space’ that Ostheimer intended for both performer and spectator.
Barnaby Booth’s lighting design was instrumental in shaping the audience’s journey, masterfully conjuring mystery and amplifying the potent emotion emanating from the dancers. Colour, with its inherent symbolic weight, was wielded with precision: the strategic deployment of red, soft blue hues, and warm amber within the choreographic structure imbued specific sections with layers of meaning. A particularly arresting sequence, which one might term as ‘the red section,’ delivered a stunning dialectic of intimacy versus high alert, passion versus aggression – a choreographic passage of immense power, rendered utterly captivating through its harmonious interplay with the lighting.
The piece describes a full, resonant cycle, concluding much as it began. Dancers materialised and dematerialised in fragmented glimpses, their forms at times rendered as silhouettes by the carefully orchestrated play of light. This evocation of life’s cyclical nature became increasingly eminent, culminating in a breathtaking final tableau: a lone dancer, seemingly swept from the stage by another body, leaving the audience suspended, wanting more.
There is, ultimately, nothing truly ‘mortal’ about the enduring impact of this work. One sincerely hopes that ‘Mortal Heroes’ will remain a vibrant and vital component of ŻfinMalta’s repertoire, allowing its profound artistry to be witnessed and appreciated for many years to come.`
