Steptext

Photo: Jorge Fatauros
On this photo: Leigh Matthews, Karin Heyninck

Choreographer: William Forsythe

The American choreographer William Forsythe has recycled a ballet, as he called it himself at the time. He took a part from an earlier work, ‘Artifact’, and re-made this for a smaller cast. The result was ‘Steptext’, made for three men and one woman - instead of for two couples and another forty dancers.
'Steptext' differs entirely from the more detailed version. ‘Artifact’ had an anecdotal meaning - the theme being communication rituals – ‘Steptext’ has no story. At the most a suggestion of rivalry present between the men. Forsythe also created a different ending. In ‘Artifact’ the dancers gradually fade away from the stage; ‘Steptext’ ends with the group of dancers separating. They face each other with clenched fists. What matters most in ‘Steptext’ is the combination of movements, 'the text of steps'. Forsythe developed this work as sentences with words that belong together, flowing from each other with interruptions as if they were commas and full stops.