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Reviews/Dance; Swiss Institute Bill Belies Stereotypes By JENNIFER DUNNING Published: May 28, 1989 SIGN IN TO E-MAIL PRINT
The program of dance presented by the Swiss Institute on Thursday night would have surprised anyone who thinks of the Swiss as a relatively sedate lot. To start, there was a bit of agreeably zany fun called ''Swiss Export,'' choreographed by Elfi Schafer-Schafroth. And there followed a knockabout Afro-Swiss-American ritual called ''Lines,'' choreographed by Estelle Eichenberger. Miss Eichenberger has set her dance to percussion music and chants composed and performed by Tiye Giraud, Pamela Patrick and Cooper Moore, who wind through the stylish roughhousing. Moving in and out of lines and communal circles, the dancers build to an explosively high-energy finish, their bodies painted with brilliant color and patterns created by Erik Schurink's slide projections. There are also glints of sensuality and fear in the dance. The piece was performed by Miss Eichenberger and Lisa Hoffman, Wendy Joseph, Beth Klarreich, Amy Pivar, Nefretete Rasheed, Shirley
Vincent and Maya Winter. Miss Rasheed also created and performed some of the chants. In ''Swiss Export,'' a young dancer is reminded of a national Swiss dish as she moves through a ballet exercise called a fondu. Nostalgic for her home country, she talks of how the dish is made, and two dancers break away to play the roles of wine and cheese. Soon all are dancing a kind of balleto-maypole dance, entwined in Gruyere-colored strips of stretch material that finally knit into what the program notes solemnly describe as ''a treacherous spider's web.''
The dance is slight and not terribly sophisticated, but the sweetness of its humor makes up for that. Herbert Blaser stands out for his understated humor as the lone male in the class, whose nibbling on the ribbons leads to disaster. The cast was completed by Susanne Braun, Gabriela Luthi, Anke Menzel, Miss Schafer-Schafroth, Barbara Schonewolf and Ursula Scherrer, with Regan Ryzuk playing the piano. The music was composed by Mr. Ryzuk, Andreas Vollenweider and Franz Hohler. The program was part of the institute's commendable yearly series of dance and performance by Swiss artists. Â