DANCE REVIEW : TRISHA BROWN: GLOSSY POST-MODERNISM AT UCLA

When Trisha Brown first danced at UCLA, nearly 11 years ago, it was in an unorthodox space (the ballroom of Ackerman Union) and with an unconventional, back-to-basics program. In “Group Primary Accumulation,” she and her four-member company proved that bold, formal, logical movement structures could be as satisfying to watch as the glamorous exhibitionism of ballet or the intense expressivity of modern dance. No longer.

At 50, Brown has become an institution--the wisecracking sibyl of post-modernism--and her work now seems as addicted to empty technical display, scenic spectacle, nostalgia and glamour as any dance form that she once rebelled against.

There she was, in Royce Hall on Friday, demonstrating and verbally celebrating her prowess in a virtual juggling act: alternating the low-key gestural processes of “Accumulation” with the expansive quicksilver lunges of “Watermotor” while concurrently telling two stories (Tale A intercut with B) of her past and present glories. It had grown too easy, she confided, to merely tell one story (or, presumably, to dance just one dance).

After this hollow indulgence came two group pieces capitalizing on her still-innovative sense of space and on the remarkable fluidity of her eight-member company.

Set against four slide-screens--with black-and-white Robert Rauschenberg images of rustic Americana cross-fading from one screen to the next, in a procession from left to right--”Glacial Decoy” (1979) explored horizontal space.

By placing four women evenly across the stage and in the wings, but only rarely showing us much of the peripheral dancing, Brown suggested that the choreographic scope extended beyond the proscenium frame, that we were seeing only a cropped center segment.

In contrast to this wide, rural perspective, “Lateral Pass” (1985) investigated urban verticality, with Nancy Graves’ scenic units descending and rising to redefine the areas available for dancing--and with one dancer hoisted up like Peter Pan for an airborne refraction of the floorbound dance motifs.

The emphasis on layering (in Graves’ asymmetrically ornamented costumes and her overlapping scenic units, in Brown’s group deployments and even to some extent in the bouncy pop music by Peter Zummo) heightened every new thing to be seen or heard: something as small as a sleeve on a dancer or as imposing as a network of metal or plastic tubes overhead.

Darting through wry mock collisions or freezing in perfectly balanced suspensions, the sleek, accomplished, ingratiating company and Brown herself (in isolated, guest star-style solos) created an abstract cityscape: glossy, glib and trivial for all its seductive energy and deft laminations. Soft in the center, Brown only at the edges.

Back to basics, anyone?