DANCE REVIEW : Bay Area Companies at Barnsdall

From expatriate Isadora Duncan to immigrant Ann Halprin, the Bay Area has always been a source of redefinition in modern dance. Gary Palmer (of San Francisco) and Mary Reid (of Oakland) honored that tradition in their companies’ shared program Monday at the Barnsdall Park Gallery Theatre.

Both choreographers probed and dissected that obtrusive mechanism of ‘80s postmodernism, expressive gesture. Palmer’s deadpan group piece “Stormy Weather” reflected composer J. Cloidt’s virtuosic deconstruction of the Harold Arlen classic in its parodistic emphasis on umbrellas, its mock-pretentious pantomime depictions of love, death, despair and the weather forecast.

To music by David Hodnett, Reid’s “Small Drama” (a solo for Jonny McPhee) detached expressive gestures from any defined expressive context, presenting them as isolated pure-movement motifs.

When McPhee touched her hand, arm and shoulder repeatedly, she invested the actions with as much intensity as if she were performing a dance-drama about a woman remembering a former lover. However, the moment remained free of any imposed interpretation, any literal content. Whatever it may have evoked, it signified nothing more than it showed.

In contrast, Reid’s quartet “Living in Linda’s Life” floundered in silly playacting about prom night rivalries, but compensated with its clever collage of signature-moves from vintage social dances--again, something new made from something familiar.

Reid’s solo “Simply Stated” (music by Robert Fripp) began in loose, colloquial arm-swoops--gesture in the abstract--with her feet merely establishing a percussive ostinato. Soon, however, the speed and complexity of the footwork escalated (in place, Laura Dean-style), with no loss of ease or precision.

Similarly, Palmer’s “Ignite” demanded (and received) remarkable technical surety from its six-member cast--but here the major challenge was partnering. Although he relied, at first, on cornball, static Expressionist pictorialism, Palmer soon unleashed his dancers in fluid passages unified by contrasts between individual and group statements and by inventive lifts suggesting many kinds of relationships.

Even more fascinating, perhaps: the score by Erik Walker, with its strong pulse, eerie textures and surprising use of exotic instruments and idioms.