Via hearsay, I learned about Open Space’s Summer Soup several years ago: It was said to be a fun ride, an eclectic mix of offerings designed to show the young organizations’ style, talent and relationships with other dancers in the community. It was something I had always wanted to see. Having missed my scheduled review of the company’s spring show due to a bout of illness, I got my chance to get a taste of Summer Soup this August.

On Friday, August 16, I came to Oregon Contemporary, Open Space’s partial home, for the show. I passed through one of the galleries, decorated in pool-party decor and full of bubbly patrons, grabbed a drink at concessions and then settled myself into a seat in the Disjecta Studio, where Open Space holds classes and often performs.

As the audience bustle settled, Artistic Director Franco Nieto—who also graced the stage as a performer that evening—and Executive Director Charlene Hannibal stepped up to greet the audience and share some exciting news: Two hours prior, they had officially gotten word that Open Space is now a nonprofit.

Open Space had been fiscally sponsored up until this point, with Oregon Contemporary lending its 501(c)3 status to help take in tax-deductible donations. As Hannibal noted, with its own nonprofit status, Open Space would be able to spread its wings and fly on its own a bit more. Nieto also explained that the show would feature work from Open Space’s professional company as well as its sister company LED Boise, choreographed by Lauren Edson. 

“Upstairs Neighbor,” choreographed by Nieto in collaboration with the dancers of Open Space, opened the show. It is difficult to overstate the presence of the fog machine throughout this evening’s bill, and it kicked off the performance by spraying a burst of fog into the space, just before Annie Borden—dressed in a green suit complete with open jacket and taped chest— and Ariel Clarke—wearing a plaid skirt and puff-sleeved top—started their dance.

Gender play was apparent in both costuming and the blurry spectrum of masculine and feminine energy that ran through this vigorous, abstract duet. Borden performed with sharpness and precision, accented by a slick-back hairstyle, lifting Clarke up high. Meanwhile, Clarke danced with more overt emotionality, jumping from lying to kneeling in one fell swoop. The dancers pulled up a line of green tape that had divided the center of the space. This removal of a false barrier invoked more intricate partnering—an application of strength and physics that seemed to unfold organically. The piece ended abruptly, leaving the audience to guess the fallout of these dancers’ exchange.

After another puff of fog, street dancer NØIR took the dance floor to perform an improvised solo, drawing on his wealth of experience in Hip Hop Freestyle, Popping, and Animation, among other styles. Contemporary dance performance, to be sure, often draws heavily on the syntax of street and club performance, and NØIR’s solo allowed for this to distill into the space. He wore a black turtleneck and baggy pants that added texture to his movement..

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Watching NØIR intricately articulating his joints reminded me that sometimes the most pleasurable dance to watch is a dance that shows me what is happening, rather than hazing me with grandiosity. He executed a seamless Aikido roll and moved with elegantly through creative trajectories between standing and floor work. The sophistication of NØIR’s improvisation offered a strong counterpoint and context for the rest of the program, making it a standout.

A group of dancers dressed in blue cheekily delivered some set material—a rug, a table, four chairs, four glasses, and a jug of milk—for the next performance, “MILK,” and then left. This work, choreographed by Lauren Edson of LED Boise, was set on Borden, Clarke, Nieto and Jordan Isadore.

This cast of four danced groovily in their red-accented ’50s style outfits to start the piece. Then, one by one, three dancers launched themselves toward Clarke, grabbing at her in a way that elicited my own feelings of discomfort. Other partnering moments in this work felt strange, as if the dancers were testing a series of experiments – for instance, when the cast rotated Nieto on his head by his upright legs.

Eventually the ensemble paused around the table. With a blank stare Clarke overfilled a jug of milk, and then Nieto and Isadore engaged in a moment of violent physical altercation. While stunningly danced, “MILK” waxed at once unsettling and a little too familiar, pulling from the trope of the ’50s housewife, or, in today’s lingo, the tradwife. Conceptually, however, I see merit in the return to this theme. After all, how far have we really come as a culture in family dynamics, still rife with gendered violence and unrealistic expectations? 

After a brief intermission, the evening concluded with “An Arm and a Leg,” a boisterous ensemble number by Lauren Edson featuring seven dancers—the ones from the earlier scene change dressed in blue—who represented from both Open Space and LED Boise: Audrey Wells, Cassidy Fulmer, Cardin Chung, CJ Hankins, Cydney Covert, Elise Gonsalves, and Nell Rollins. The work demanded that the dancers both vocalize and move experimentally, employing wordplay of binomial pairs to explore the limitations and potentials of language. It began and ended with the fanciful Joni Mitchell song “Both Sides Now.” 

So many things happened during this performance: The dancers debated the choreographic merits of “this or that” whilst manipulating passive Covert into different positions. Wells ventured on a winding interrogation and unraveling of the phrase “ladies and gentlemen boys and girls.” Rollins mystified with electric side-eyes while trying to dance “dysfunction” as per demanding cues from self-appointed director Fulmer. Toward the piece’s ending, Chung unleashed a vocal and physical fit of equal parts abandon and prowess.

Some of the prolonged dancing during “an arm and a leg” left me a bit lost, struggling to connect the dots back to the ideas that had been so adeptly teased out in previous sections. But on the whole this work illuminated the mastery of Edson in choreographing theatrical dance, as well as the dancers’ skill in performing it. As the conclusion to this eclectic program, this work typified the dynamic talents of Open Space and their extended community. If this evening was any indication, this young 501(c)3 will be cooking up exciting Summer Soups for audiences for a long time to come.

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