Story
WE DANCE
February 21, the middle of winter. Athletic, sulky teenagers spring into the corridors of the Place-des-Arts station wearing white-striped black sport pants and light-coloured shirts. They don’t feel the cold and soon, neither will we. For three hours, we are treated to a celebration of the city and of movement as they dance on a treadmill that starts and stops, their motions attuned to the subway trains underneath. Those of us who happen to be passing by in our rush to cook supper or pick up the kids have stopped. We are transfixed and fascinated, swaying to the electronic beat of a soundtrack that shouts, slows down, speeds up, bellows and waltzes to the whims of the composer and choreographer, the witty elf and playful brown-haired Tintin, Jacques Poulin-Denis. He imagines a subway that runs along the entire island with stations everywhere from Pointe-Claire to Rivière-des-Prairies, a dream we thought impossible in the '80s. A voice says:
Next stations: Roxboro-Pierrefonds, Ville Mont-Royal, Beaconsfield and Pointe-Claire. Transfers to the Bright Orange, Brown, Gray, Pistachio Green and Purple Polka Dot lines. Connections to trains on the Flower line, Striped line, Safari line, Fluorescent line, as well as the Rainbow, Gold, Chocolate-coloured and Bright Pink lines.
A series of dancers on a treadmill. One dancer, out of breath, runs with flowers he will never deliver. A beautiful bald girl is wracked by nervous tics. A man in a hip hop trance dances to the chants of a voice naming imaginary stations and to the encouragements of a group of dancers gathered at the edge of the treadmill. Two dancers twist and bend around each other, and then she slips from his grasp, her unspoken anger barely concealed. Dancers cross paths, avoiding and ignoring each other or pretending they haven’t noticed, just as all commuters do. After all, the best way to deal with the lack of privacy on a subway train is to avoid eye contact.
Spectators flock to the camera, explaining how they identify with the dancers and sharing insights into their daily commute, revealing the poetry of a seemingly alienating experience.
Daniel Canty’s text oscillates between sound and movement, evoking every meaning of the word transport as his fantasies unfold. He dreams of an “unbreakable bubble” that could sail across the Lachine rapids, of an airboat gliding along the Canal, of cable cars swaying above Kahnawake, and of a “subway large enough for abandoned stations to exist”.
The extraordinary resides in the banality of an ordinary subway ride, and we see how daily routines can suddenly reveal their underlining whimsy, folly and fantasy.
Last stop. Thank you for travelling with Waltz.
says the voice.
It’s over.
They’re out of breath.
Thank you for the waltz.
