![\"\"](\"https:\/\/www.artsjournal.com\/dancebeat\/wp-content\/uploads\/2011\/12\/AJ-1-CoverBoy1_JulietaCervantes.jpg\" "\\"Photo:")
<\/a>Niall Jones, Paul Monaghan, Matthew Rogers, and Michael Ingle in Tere O'Connor's Cover Boy<\/em>. Photo: Julieta Cervantes<\/p><\/div> This dynamic formalizes and expresses the implications contained in the title. Yes, photos of any one of these four could grace the cover of a magazine for men. The performers also convey the wariness of the closeted gay whose desires are kept undercover, especially the desires of a boy just discovering his sexual identity. By extension, the sense of isolation they experience can afflict anyone (an artist in particular) who works outside the mainstream.<\/p>\n The ambience is both enigmatic and poetic. The set by Aptum Architecture (Roger Hubell and Julie Larsen) consists of a huge, white object suspended over the performing area in St. Mark\u2019s church; its shape is that of a set of hinged wings, with small, regularly spaced \u201cwindows\u201d pitting it (an airplane, a bat, a folded city building?). It could be plastic or cardboard; you can detect grommets and what might pass for rivets. This object projects a sense of lightness and slight awkwardness, especially at the beginning when the wings move slightly. Near the end, lighting designer Michael O\u2019Connor aims spots of amber, blue, and violet up through the apertures in this \u201ccover\u201d and spangles the walls above the church balcony. Meanwhile while traces of religious choral music filter toward an \u201camen\u201d in James Baker\u2019s richly textured. score for guitar, violin, other instruments (Baker is a versatile percussionist), muffled noises, and the dancers\u2019 voices muttering or singing. Ingall and Jones embracing, Monaghan (center), and Rogers. Photo: Julieta Cervantes<\/p><\/div> Immediately after the opening moments, the dancers turn to face outward and are hurled fiercely back by imagined forces or individuals that they rise to confront several times. Once, the \u201cblows\u201d knock the wind out of them; the next time, they laugh. Over the course of Cover Boy<\/em>, they can be giddy, sober, horny, puzzled, unsure. Once, after Rogers has performed a remarkable solo, the others want to catch him; he roars, screams; they grapple. You can\u2019t be sure whether they\u2019re helping him or bullying him.
\nOne of the most intriguing things about Tere O\u2019Connor\u2019s Cover Boy<\/em> is its overall rhythmic structure. During the hour it takes the piece to unfold, the movements of the four performers (Michael Ingle, Niall Jones, Paul Monaghan, and Matthew Rogers) set up subtle interplays between asserting and backing off, between attacking and melting. <\/p>\n
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\nThe men\u2019s behavior veers between the enigmatic and the quotidian. They enter taking jiggly baby steps, with one foot leading the other, then back up to the four corners of the dancing floor, where they undulate their arms dreamily and make soft gestures as if molding a piece of air between their hands (these will recur). They look tentatively around, perhaps recognizing one another, perhaps sensing a common bond, and begin to converse quietly. The speaking too will recur; it seems anchored both to the choreographic process and to the here-and-now. At one point, Monaghan approaches the other three, apparently commenting on his costume. Another time they agree that they\u2019ve done something well. The fact that we can rarely hear what they say adds to the impression of clandestine encounters.<\/p>\n
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