Dance tells stories of urban and rural life

The Southern Theater stage is transformed into a pastoral landscape threatened by the concrete jungle for Black Label Movement's "Field Songs." Carl Flink's physically demanding choreography unfolds on freshly laid sod, and the dancers, grass-stained and dirty by the work's end, offer an alternately joyful and sobering glimpse into the ever-shifting boundaries between urban and rural ways of life. The thought-provoking piece is equal parts cultural commentary and political statement, punctuated by interludes of grace and violence.

"Field Songs" opens with Kaori Kenmotsu planting single blades of grass in a box surrounded by a gray environment. Behind her, eight company members step onto the sod, breathe deeply, pull on their work boots and commence movements that recall farm chores -- threshing, planting, chopping -- but soon their mundane gestures develop into something more idiosyncratic. Pent-up energy, not to mention despair and defiance, manifests itself through pounding fists and playful roughhousing, all fueled by memorable foot-stomping music played live by local roots-rockers the Jinnies.

Although parts of the piece are built around structured improvisations, the performers unite as a tightly knit group engaged in an unorthodox square dance. They initially embody the stoic personas of those who work the land, but they soon transcend stereotypes, and as the world around them becomes less certain they become wilder and more unpredictable in their relationships to one another. There's much to ponder in this fascinating yet startlingly fragile emotional landscape cultivated by Flink in collaboration with his courageous dancers.

The program also includes works by company members Leslie O'Neill and Edward Bruno Oroyan. O'Neill's "Trigger," a 2009 solo for Emilie Plauché Flink, plays out as a gothic mystery. With her stuttering steps and gnarled hands, Flink is like an apparition, but later she's a disturbed figure slithering around an abandoned swing set. This short work is long on intrigue and begs for a sequel. Oroyan's 2000 effort "Golf Ball Hunting" is the dance Quentin Tarantino would want to make. The performers literally bounce off the walls, jump like ninjas, and go fast and furious from beginning to end. In short, it's a blast.

Flink's "Lost Lullabies" (2004) and a short version of 2006's "A Fractured Narrative for a Sad Ending," both well interpreted by the cohesive company, round out the evening.

Caroline Palmer writes regularly about dance.