Nimbus keeps its cool, premiering works with visitors from Taipei

butterfly-dream-huang-yi-chu.jpgDancers Michelle de Fremery and Huang-Yi Chu perform in Xiao-xiong Zhang's "Butterfly Dream."

A spillover crowd packed the New Theater at Rutgers University on Wednesday to watch Nimbus Dance Works, from Jersey City, and the Taipei Crossover Dance Company as the two ensembles joined in the premiere of choreographer Xiao-xiong Zhang’s mysterious “Butterfly Dream.”

True, admission to the events in the Summer Series at Mason Gross School of the Arts doesn’t cost anything.

Yet, something more attracts people to dance in summertime. Watching dancers move, finessing every angle, feels like a way to escape the heat. Their lines are so crisp. Some of the freshness and vigor always rubs off.

Nimbus was at its coolest in “Puzzle Pieces,” a repertory workhorse choreographed by director Samuel Pott.

Even with red lights blazing, this dance maintains its distance. The women who begin the piece might be prisoners. Kneeling, they keep their hands behind their backs, and their faces are hooded. Yet the “hoods” are actually pieces of stretch fabric they will pull into aerodynamic shapes.

For all its subsequent intimations of desire and possession, “Puzzle Pieces” seems built around these design elements. The men’s ragged jumps animate fabric sewn to their sides, making the caplets flap like bat wings. The push and pull of encounters between men and women reflect the tension of the mesh stretched over the dancers’ heads. Ultimately, “Puzzle Pieces” is a formal exercise in which feelings as well as heads are veiled.

Twelve Rutgers students joined the cast of Pott’s “Memo,” including airborne Nicholas Sciscione in a principal role. This familiar work begins with a slideshow documenting the history of the host community, and incorporates slips of brown paper on which audience members scribble memories they hope never to lose. In five words or fewer, these essential bytes included “the feeling of true love” and “chocolate ice cream in July.”

An arm pokes through the paper backdrop, offering props to Masha Dashkina Maddux. They seem to come from another time and place, and she doesn’t get to keep them. Finally, the backdrop is torn open, and dancers raise an arm in farewell. Though heavy on symbolism, “Memo” touches all the emotions we associate with contemplating the past — from cherished fondness and delight to regret over irreversible losses.

“Butterfly Dreams” comes less freighted with materials, but its import is fuzzy. A slender figure in white briefs, Chien-Wei Wu lies slumbering, or watches other dancers interact. One group might be butterflies, walking proudly and flaunting bustles of colored tulle. A contrasting couple, Pott and Xiao-xuan Yang, are wearing dark jackets. Yet choreographer Zhang does not establish clear relationships between Wu and these characters. Pott appears to play a protective role.

What makes “Butterfly Dreams” absolutely captivating is the Chinese dancers’ movement quality, their stability when off-center and their subtlety in negotiating transitions. A choreographic phrase will unfold slowly, and then an image blossoms, suddenly complete. Dancers let themselves fall, only to land in perfect positions, their looseness concealing total control. “Butterfly Dreams” is both deliberate and wild.

Evidently the American dancers have not had much time to absorb Zhang’s style, yet it must take years to master this soft and evasive technique which seems rooted in martial arts. The fine cast also included Michelle de Fremery and Huang-Yi Chu; Yao-Ting Chang and Jackie Bulnes; Jean Paul Jr. and Sciscione.