ImPulsTanz: Trajal Harrell. Sister or He Buried The Body

Trajal Harrell is known for his interventions into already written stories and histories – be it the imaginary meeting between the Judson Church postmodernists and the Harlem ballroom scene in (M)imosa, or Maggie The Cat, his adaptation of The Cat on a Hot Tin Roof, in which he turned the spotlight on the Black servants disregarded by Tennessee Williams. In his solo Sister or He Buried the Body, too, he finds realness in fiction: here, butoh originator Tatsumi Hijikata not only encounters Katherine Dunham, pioneer of Afro-American dance, but Harrell declares them siblings. Once again, he proves his extraordinary talent for untying historical and aesthetic knots while closely interweaving what, at first glance, seems disparate.