Festival de Coreografos.

Although I had previously seen the Costa Rican companies of Diquis Tiquis and Losdenmedium at the American Dance Festival in North Carolina, I was struck by the level of excitement, energy, and expertise at the Festival de Coreografos, or Choreographers' Festival, in San Jose this winter. This year's edition, the tenth, was dedicated to the memory of Graham dancer Tim Wengerd.

Seated in the 1897 baroque National Theater, I kept expecting to see royalty. Instead, I saw both tourists and locals taking in dances as colorful as a toucan's beak, fiery as a volcano, and black as the night jungle. Thirty-six works from Costa Rica, Nicaragua, Venezuela, Mexico, and the U.S. were presented.

Then, there was Lulu. She swayed, glided, and stretched in Sol Carballo's La Eterna Espera ("The Eternal Wait"). This well-crafted dance was not about waiting for Lulu, the python, to make a break for freedom. It concerned toe-tapping tedium, and the fidgety expectation of lives on hold waiting for love, or sex. The Compania Nacional de Danza cast included a rocking woman, a keytoting guard, and a bare-breasted snake handler.

Nothing poisons perception of a dance like unnecessary length. Though most of the offerings impressed, one evening of overlong dances proved especially tedious. The most interesting work on the program, Jimmy Ortiz's Sumo Hysopo (an untranslatable title), suffered from coming at the end of the evening.

Besides editing some of the dances for length, adding music credits to the printed programs would have been a plus. I recognized Louis Armstrong, whose version of "It Don't Mean a Thing" was used in Balada Para Locos ("Ballad for the Crazy") by Nicaragua's Indiana Ortiz and Roberto Estrada. Performed against a backdrop on which was scrawled "Stop Violencia!" this emotional work depicted people pushed to the edge but somehow managing to hold on.

An excerpt from Trazos del Delirio ("Design for Madness") by Costa Rica's Nandayure Harley and Luis Carlos Vazquez described a horrific future where people must live underground. White-coated dancers suggested nuclear mismanagement and megalomaniacal experimentation on humans.

Alejandro Tosatti's Pruebas para San Jorge ("Rehearsal for St. George") proved once again that Diquis Tiquis (the duo of Tosatti and Sandra Trejos) can use simple, repetitive, and sudden, strange movements to imply great drama. In Trejos's Tanatos ("Death"), Metzi Hovenga battled the ultimate foe, and had the bruises to prove it as she repeatedly slammed herself down on the stage.

Several of the other offerings were especially intriguing. Antares's bathing-suit-clad dancers offered Olympian breathing lessons in the fluid Azul Cobalto ("Cobalt Blue"). Ena Aguilar's use of a garden's worth of flower petals created a sumptuous, sensuous Naturalmente Tierras ("Lands, Naturally"). And Laura Perez created a sense of simpatico between two women in Ojala el Corazon... ("Pardon the Heart..."). The pair rarely touch, but when they do - fingertips connected for an instant - the effect is electric.

The festival ended on a note as high as an ocarina's with a program of three works: Venezuela's Rafael Gonzalez offered a gem, a colorful painting of movements in Cromos en Tiempo ("Chromes in Time"), while Rogelio Lopez showed every step of life as an Acto de Fe ("Act of Faith"). A dramatic work wound around an emotional theme, the piece concerns facing death from AIDS, and, in a larger sense, everyone's last dance on earth. Repeated use of a dancer, kicking up one heel in a running start, underscored this race for life. The final image burned as brightly as the row of candles that seemed to measure eternity as it extended into the wings. In one long line the members of Compania de Danza UCR rushed to the edge of the stage then stopped, faces frozen in fear, sorrow, and apprehension as they faced their own approaching deaths.

In four duets, Mexico's Benito Gonzalez and Evoe Sotelo appeared to be birds, bugs, and beleaguered humans who displayed great spunk as they weathered all forces sent to destroy them, including a man with a spray gun. Viva ("Long Life"), the title of one duet, could describe this talented couple's hopeful outlook on life and a dancegoer's wish to see more dances by them. Forty minutes' worth was not nearly enough.