I saw many dance shows before, especially in college when we had a per-semester dance project called “Berkeley Dance Project.” But among all these dance pieces, Eva Feng’s It’s not that serious is special. This piece is illuminating. I don’t give this type of comment lightly. To someone with a visual arts background, Eva’s piece first makes me feel that dance, like oil painting, poetry, installation, and animation, can be an art form. 

A group of six dancers maneuver around a venue with no music. They first break the fourth wall by staring at us and playing rock paper scissors with us. Then, guided by light, they gathered and walked around the space. They stood in two triangular lines, performing simple motions like bowing, raising hands, and turning around, alternating their pace while making sounds when their hands came into contact with the body. The motions got more fierce towards the end, as the dancers quickly shook their bodies, jumped off the ground or onto the ground, and stamped their feet. The piece ends when one dancer streams from the bottom of their heart, and they returned to the light. I have goosebumps even writing this — it is the perfect choreography of sonic events, motion, and expressions… oh wait… this is a dance piece after all! 

It’s unfair that the readers are barred with my limited vocabulary rather than experiencing the piece themselves. But anyway, it is illuminating how It’s not that serious plays with /e/motion and challenges the convention. 

In Japanese, the word “painting (絵)” makes the sound /e/. The wordplay gimmick (/e/motion) fits really well here — the dancers’ bodies are like painterly brushes to Eva, and through their motion, Eva draws out her extended portraiture, giving splashes of emotions to this world. Unlike traditional portraitures that embrace visual representations, in Eva’s piece, she is hidden physically but very much alive. Actions and emotions are suggested in relation to the environment, through playful interactions with the audience (curiosity), illusions of light (hope), slow maneuvers and bodily contact with the space (explorations), fierce gestures (questioning), and the eventual scream. Like how Deleuze and Guattari describe the notion of an “assemblage,” It’s not that serious is evolving and adapting based on the environment (both phenomenological — the venue — and ontological — Eva) and portrays the “self” as becoming, not being. Through the web of depicted events, I saw Eva’s emotions shift, accumulate, and explode, and wonder what’s next. What seems like a resolution in the end (the scream and the light) is in fact temporal, since the train of emotions will never be determined. 

I cannot help but compare this piece to one of my friend’s recent video essay pieces — a digital lawn made up with an ocean of graphical combinations of the letter “w,” while a Siri voice reads “w, w, w…” in a mechanical yet melodic rhythm. It might sound exaggerated if I say both pieces are like Duchamp’s Fountain to the entire art/dance world respectively. But to me, they are very much like that — challenging conventions and bringing delights to people’s hearts and (iykyk) smiles to people’s faces. Both challenge the fundamental notion of a medium. The “w” piece challenges conventional video essays that emphasize argument and clarity. Through simplicity, it opens a door to a(n) (double)image-making process stemming from pop internet culture — “w” as grass. 

Likewise, Eva’s piece is giving Marina Abramović’s Art must be beautiful… Artist must be beautiful…— a denial of traditional aesthetic comfort. The typical expectation of a dance piece is planned or curated rhythms, repetition, and music. However, like Alan Kaprow’s Happenings and Fluxus works, It’s not that serious pushes the ontological boundary of a dance piece — everyday movements like walking, jumping, and screaming are integral parts of the piece, while improvisation and sometimes accidents shape the uniqueness of each single performance. This piece celebrates and amplifies the human-ness of sound with the absence of music. What typically dissolves into music becomes the center sound piece of Eva’s work — the squeaking sounds when feet slide on the floor, the patting sound when hands touch the body, even the shaking sound of cloth as the dancers move around the space. The typical professionalism aesthetics devoid of disruptive “noises” are replaced with the celebration of “noise” and “mistakes” and part of the daily human experience that shapes Eva’s narrative. In a sense, Eva’s piece blurs the line between dance, performance art, and theater. 

It is so brave to break free from or challenge the conventions, or simply dare to do something different. You’d face so many cold shoulders and gazes. Oftentimes these are not commentaries on the quality of the work but simply because of how uncomfortable most feel to see the comfort zone collapse in front of their eyes. It is always wonderful to see someone making art that challenges the conventions. Underneath it all, it is always the disruptive inventions that push the human race forward. You can quote the people who dare to be different, disagree with them, glorify or vilify them, but you just can’t ignore them. Because they change things. After experiencing this piece, I am eager to see what’s next. 

©Copyright 2025-26 Sierra Zhang and Lonely Corridor Studio.