Will Rawls performs his latest solo work, Personal Effects, for Performa 15, combining athleticism, history, and space in a fully immersive performance art experience.

The piece opens on Rawls running. He runs around the basement sculpture space of Westbeth, home to the Martha Graham Dance Company. The space is brightly lit and worn down; the paint is chipping, the concrete floor uneven. Will Rawls is running. His running slows to a kind of forward moonwalk—his legs moving rapidly while this upper body glides evenly in spatial patterns. He raises the hood of his sweatshirt, removing his face as a factor.

His movement—as it evolves from running to walking to shuffling to ‘movement’—echoes faintly the styles and history of dance as we’d recognize it, and transforms it from motions learned into an identity in motions.

Rawls’ soundtrack is his own voice. Uttering sounds and guttural noises that, like his movement, come in and out of recognizability. A balletic fifth position here, an auctioneer’s call there. A Beyoncé video step followed by a song about taking out the trash. All cushioned by shapeless motion and syllable-less sound.

Rawls floats effortlessly between structure and fluidity, striving for the element of self, and successfully creating his own dance language that speaks—though it’s not always clear to the audience about what.

Performa 15 continues through November 22. For more information visit: https://15.performa-arts.org/calendar