Last night in the Great Hall of the Memorial Union the dance team Motion Sickness performed and hosted the Zombie Awakening Talent Show for students and supporters of the arts.

The group is composed of a variety of students who all have one thing in common — they love to dance.

To promote this passion, Motion Sickness has been hosting this talent showcase every semester since its creation over a year ago. A variety of acts were performed during the two-hour event. The talents showcased a wide spread of culture appreciation, from traditional Bollywood dancing to a more urban style of dance. 

Some of the featured performances were from groups such as Raas, Total Filmy and Bhangra. Solo and duet performers also were showcased on stage. 

One of the best acts of the night was a dance solo from Bohan Li. Li began his performance by rolling his body onto the stage while the audience waited in anticipated silence. A pause, then a techno beat began. 

Li busted a move to the music and brought up the energy with movements that were fluid yet sharp. Whispers of “crazy” and “look at him go” were heard amongst the crowd along with whoops and cheers. 

Bollywood Dance Club was also featured at the Zombie Awakening Talent Show. While this group performed a more traditional style of dance, they did incorporate modern hip hop that helped the audience connect to their show. 

The largest element that Bollywood Dance Club seemed to be missing was energy. Their faces looked strained at times and most of their movements were not together. 

The final act to close the show was a performance by the host of the event, Motion Sickness Dance Team. Motion Sickness themed their show “The Zombie Awakening” because of the recent popularity of zombies, according to Webb Kpor, the founder of Motion Sickness. 

The detailed costumes and makeup was impressive. Unfortunately, the lighting during the performance made it difficult to see the first few rows of dancers. About halfway through Motion Sickness’ dance the lighting was finally fixed so that all dancers could be seen.  

While the team walked on stage unnaturally like zombies, their performance was far from awkward.  Motion Sickness moved fluidly and swiftly, which is normally difficult for such a large group. 

This urban, Chicago-underground style of dance performed by Motion Sickness was crowd-friendly and fascinating to watch. The rapid and accurate movements of the team were striking and brought a great response from the audience, along with the dancers’ strong energy onstage.

“This style [of dance] is not native to Iowa,” Kpor said of his team. “People have to work very hard.” 

The Zombie Awakening Talent Show was a fun and interactive event that showcased the hidden talents of students here at Iowa State. I would recommend students to check out talent shows put on by Motion Sickness in the future.