The last time Sweden’s GöteborgsOperans Danskompani performed at Sadler’s Wells, in Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui’s Icon, they had three and a half tonnes of clay on stage with them, so this bold, cool and accomplished company are not afraid of a statement prop. This time it’s a dancefloor inclined at 34 degrees in Damien Jalet’s Skid. That’s a pretty steep slope, with graceful scuff marks on its white surface like fissures in a sheet of ice. A body emerges over the top and cedes to gravity, very slowly sliding, through a thick, swelling wall of sound by experimental electronic artist Christian Fennesz and Japanese composer Marihiko Hara.
Skid is an exercise in what can be done in this particular inhospitable terrain. Speed gradually increases, dancers start to tumble more intentionally and slide through each other’s legs. Then there’s the upward climb, a crouching march, the squeak of rubber soles digging in. We even get a naked body suspended on the wall in a kind of amniotic sac (or trapped in a pair of tan tights if you’re being less poetic about it). The idea of struggling against or surrendering to natural forces is a strong concept, but that drama doesn’t particularly materialise.
These versatile dancers surrender completely to the world of Israeli choreographer Sharon Eyal in Saaba. Her style is hugely distinctive, the dancers on demi-pointe as if wearing invisible heels, forcing the exaggerated curves of the body like a catwalk caricature of femininity except this is entirely androgynous, dressed in nude bodysuits by Dior designer Maria Grazia Chiuri.
It’s a weird, sensual, unsettling world. Often Eyal’s dance is soundtracked by dark, pummelling club music; this one starts with something more housey and fun. If you’ve ever lost yourself on a dancefloor, you’ll get the feeling of being swallowed by the tyranny of the beat. And yet there’s no abandon here, it’s tightly controlled, with something courtly almost about the dancers’ small, mannered movements.
This is dance that makes you marvel, at human bodies that seem like alien forms, that seem to have different voltages flowing through different parts of the body. It’s dance as a drug, that can feel intoxicating or numbing, and never quite as potent as the first time you experience it.
At Sadler’s Wells, London, until 13 May
