Sehnsucht/Schmetterling

Sadler's Wells Theatre, London EC1

THE full impact of Sehnsucht ("Longing") and Schmetterling ("Butterfly"), two dance pieces performed by Nederlands Dans Theater 1, is related to how well the dance expresses their exploration of the transformative power of love and the impermanent nature of existence.

Heavy themes indeed and these two works, created by Sol Leon and Paul Lightfoot, combine a swirling, refined classical choreography with a darker and more expressionistic movement language.

The level of intensity, sustained for long periods by the brilliant technique and characterisation of the dancers, comes not through the lovers' melodramatic duet in Sehnsucht — which has a curiously distancing effect — but in the cartoon-like capers at the beginning of Schmetterling.

Sehnsucht explores feelings of loss and separation in a confined space in which Parvaneh Scharafali and Medhi Walerski dance out the last moves of lovers who are constrained as they rotate within a massive cuboid room.

The hydraulics of the room turning, with dancers moving inside it as it turns upside down, creates an extraordinary effect.

Similarly in Schmetterling, set to music by indie rock band Magnetic Fields and contemporary composer Max Richter, the dancers appear in adjacent and conjoining spaces.

Yet this time the movement is distinctly oddball, with the focus on Ema Yuasa’s captivating portrayal of the wildly disturbed wanderer passing through mayhem in a landscape of dark light and skies.

Peter Lindley