Dance: A reminder from mother earth

Akram Khan Company
Thikra: Night of Remembering
director & choreographer Akram Khan
visual director, costumes, set Manal AlDowayan
dancers Pallavi Anand, Ching-Ying Chien, Kavya Ganesh, Nikita Goile, Samantha Hines, Jyotsna Jagannathan, Mythili Prakash, Azusa Seyama Proville, Divya Ravi, Elpida Skourou, Mei Fei Soo, Shreema Upadhyaya, Kimperly Yap, Hsin-Hsuan Yu
music & soundscape Aditya Prakash • sound Gareth Fry
lighting Zeynep Kepekli • dramaturgy Blue Pieta
Sadler's Wells, London • 29.Oct-1.Nov.25 ★★★★

A collaboration between choreographer Akram Khan and visual artist Manal AlDowayan, this one-hour dance performance is a journey into an elemental past that plays on rituals, history and mythology. Watching it is an unusual experience, as there's the sense of a strong narrative in the action on-stage, even if the meaning remains tantalisingly out of reach. But the expressive movement bursts with humanity as it explores spaces between the past and present.

With an all-female cast, it opens with a leader standing atop a rock encircled by acolytes, as a young woman in white appears. This is an ancestral spirit, who returns to her tribe for one night to help them reflect on their existence. The story plays out in swirling dance scenes in which four key characters interact in a variety of intense ways, controlling and being controlled, sleeping and waking, echoing each other and leading the larger group into wider actions. While the show emerges from the ancient Arabian city of AlUla, it reverberates with pre-history along the spice route through Europe, Africa and Asia.

Choreography is sweeping and expressive, often involving the performers' long straight hair. Much of this is individualistic, but there are ripples of synchronicity that sometimes blossom into precise full-group sequences. Floaty costumes and the extended locks add to the flowing effect, with the four central figures standing out in white, black, red and burnt orange. So watching this is mesmerising, with impressive work from the dancers as they go through some seriously demanding movements. It's restlessly eye-catching, and darkly moving.

Intriguingly, this piece was originally designed to be staged outdoors, and it certainly has a primordial sensibility to it, transporting the audience out into the wilderness and back to the dawn of time. The set, lighting and swirl of music and sound create a strongly evocative mother-earth vibe. So even if we're never quite sure who these characters are or what they're up to, their interaction is both visual and emotional. And it speaks to our primitive souls.

For details, SADLER'S WELLS >

photos by Camilla Greenwell • 28.Oct.25