This was an evening which displayed Russell Maliphant's pre-occupation with light or the lack of it and the way in which highlighting only selected parts of the body can affect the look of the dances he makes. Also typical of this exceptional choreographer is his exploration of the ways in which two or more linked bodies can reach positions that would be impossible for a single dancer. Throughout his work dancers fall against each other, to be caught just off the floor, or, using cantilever techniques, lean away at gravity-defying angles.

One Part ll is a long and demanding solo for Maliphant himself, danced to movements from Bach keyboard partitas. Sharply illuminated on a black stage, it develops in a series of slow, fluid moves, broken now and again by fast turns on deeply bent knees. They are the dance equivalent of trills, but he is too subtle to place them where trills occur in the music, into which he entwines himself with increasing complexity. There are moves reminiscent of breakdancing and of martial arts, but the overall picture is of a beautifully-controlled, continuous flow.

At the unlit start of Transmission I thought the dancers were holding torches, but they were, in fact, placing just their hands into four narrow downward beans. This is another slow-paced work, full of interesting juxtapositions, a piece in which we see that the choreographer is more interested in the shapes his dancers make in combination, than in their personalities, which remain unrevealed in the gloom.

During the long opening section of the duet Push, which lasts an astonishing 35 minutes, Julie Guibert does not touch the ground. She begins on Alexander Varona's shoulders, winding herself around him in serpentine explorations, draping herself over him like a cloak, or riding high on his body like a charioteer. This is a remarkable piece which Maliphant made for himself and the legendary Sylvie Guillem. Guibert and Varona did it justice.