Akram Khan Company/ National Ballet of China The Dome, Brighton
Akram Khan's work displays multiple influences. Born in London, the choreographer, 34, trained in contemporary dance and the Indian Kathak tradition before launching his own company in 2000. A series of much-praised productions culminated in Zero Degrees (2005), created with Belgian choreographer Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and dramaturge Guy Cools. The piece explored identity loss in a globalised world and was followed by Sacred Monsters, in which Khan, Cools and Sylvie Guillem reworked the same notion in a lighter vein.
In Bahok, first performed in Beijing earlier this year, Khan unites dancers from his company with guest artists from the National Ballet of China. Again, the theme is identity loss and again Cools is credited as dramaturge. The location is an airport transit lounge whose information board flashes up notices like Delayed and Rescheduled as the performers bicker, soliloquise and otherwise express their mutual disconnection.
The dancing's great - twitchy, galvanic, exhilarating - but the framing material now looks formulaic and calculating. If Khan is to fulfil the promise of his early work, he needs more original subject matter
