Summarize this content to 2000 words in 6 paragraphs in Arabic Unlock the Editor’s Digest for freeRoula Khalaf, Editor of the FT, selects her favourite stories in this weekly newsletter.A woman stands centre stage in a faint spotlight. Her empty hands tweak and caress the air around her: conjuring objects, expressing emotions, telling stories. She is Kapila Venu, mistress of the ancient Indian mime form of kutiyattam, and her skill lies at the heart of Akram Khan’s Gigenis: The Generation of the Earth, which had its UK premiere at Sadler’s Wells on Wednesday.Originally conceived as a straightforward showcase for Indian classical dance virtuosi, the piece evolved into a loosely structured narrative about love, death, war, the universe and everything. The touchstone is the Mahabharata. The ancient Indian epic was staged by Peter Brook in 1985, in a legendary nine-hour production which toured internationally and featured (from 1987) a 13-year-old Akram Khan. The narrative line of Gigenis is not always clear but there are frequent vague allusions to the dynastic conflict that runs through the Mahabharata with Mavin Khoo and Khan himself as two irreconcilable brothers.The simple staging surrounds the performance space with three lines of programmable lightbulbs which flare or flicker above the low platforms housing the seven musicians. The painfully amplified sound mix includes great rolls of thunder, clanging bells and an intermittent voiceover stressing the feminine world view: “In another time, I was a daughter and then a wife and then a mother.” The live score is dominated by Kalamandalam Rajeev, seated upstage with his copper mizhavu, traditional accompaniment for kutiyattam dance theatre. His fantastically complex rhythms feed (and feed off) the flying feet of the dancers: part percussion, part applied maths.The movement has been co-devised by Khan’s collaborators — all stars in their own fields. In a recent interview with the FT, Khan acknowledged that his work with English National Ballet had reminded him of the importance of the traditions encoded in a dancer’s muscle memory. Rather than homogenise his performers into a contemporary fusion, he has highlighted and celebrated their very different styles. In a sublime early sequence, Kapila Venu summons up a memory, her fingers seeming to pull a love letter from the air while bharatanatyam specialists Vijna Vasudevan and Renjith Babu flit flirtatiously around her, the embodiment of her long-ago courtship. At once playful and profound, this happy dance is a delicious mix of contradictions: grounded footwork, weightless pas de chats and ditzy parivahitam head-wobbles.There is a recurring coronation motif in which power is conferred (or stolen). Hyperflexible fingers are curled together as if cradling an invisible ball and the unseen “crown” is then put in place. During the final power-grab Khan crushes his peaceable brother Khoo, but as his crowning fingers hover above his head the right hand refuses to cooperate, repeatedly pulling away and triggering a sustained solo that shows us a body at war with itself. Khan, 50 last birthday, had originally intended to simply shape and curate Gigenis but could not resist joining the dance. Last Wednesday’s performance proved that he was right to change his mind.★★★☆☆To November 24 then touring, akramkhancompany.net
