Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker’s work En Atendant is a mindful, peaceful, and simple work where each movement is a resonating hum in accord with her conceptual decisions. Consistently inspired by music, Keersmaeker has in previous works played with music by The Beatles, Mahler, Coltrane, and Reich, but in En Atendant, Keersmaeker has moved further back in history, to the late 14th Century, a musical period known as Ars Subtilior, a polyphonic form based on dissonance and contrast.

True to form, Keersmaeker has used these complex musical forms to create a choreographic language that is both pedestrian and rich in abstraction. Though her development process is exacting and articulate, the end result is as meditative as the musical score, movement concurrently growing and receding with the ebb and flow of the music, led and abandoned by live performers on stage. Neither music or dance creates an entire piece, but there are stages within the work where one element overlaps and diminishes another. Neither is dominant, yet both are equally responsible for the propulsion behind the work.

In its initial incarnation, the work took place outdoors at dusk, in the courtyard of a monastery. The stage as Sadler's Wells has been well-manipulated to form a similar impression, the light fading to the back of the stage, the floor stripped bare, and a single rustic wooden bench for the musicians. The dancers, clothed in simple blacks, move with a solemn grace which exemplifies the exactingness of the movement.

The most physically exciting part of the work occurs when a line of dancers “explode” into simultaneous movement, forming trios and pairs, interlinking, shifting and moving through one another and the space. Individuality amongst the group, but not enough to break it is a fragile yet effective visual delight.

To create a piece which is calming and sophisticated, yet not boring, is a difficult line to create. Keersmaeker can teeter on the edge, but perseverance and understanding are well rewarded, for when you yourself become quieter, enjoying the movement and musical vocabulary that this choreographer can offer, an enticing and mysterious world await to be experienced.