BEARING urns, glasses and other receptacles filled with water, one by one the dancers entered the stage and weaved their way across it to fill a big container.
It was held in one corner, jealously even, by a sole performer.
Some dancers poured their water with menace, others even spat into their receptacles as they drained out the water into the container. Others did the emptying with what seemed like sorrow.
It was a riveting start, made more emotional by the various expressions fleeting across the main container holder's face, Haiqal Zulfitri, as he effaced himself before the other dancers.
One slow performer was overtaken by another, in what seemed like derision on the latter's face over such laggardly progress across the floor.
Performing a full-length dance for Aswara's annual Jamu showcase, 11 students dressed in T-shirts and shorts, flowing clothes, and other pedestrian outfits gave their best in an emotive, and sometimes very physical performance.
They were chosen from an audition of 30 student dancers, and had trained for about three months for this showcase which ran over a recent weekend.
It was a contemporary offering, with an eclectic choice in music that lent depth to some parts of the show.
The showcase of the dance faculty of the National Academy of Arts Culture & Heritage (Aswara) was special as it was its first full-length piece since Jamu started in 2001.
Previously, the showcase was of a mixed bill of special curated dances by the Aswara lecturers, running up to 15 minutes or so per piece.
This Jamu 2024 had five Aswara Dance Faculty lecturers and one from Aswara's Centre for Foundation Studies in Creative Arts working as a unit to present a full-length dance with Umesh Shetty and Datin Marion D'Cruz as adviser.
The choreographers were Safini Jafar, Yunus Ismail, Faillul Adam, Murni Omar, Baizura Ghani and Hafzal Aziz.
Water was obviously an element that meant something precious in the dance.
The dancers fought over it, and revelled in moments of discovering common joy and sometimes tension with it, through it.
Sometimes, the sequences were beautiful to watch, as when dancers moved in a sarong with one trapped beneath it.
The effort and energy expended by these dancers was keenly felt as they focused on maintaining strength, and balance.
The Black Box stage was used in all corners, with minimal props, those being urns, jars, and other receptacles that the dancers gracefully swayed their way, or sauntered, or crawled even and left on one side of the stage.
Lighting and stage management by by Tan Eng Heng lent the scenes depth, highlighting some dramatic moments as when the dancers moved as one corps as if acting against a threat from the unseen.
Some of the segments did start a little too slow after the lights went down, leaving a slight loss of tension.
As the dance built momentum, you are carried along by the cohesiveness of the fluidity in movements.
It seemed as if the dance spoke of disparate people finding commonalities in each other, till finally came the sharing of the water, as if in knowledge gained, with the audience.
It was almost a cathartic end to an intense show.