Six short dance pieces choreographed by members of the Hofesh Shechter Company were presented in the intimate space of The Old Market.

Being close-up meant you could feel the intensity oozing from the five staged pieces, all of which conveyed a unique take on the expressiveness of dance, movement and physical theatre.

The sixth piece – a film featuring a single dancer emerging from a forest into a street full of bemused people - was no less visceral. The movements were insect-like and the expressions hinted of mental illness but you were never quite sure what was going on behind the eyes.

There were ideas of isolation and oppression behind much of the choreography but also plenty of times when you were left guessing at the emotions being expressed, which of course was the whole point.

The final two pieces – Skinship by Kim Kohlmann and Pandemonium by Bruno Guillore – involved two pairs of performers at the top of their game.

The former piece seemed to be exploring the tangled web of relationships and the latter took us back to humanity’s dark and brutal origins, seeking out the boundaries between the “animal” and the “human”. Clearly the passage from our jungle ancestry to wherever we might be now has not been an easy ride!