INDance offers a distinctive platform for Australia’s independent dance sector, providing artists the opportunity to have their work professionally presented by Sydney Dance Company. Designed to showcase diverse small- to medium-scale works, the program connects independent choreographers with the company’s established audiences.

Both High Octane and Wet Hard Long present experimental contemporary dance from two of Australia’s leading independent choreographers, Emma Harrison and Jenni Large, each performing in their own work.

High Octane leans hard into the high-adrenaline culture of V8 racing, with the dancers wearing helmets and racing gear. The room is thick with smoke. A trio of dancers (including Harrison) move through the haze, revving the crowd with the same intensity as the engine sounds that fill the space. The effect is immersive and high-energy.

Harrison’s choreography draws from a wild range of references – wild dogs, ballets and cars. The performance is at its strongest when the dancers are locked in rhythm together. Some of the experimental choices – the dancers conversing about shopping at Supre – land less so.

The helmets become props as the dancers sit on them, staring the audience down, as though being interviewed post-race. The power dynamic then tips, with the dancers stepping on one another, heads protected only by the helmets beneath their feet.

The lighting design is a kaleidoscope that pulses from vivid 80s hyper-pink to naked sand and to alien green, each shift signalling a gear change in movement. A loud, relentless baby’s cry builds to the point of discomfort, then cleverly morphs into the sound of a revving engine. The mood shifts again: music and movement turn animatronic, a sexual edge creeping in before a wind machine tips the whole thing into comedy. The line between seduction and the absurd blurs.

The trio are relentless, frenetic and electric.

Wet Hard Long is an extended and epic iteration of Long’s 2022 Keir Choreographic Award-winning work. The original Wet Hard took home the People’s Choice Award. Here, she performs alongside collaborating partner Amber McCartney.

A silver two-pronged ladder gleams, two dancers hanging from its bars with a single bucket suspended between them. Below, the floor appears slicked with water. The scene and soundscape are high-pitched and eerie, setting a film noir, sci-fi, end-of-days mood to the piece.

Long and McCartney wear identical bland beige pants and tops. The plainness offset by sparkling arm stockings, a flash of fishnet on their legs and towering eight-inch platform heels. They move in an erotic display of entwining and curling into one another, before slithering across the floor snake-like. Their repetitive, mirrored movements become hypnotic.

They dip their heads into a bucket, teasing the audience, confirming the buckets contain water. From balancing on precarious heels to extreme slow-motion movements, their core strength is staggering, as they drop back, slowly tipping the bucket of water over themselves. The floor becomes genuinely wet. The dancers, drenched, spin and splash, moving in near darkness, which accentuates the reflective floor making it look like the stage is filled with water. 

With their teeth, they take hold of a rope, controlling the bucket. Moments that could be sexual become predatory, primal, alien. With dead-pan expressions, they stare down the audience, daring them to look or look away.

The deep, oily squeaks of the soundscape return, like a rusted tap being forced to release. The dancers work to the rhythm, bodies slapping against the hard floor, twisting and manoeuvring on top of, underneath, around and through the bars, and each other’s bodies.

Transfixing. Bold, provocative and daring.

Next up is 5 Arrows and The Butterfly Who Flew Into The Rave. Presented by Sydney Dance Company INDance is playing at Walsh Bay, Sydney until 9 May 2026.

Run Time: each performance is 55 minutes (no interval)

For tickets visit Sydney Dance Company