Breakin’ Convention review: A bold, eclectic celebration of hip-hop dance theatre

Breakin’ Convention is back, and it’s on triumphant form: eclectic, curious, embracing the world. Now in its 19th year, the festival celebrates the range of hip-hop dance theatre, from bravura displays to fierce storytelling. It’s a show that spills across the building and beyond. You’ll see workshops and art exhibitions, kids dancing and drawing in the foyers, an afterparty at the O2, and a free outdoor Park Jam on the final day. 

After two years of pandemic restrictions, this festival feels particularly open and international. Dancers from Peru and the Czech Republic take bold and distinctive approaches, unpacking politics or twisting their bodies into surreal imagery. The show is curated and hosted by Jonzi D, who nods to local British politics, offers context, and brings a sense of celebration to the whole show. He’s matched by an exuberant yet sensitive sign language interpreter Jacqui Beckford.

Beckford offers sympathetic support to the searing Our Bodies Back, originally created as a dance film during lockdown. Poet jessica Care moore retells the story of a young Black mother who died by suicide, reframing her story with anger and compassion. Dancer Axelle “Ebony” Munezero twines herself around the words, to music played live by saxophonist Soweto Kinch. 

Many of the companies use live music, with bright chemistry between players and dancers. Cie Niya’s silky moves seem to echo the touch of the handpan player. One dancer wriggles at the feet of a violinist and rises almost into her playing space, as if the musician has conjured him up.

Mr Kriss, a dancer from the Czech Republic, gives his twitching movement the quality of stop motion animation. Wrapped in a blanket, he emerges into flexible, intricate lines – or makes the blanket dance by itself, darting about the stage. 

Imagine Perú, the dancers of D1 Dance Company, share their own stories, interacting with a video backdrop. In a segment about living with water shortages, a woman catches virtual water in a real bucket; when a dancer dies, their soul flutters on the backdrop. The company weave Latin rhythms through hip-hop dance, building images of community and vulnerability.

Antoinette Gomis’s Les Ombres follows its characters from the desert to the city and beyond. A traveller moves in rippling steps, echoed by a shadowy figure behind a scrim. When he emerges, he moves with sliding feet, as if struggling to keep his balance in sand. As the beat kicks in, the movement gets faster and harder. Dancers are caught in a narrow shaft of light, looking up – and projecting their dance upwards – as if calling from the bottom of a well. It’s a poetic end to a striking evening.