The title of this duet, from New-Zealand’s Foster Group led by choreographer Sarah Foster-Sproull, is the literal English translation of ‘doppelgänger’. Various lore surrounds the notion of seeing your double, such as it heralding imminent death or echoing a lost state of twinship. Both of these ideas, along with a more general sense of the unearthly or other-worldly, permeate this fascinating and hypnotic piece, which examines the intimate relationship of two similar souls in all its beauty and ugliness. 

Dancers Tamsyn Russell and Rose Philpott begin gnarled together as one, naked from the waist up, almost like conjoined twins; an idea made more visceral by Andrew Foster’s score of amniotic sounds. After they separate, passages of mirroring follow, first gently harmonious, then growing into something more warrior-like as they take up more space around them, flinging their limbs and spreading their stances. There’s a Polynesian feel to the choreography sometimes, and an underlying sense of myth that holds the piece together even in its more exploratory sections. 

It’s these curious explorations, though, that make for some of the most striking choreography. Foster-Sproull’s eye for an image is mesmerising: both performers use their long hair brilliantly, at one point draping it forwards over folded arms so that their torsos become faces, with breasts forming bulbous sea-creature eyes. It’s a startling and ingenious piece of dance, thought-provoking as much in its visual creativity as in its ideas of female solidarity and competition.

Double Goer, Assembly @ Dance Base, until 27 August, 2.25pm.