Les Ballets de Monte-Carlo

The debut of "Les Ballets de Monte-Carlo" at The Joyce this week marks the company's first New York appearance in almost a decade, but Wednesday night's performance proved that the company's strong classical roots have not prevented it from continuing to be a resonant contemporary force.

Consisting of two abstract works by artistic director Jean-Christophe Maillot, the 120-minute program showcases the versatile talents of both choreographer and company. Although the company's repertory includes works by Balanchine and a host of other contemporary choreographers, it is Mr. Maillot's enviable ability to create and refine works on a handpicked, international ensemble that has shaped the precise, yet poetic style for which Les Ballets is known.

The program opened on a sacred note with "Altro Canto I", which premiered in 2006 and features costumes by Karl Lagerfeld and sets by Rolf Sachs. The title of the work, meaning 'on the other hand' in Italian, captures the themes of dualism explored in the piece -- to a mostly-Monteverdi score that Maillot says "creates harmony by juxtaposing opposites, bringing to...mind the masculine/feminine duality which makes up each person."

The melding of masculine and feminine is reflected in the androgynous costuming, as well as the casting and choreography. In the opening frame, the delicate and sylph-like Mimoza Koike, in men's trousers and pointe shoes, partners the sinewy Carolyn Rose in traditional feminine garb. The two women fluidly trade roles as they dance the interplay between power and vulnerability, periodically resolving in mirror-image sequences in which they appear to become one entity with two distinct halves.

Similar such groupings of both same- and mixed-sex dancers appear throughout the work, which features notable performances by J�r�me Marchand, Ramon Gomes Reis, and Bernice Coppieters -- long the muse of Mr. Maillot, and the very embodiment of the tensions at the heart of the piece.

First ascending as Jesus from the cross -- borne by men with hands cupped as if receiving communion -- Ms. Coppieters is later blown into the wings by Mr. Reis, as if she had no more substance than dust. Between her strong entrance and fragile exit, she blurs the line between these extremes in undulating lifts; then treads it tensely in a pas de deux in which she and Mr. Reis scarcely touch, yet remain magnetically connected.

"Altro Canto" ends with the ensemble in male-female pairs, drifting offstage in opposite directions, while reaching for one another as if yearning to be made whole. And yet, it is the union of diametric forces within each dancer -- masculine and feminine; artistic and athletic; classic and contemporary -- that gives the work its own sense of wholeness and harmony. As Mr. Maillot writes in a program note, it is a piece that "requires that the dancers go to the extremes of themselves...[.] They are the ones who write the poem."

More prosaic, but still pleasing was "Opus 40," Mr. Maillot's 40th work, which he created in 2000 as an "ode to youth" on the occasion of his 40th birthday. While American painter George Condo's vernal costumes and airy sets invoke the innocence of youth, experimental music by Meredith Monk -- alternately plaintive, ecstatic and guttural -- recalls both its pleasures and its pains.

Ms. Coppieters again features prominently in this work, opening with a solo in which she appears to be rapt with adolescent discovery, grazing the contours of her body and succumbing to the mysterious impulses that now move it. At one point she clasps her hands over her heart in what could be agony or elation, and shortly thereafter is in the throes of young love.

Mr. Roelandt, Mr. Marchand, and Ga�tan Morlotti join Ms. Coppieters in a dance of courtship, in which awkwardness and confusion emanate from trembling hands and chests heaving with what could be sobs or laughter. The next section finds Ms. Coppieters wandering fearfully among an ensemble of 10 men, who appear oblivious to her as they dart and leap, obeying the visceral demands of the music.

With innocence having passed, nostalgia creeps in as women sway languidly to incantations of simple joys -- coffee, birdsong, football. Marking another rite of passage, Ms. Coppieters then daringly perches on and plunges from her partners, appearing to have developed the confidence to love without fear.

The final section reprises the music and choreography from the first one, but this time Ms. Coppieters' movements are driven not by impulse, but by the influence of others. After so much manipulation, she folds in two, initially resisting the touch of a man who then helps her to stand.

Finally, though, she returns to nuzzle her head into his hand, allowing it to slide down her chest to feel his touch not with the bliss of youth, but with the wisdom that comes from its passing.