Geography: Europe > Northern Europe > United Kingdom
Year: 2005
Produced by: Akram Khan Company | Les Ballets C. de la B.
Creative Team: Akram Khan & Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui | Composer: Nitin Sawhney | Dramaturge: Guy Cools
Synopsis: Zero Degrees was a beautifully crafted piece of performance art created by Akram Kahn and Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui. The collaboration was between the choreographers from two different countries; Khan is a British and Bengalese artist and Cherkaoui is a Flemish and Moroccan performance artist. The story behind the performance was based on an experience and trip that Kahn had been on where there were chaos and a death on a train through India. Khan discovers a dead body on the train to Kolkata (formerly Calcutta) and his cousin is fearful that he may be seen as being linked to the death because he is not of Indian heritage (Katrak, page. 108). During this event, the police did take Khan and his cousin’s passports and requested money for a bribe. Khan wanted to help the deceased man’s wife, but his cousin keeps telling him to not help, because he was a foreigner on the train. The reason why Khan and Cherkaoui focused on this story stems from a meeting where the two finally got together to work on a project. They were playing storytelling games where they would share a story that no one else heard, and this is what Khan spoke about during that meeting (Scherr,1). This event in Khan’s life became the catalyst of their performance the two choreographers would build together and tour.
Source: https://www.akramkhancompany.net/productions/zero-degrees-2005/