We don’t always know what we are witnessing during a performance. As audiences, we need to be educated.

Nicola Galli’s Genoma Scenico • Metodo does this overtly. In this interactive work, a selection of cards is placed on a table in front of the performance space. The cards represent different potential building blocks of the performance, which, when ‘played’, will dictate the number of bodies on stage, the type of movement, the direction of travel, and the genre of music, etc. The audience is invited to select a combination and watch the result.

But all performance needs this education in a certain sense, if the audience is to fully experience the work’s intention. A street artist does not do their best trick first – we wouldn’t fully appreciate how difficult it is. No, first they will balance on a wheel. Then they will throw and catch one object while balancing on the wheel. Then they will juggle three objects while balancing on the wheel.

This showing of the building blocks, this set-up of parameters so as to highlight their subsequent development does not necessarily mean an escalation in skill or complexity. A spotlight – literal or figurative – must first be employed, elements carefully highlighted, so that we understand and feel what it means when they collide. In the opening of Sharon Fridman’s Go Figure, dancer Shmuel Dvir Cohen trails a hand on the floor as he circles around the stage on his scooter, which moves at a constant speed. This simplicity draws our attention to line and pacing, which are (beautifully) broadened when he is later joined by second dancer Tomer Navot.

Guiding the audience in this way can be tricky. Particularly as what may seem obvious to a choreographer or dancer after months of rehearsal – or years of practice – is not so for those outside of the creative process. But how do we appreciate flight if we don’t first see the jump?