CHOREOGRAPHER John Scott lists numerous influences for his latest piece, Perfect State, which Irish Modern Dance Theatre is performing this week in the Project Arts Centre before a countrywide tour. These range from Gray's Anatomy and the paintings of Francis Bacon to Seamus Heaney's The Republic of Conscience, Yeats's Sailing to Byzantium and Maureen Gordon's Spindle, but it spoke most strongly to me of German expressionism and the paintings of Magritte.

Like most of Scott's work, it subverted everything. Each beautiful movement was followed by a grotesque pose, coats were worn back to front, legs went into armholes, faces were hidden under cloths or behind shells. Often this was ingenious, thought provoking or funny, especially when emphasised by sound effects or percussion by Rossa O'Snodaigh. Sometimes, however, it became fussy and repetitive until I longed for five such fine dancers as Orla McFeeley, Laura Macken, Aisling Doyle, Jonathan Mitchell and Matthew Skilton to be allowed to express grace and joy occasionally (as they did briefly towards the end) instead of aggression or humour, especially when moving to Bach's Brandenburg Concerto No. 2, or the more lyrical passages of Ciaran Farrell's fine score for recorded violin and cello, played by Alan Smale and David James.

Irene O'Brien's settings consisted of fencing - clearly electric fencing from the reaction of the dancers when they touched it - and her costumes varied suitably from the grotesque to the girls' sparkling black tunics, while the dancers were augmented by the athletic Robert Foley and Keith Walsh, both from Cork.

The enthusiastic reception of the piece suggests that the majority of the audience did not share my reservations.