It’s a summer evening in the Ivory Coast, in a suburb of Yopougon in Abidjan. A boxing ring stands in a hot alley, full of people and colours. Splendid-looking men and women decked out in formal attire crowd together. These night beauties and sapeurs are joined by groups of dancing bikers, jet setters, boucantiers (Coupé-Décalé artists) and DJs. Each outdoes the other in the ring in a display of movements from their respective cultures.

The outcome is Faro Faro, an ode to the multiplicity of everyday life, to energy and to collective power, by Ivorian choreographer, dancer and set designer Massidi Adiatou. It’s a delightful and fascinating choreographic oddity showcasing the virtuosity of these urban-inspired dances, celebrating fashion, swagger and the sape culture, and using movement to honour African cultural diversity. The show combines concepts that the choreographer used to create the “Maspros” technique, which mixes movements inspired by hip-hop, fashion and ostentation, enabling everyone to express their cultural diversity in the same collective work. It’s a way of being in a world that bursts into a fireworks display of urban dance, acrobatics, speed and virtuosity.