Robyn Orlin doesn’t have a company of her own. The Berlin-based South African choreographer goes wherever her pointedly political brand of Pina Bauschian dance theater (episodic, comic, and communal), crossed with Wooster Group live-video excess, is wanted. The Garage Dance Ensemble in Okiep—mining territory 350 miles north of Capetown—wanted it as long as they didn’t have to “ask questions about our ancestors, our origins,” they explained wearily. Designated “coloured” (i.e., mixed race) by the apartheid regime, they have since watched their social status grow volatile. “We just want to say who we are and how we celebrate life.” Orlin went north and looked around her: “After the winter rains, the semi-desert soils are covered with a magnificent carpet of wild daisies.” In How in salts desert is it possible to blossom …, five of the Garage Dancers and the piercingly sweet a capella duo uKhoiKhoi are those flowers. Swathed in Birgit Neppl’s trademark raggedy layers, they bloom in unexpected ways. —Apollinaire Scherr