Turning Sadler's Wells inside out, No Body is an unprecedented undertaking for the venue – a series of choreography pieces without any performers. Dances without dancers. Instead, there's film, music, lighting installations and soundwalks of one of London's favourite dance venues. The result is a series of pieces that maintain the full immersive experience of theatre & dance, while completely challenging our traditional relationships with it. No Body features installations from Michael Hulls, Lucy Carter and Nitin Sawhney.

Lighting Designer Michael Hulls has created an astonishing piece of lighting work for No Body in collaboration with video designer Jan Urbanowski and composers Andy Cowton and Mukul. The audience are invited on stage and bathed in light, confronted with the experience of standing centre stage. We caught up with Michael Hulls to discuss the piece.

You've created a dance piece without any dancers.

Rather than a 'dance' piece I’d say it’s a lighting show that I've choreographed the lighting for.

How do you create a lighting work that captivates as much as dance or theatre?

I think you have to engage and captivate people with light in a different way to dance and theatre. You can stimulate the eyes, you can change how people feel but that's very different to how an audience can be captivated by a human presence on stage.

Your piece welcomes the audience to the main stage, where they are challenged by the intense ambience of your lighting, giving them a (potentially intimidating!) sense of what it's like to be a performer on the stage. How do you expect the audience to feel in this scenario?

Enchanted, engaged, excited, intimidated, released and relieved!

Lighting is an often overlooked artform, but the past few years have seen lighting designers being praised for their innovation as artists. Why do you think there has been this shift in outlook?

We live in an increasingly image orientated world. It's a cultural shift born out of the explosion of visual media and instant access to a huge range of imagery.

How do you think audiences' perceptions will continue to change?

I think people will be increasingly bedazzled by new technology – but then realise that without emotionally engaging with it, that excitement is ultimately empty of feeling.

What is your favourite space in Sadler's Wells? What is it that fascinates you about the space?

Unsurprisingly it's the main stage as it offers the greatest opportunity to work with darkness and theatre lighting, and has a flying system that raises and lowers the lights to whatever height you want from the floor to the roof 18m above!

No Body
7–12 June
Sadler's Wells
Rosebery Avenue, London, EC1R
More information and booking