INTERNATIONAL DANCE DOMINATES AT LINCOLN CENTER.

THE GRANDLY DIVERSE Lincoln Center Festival, held July 11-30, will mark its fifth year by offering more dance companies than ever before. In addition to the Bolshoi Ballet, New Yorkers will be treated to Belgian choreographer Wim Vandekeybus's company UltimaVez, France's Companie Mathilde Monnier, and the homegrown Alvin Alley American Dance Theater and Bill T. Jones/Arnie Zane Dance Company. In addition, the French circus Les Colporteurs makes its New York debut, and choreographer/composer Meredith Monk will perform a variety of her musical compositions.

Festival executive producer Nigel Redden spoke animatedly about his combination of new and familiar. He called Vandekeybus's new work, In Spite of Wishing and Wanting, "a series of ruminations about being a man; the worries, the nightmares. The telling image is an explosion of a feather pillow, a rainfall of down feathers." There's aggressive dancing for the eleven-man cast, and also theatrical dialogue in English, French, Arabic and Italian. With original music by David Byrne, Wishing is such an affecting dance that one European journalist wrote, "It's as if we are dreaming their dreams."

As part of its focus on cross-cultural connections, the festival presents Monique Monnier's Pour Antigone, a choreographic encounter between Sophocles' heroine and traditional African dance. Monnier found that the Sophocles story of a young girl defying the king's orders resonated in Burkina Faso, where she went looking for dancers. Monnier chose five dancers from Africa for "their power to let themselves go." In Pour Antigone she does not attempt to blend western and African traditions, but allows each to assert itself. The set is a corrugated tin wall and a broken car seat.

The nouveau cirque group Les Colporteurs presents Filao, a one-ring spectacle of lights, motion and sound. The French newspaper Liberation raved, "Aerialists, illusionists, high-wire dancers and musicians debate and challenge each other between earth and sky to the rhythm of a thrilling musical score." This is the company's first New York City appearance.

While the festival is expected to bring in exciting new groups, Redden said, "We're not about discovering all the time, but rediscovering in different spaces." He's eager to see the Alley company at New York State Theater (a vast stage compared to City Center, where they usually perform) and to give Meredith Monk three different spaces--the LaGuardia High School concert hall, the New York Society for Ethical Culture and Alice Tully Hall--in which to perform excerpts of her music, which dates back to the early '70s. LaGuardia will also host Ultima Vez, Companie Mathilde Monnier and Bill T. Jones, who will perform his acclaimed solo The Breathing Show and his new evening-length work You Walk?