Kyr was commissioned by The Israel Festival and was the first piece created by Naharin after being appointed artistic director of the Batsheva Dance Company in 1990. The work is a collaboration between Naharin and the band Tractor’s Revenge (Nikmat HaTraktor). Kyr went on to become one of Naharin’s most renowned works. Perhaps the most iconic sequences in the piece features a rock version of the traditional song Echad Mi Yodea, traditionally sung at the Jewish holiday of Passover.
Kyr reflected an impression of Israeli life at the time of its creation, “with its lost values, lack of faith in the future, aggression and fractured human relations”, as an Israeli journalist wrote after the premiere. Kyr can be read as an allegory about an intensity that borders on insanity. The work is considered to have some parallels with Naharin’s life and his background.