Compagnie Heddy Maalem interprets Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring on Tuesday at the Providence Performing Arts Center as part of the ongoing FirstWorks Festival.

Film meets dance. Grace meets violence. Compagnie Heddy Maalem performs The Rite of Spring.

The one-hour dance concert, which is Tuesday in the Providence Performing Arts Center, is part of the ongoing FirstWorks Festival. The title is taken from the music for the production, Igor Stravinsky’s 1913 classical composition.

“I perceived a strange connection between this music and the city I found myself in,” said Heddy Maalem, artistic director of his eponymous company.

In 2005, Maalem, a French-Algerian, found himself in Lagos, Nigeria, a society of discord and violence. The inspiration for the piece started there, he said, but didn’t stop there.

The Rite of Spring may be African in appearance, featuring 14 African dancers, but, Maalem said, it’s universal in its application, of beauty both attracting and repelling.

“This dance is a spectacle that’s brought to people by other people, regardless of color. Color is not important. The fact that it is contemporary Africa is not important. It’s a human violence that I’m attempting to portray.”

The portrayal is juxtaposed with film, a series of images created by documentary filmmaker Benoit Dervaux. While the Stravinsky piece was originally composed for ballet and is typically performed to ballet, here the movements are modern and African.

For Maalem, a former boxer and practitioner of the martial art aikido, movement can be beautiful and violent.

“A manifestation of beauty is connected to death.”

You will not see jabs, hooks or uppercuts in The Rite of Spring. Maalem’s boxing background doesn’t inform his dance so directly.

“I’m using the fundamental relationship between the body, time and space.”

Maalem’s switch from boxing to dancing was gradual, starting 30 years ago, with aikido serving as the pivotal transition.

“My eyes began to open to new things. Aikido is philosophy in movement.”

— Bryan Rourke

Heddy Maalem was interviewed through a French/English interpreter, Lydia Beckon, the development director of FirstWorks.

Compagnie Heddy Maalem performs The Rite of Spring on Tuesday at 7 p.m. in the Providence Performing Arts Center, 220 Weybosset St. The show is preceded by a “JumpStart” show at 6:15 p.m. For tickets, $18 to $38, call (401) 421-2787 or visit www.ppacri.org.

Tomorrow, Compagnie Heddy Maalem conducts a few free community events. From 3 to 4:30 p.m. Hardo Ka, a company member, leads a master dance class, which the public is welcome to watch, at Ashamu Dance Studio, off the main green at Brown University, followed at 4:30 p.m. with Maalem joining Ka in a so-called “meet and greet.” At 7 p.m. in Salomon 101 at Brown University, Maalem will be joined by three Brown professors to discuss his work The Rite of Spring.

brourke@projo.com