Washington University Dance Theater explores the life cycle of movement in its upcoming performance, entitled “Shifting Limits.” The program consists of six works from different choreographers, showcasing ballet, tap, modern and West African dance forms. Each piece expresses a different aspect of movement, using fluid mediums like ballet to portray the ephemeral nature of dance and percussive tap dance to demonstrate the fleeting nature of a moment.

Cecil Slaughter, the program’s artistic director and a senior lecturer in dance, explained the process of choosing the themes for WUDT’s performances.

“Every year is a challenge to push ourselves, building off what we’ve already done, and that changes every year because [our] vision is different every year,” Slaughter said.

For this year, faculty and choreographers wanted to focus on pushing the boundaries of dance in the present moment.

“In any way it is made, dance art must live ‘in the now,’” the program’s study guide says.

One of the pieces, “Now, Here, This,” directed by David Marchant, a performing arts professor, is composed and improvised by the student cast, though many of the pieces were choreographed, including Slaughter’s, with the dancers’ input in mind. While the effects of the Syrian Civil War on the Syrian people and their far-away American counterparts initially inspired Slaughter’s piece, his concept changed once he started working with dancers in the studio.

“Dance is in the moment, so each moment is different,” Slaughter explained. “As I was working with the dancers, it was much more immediate about what was happening in the studio.” His piece shifted its limit to a work about the effect of external consciousness on internal strife, “like stream of consciousness.”

“Especially with dance, you have to just let it wash over you,” Slaughter added.

Complementing Slaughter’s theme of thought process, the program for the performance asks that audiences take in the dances during the moment they happen and then let them disappear in order to “make way for the next.” WUDT encourages that audiences feel “every fall and turn” of “the dancers constantly shifting at the limit of the present moment.”

Washington University Dance Theatre will run in Edison Theatre Friday, Dec. 6 and Saturday, Dec. 7 at 8 p.m. and Sunday, Dec. 8 at 2 p.m. Tickets are $10 for students and can be purchased at the box office or online.