Bangarra's Yolande Brown. Credit:Greg Barrett But Topp was good, receiving critical acclaim for her Bodytorque works Trace in 2010 and Scope in 2011. Her latest piece of choreography, Tinted Windows, explores the divide between dancers known for their physical prowess and those who are great storytellers and features costumes by fashion designer Toni Maticevski. It is one of six new works in the national ballet company's latest Bodytorque show and one of two by female choreographers. But Topp and Halaina Hills, whose debut work Mode.L is based on Stravinsky's Octet for Wind Instruments, are rarities in the world of ballet choreography, which continues to be dominated by men. Bodytorque aside, the Australian Ballet has not had a new work by a female choreographer on the main stage since it presented Meryl Tankard's Wild Swans in 2003. A similar situation exists in Britain where the Royal Ballet has not commissioned a major new work by a woman in 14 years. The last main stage work by a woman for the English National Ballet was Cathy Marston's Facing Viv in 2002, according to Britain's The Telegraph. The lack of female choreographers concerns the new artistic director of the English National Ballet, Tamara Rojo, who said ballet was dominated by a male perspective.

Bangarra's Jasmin Sheppard. Credit:Greg Barrett "Very often we see relationships approached from a male perspective. Like in porn, it shapes the way you look at things," she told Time Out magazine. Rojo said men took a more physical approach to ballet, while "I find women start with the emotional landscape''. ''They say, 'This is the situation, let's find a language for it'.'' Rojo suggested the career interruption caused by motherhood, as well as the type of self-doubt expressed by Topp, were two reasons women were under-represented in ballet choreography. Likening ballet to pornography might be a headline grabber but the Australian Ballet's artistic director, David McAllister, concedes that gender plays a part in choreography.

''I do think there is a sense of emotional vulnerability and intensity that female choreographers have that sometimes is not so evident in male choreographer's work,'' he says. He believes women approach the creative process differently. ''Men can be a little bit more slapdash where women are more into detail and correcting a lot of detail along the way.'' But McAllister says he does not believe women in ballet are butting heads with a glass ceiling. After all, many of his predecessors have been women, including Dame Peggy van Praagh, who was the founding artistic director in 1962 and led the company until 1974 and again in 1978; Marilyn Jones, who was artistic director from 1979 to 1982; and Maina Gielgud, who led the company from 1983 to 1996. McAllister says the heavier workloads of female dancers may put a brake on their choreographic ambitions. The dancing burden in classical ballets such as Giselle, Swan Lake and La Sylphide falls heavily on the ballerinas. ''I have a theory that women in a ballet company are so busy all the time,'' he says. ''They work a lot harder than the men because of the repertoire. Women are featured a lot more in classical ballet productions. The men have more time to sit around the dressing room pondering creative ideas.''

McAllister says courage is also required to stand in front of a group of dancers and ask them to perform new movements. ''Usually guys have more chutzpah,'' he says. ''When women do decide to choreograph they come up with interesting concepts and are much more considered. Men tend to go where other people fear to tread and with more abandon.'' First-time choreographer Hills agrees but says there may be other factors at play. ''Creativity is not encouraged enough in the rigid strictures of ballet. Women in the corps de ballet spend 10 years trying to look like someone else. The creative side might be squashed a little bit less for male dancers because they don't have to be one of 16 swans.'' Hills suggests another reason why men might be more attracted to choreography may be similar to why many men design fashion for women. ''Ballet is obviously about creating movement with the human body and you want to make the human body look its most beautiful,'' she says. ''Maybe men feel more passionate about making women beautiful.''

The lack of female choreographers was explored in a 2007 New York Times story by Claudia La Rocco, who wrote: ''But as women have flourished as artistic leaders in modern dance (albeit with some struggles), ballet has lagged behind''. Certainly, major artistic decisions at contemporary dance companies such as Force Majeure, Chunky Move and DanceNorth are made by women, while freelance choreographers such as Narelle Benjamin also thrive. Bangarra Dance Theatre has staged six works by choreographer Frances Rings since 1995. Four of the company's senior female dancers will each create a new work for its latest offering, Dance Clan 3. Jasmin Sheppard, whose Macq explores the 1816 massacres of Aboriginal people around Sydney, says there is no slacking off for the male dancers in Bangarra. ''I definitely think contemporary dance is an entirely different world in that respect. Women and men have equal time on the stage and probably equal workloads. That's probably why you get more female choreographers in the contemporary world.''

Sheppard says contemporary dancers have a greater role in the choreography than their ballet counterparts: ''It's about tasking your dancers and finding ways to work with dancers and having them involved in the stories.'' Cultural protocols also provide a greater role for Bangarra's female dancers in telling certain traditional stories. But Yolande Brown, who is creating Imprint for Dance Clan 3, says she believes the gender influence can be overstated. ''I think men are inherently very different to women but every man is different from other men,'' she says. ''I see an individual's stamp more than their gender on a work and I think there are a lot of men out there who are incredibly poetic and sensitive. I think it goes further than female or male.''

Bodytorque.technique is at Sydney Theatre from October 31 to November 3. Dance Clan 3 is at Studio Theatre, Pier 4 in Walsh Bay from November 20 to December 1.