Diaghilev, with that slightly pugilistic face, that faint, proud smile and powerful head, presided over one of the most extraordinary companies ever created: the Ballets Russes. Encouraging a formidable troupe of dancers, designers and musicians, the impresario and his company stormed Europe and America and created the 20th century avant-garde on the way. This exhibition takes us on a chronological journey from the flabby dances of the latter nineteenth-century (don’t miss Nicolai Legat and Marta Baldina’s Pas de Deux), through to the humorous, bizarre and beautiful end of the Ballet Russes in 1929, then finally to the present day.

Stirring chords from Stravinsky’s The Rite of Spring – the music that caused a riot – jab their way through the exhibition. Admittedly the constant musical din is wearing, though it is forgiven when one sees the accompanying dances, not least the fascinating juxtaposition of a recreation of Nijinsky’s premiere of The Rite and Pina Bausch’s achingly powerful production.

What the exhibition excellently conveys is that the Ballets Russes’ performances were about a unifying design, incorporating set, dancer, costume and music in one powerful whole. Harnessing the most formidable talents of the day from Moscow’s avant-garde to Picasso, Stravinsky to Poulenc, Fokine to Balanchine, enriched with a plethora of influences absorbed from their peripatetic existence, Diaghilev had the Wagnerian gesamtkunst dressed in virulent Slavic colours, dainty neo-Rococo bundles, or mad Constructionist fancies. Léon Bakst’s costumes are masterpieces of extraordinary colours and cuts, which play with the exotic and erotic, folkloric Russia, while Picasso’s outfits for Parade are as provocative as Satie’s score – a plié in a 6-foot box was no doubt taxing.

Also notable was Natalia Goncharova’s enormous backcloth for the Firebird Suite (marred by the naff iPod advert-like video montage projected around it) and Picasso’s equally huge backcloth for Le Train Bleu. The curators have shown through Yves-Saint Laurent’s opulent dresses and Akram Kahn’s beautiful dance work that though the impresario is dead and his troupe dispersed, their legacy is as bright as the costumes and as thriving as their dance.