Tobogganing teenagers. If you don't have them at home, you read and hear about them in the media. The phone provides them with thousands of impressions a day, but the constant in history remained: for Generation Z, little attracts attention as much as sex. Or Sex? This language question begins the performance by HNTjong, the youth company of Het Nationale Toneel in Den...
"What I really like is that Lot Vekemans, the writer, sees and hears how some texts just don't go, or don't do it. I would grant that to more writers." Actress José Kuijpers plays alongside Helmert Woudenberg in Lot Vekemans' play Blind. The play will premiere at the Brabant company Matzer on 22 October. Vekemans is...
Ostriches, as droll as they are graceful, disappearing into man-sized reeds at dusk. I saw the sculpture yesterday in Tilburg's Spoorpark, where Circus Festival Circolo has settled again this year. As simple as poignancy can be, you can make your own story out of what good performers present to you. The nine handstand specialists of Collectif d'équilibristes showed me in Le Complexe de...
ROTTERDAM - On Wednesday 18 October at 16:30, the kids of the Maaspodium can be followed via livestream as they give a look before and behind the scenes at various theatres throughout the Netherlands, kicking off the first ever National Children's Theatre Week. Together with presenter Tirsa With, they will show how much fun theatre is! As a new initiative of the National Theatre Fund,...
November Music 2023 takes place from 1 to 12 November at various locations in 's-Hertogenbosch and opens on Wednesday 1 November 2023 with the Bosch Requiem, composed by Aart Strootman on a libretto by Jan Rot. The Bosch Requiem can be heard in 's-Hertogenbosch, Amsterdam, Utrecht, Groningen and Rotterdam in the period around All Souls' Day. Bosch Requiem 2023 For the seventh...
World premiere by young composer Thomas van Dun commissioned by Asko|Schönberg, master pianist Pierre-Laurent Aimard in György Ligeti's Piano Concerto and Unsuk Chin finds her inspiration on the streets. In 2008 and 2009, Korean composer Unsuk Chin visited Hong Kong and Guangzhou. The atmosphere of the old residential areas with their narrow, winding alleys, marketplaces and food vendors reminded her...
"I actually want to shout, 'Waaaa! That I'm standing here!" It is nearing noon when Babette Foncie Fotchind shares this with the TivioliVredenburg, still filled to the brim. It is met with loud, assenting cheers. It is one of the many highlights and highlights at this 40th edition of the Night of Poetry, the rather unique party that Utrecht...
"I think you can apply this idea of consent culture to families, friends, leisure groups, anywhere, if you like." On Friday 13 October 2023, Tilburg's Circus Festival Circolo will open with a seminar on the premises of the Fontys University of Applied Sciences. Keynote speaker at that seminar is Sabine Marringer. She will come with a special message, she announced: "I sent...
Living and working in a metropolis as a digital nomad or creative professional, on a terrace with your laptop and a latte macchiato. A dream for many people, doing well on social media. Around that fact revolves The Perfections, the short novel with which Vincenzo Latronico made the longlist of the Premio Strega, the most important Italian literary prize. The...
"My accent, my heart is with the people involved in circus. I therefore want to put them at the centre." Lucho Smit (1983) has been artistic director of Tilburg circus festival Circolo, which starts on 13 October, since April this year. He wants to put the festival, which has been around for 15 years, in the middle of the...
Filter is pulling out all the stops: the two 2023 Filter Translation Prizes, including the brand new one for children's and youth books, have been awarded to no fewer than four translators! The regular prize goes to Yond Boeke & Patty Krone for Luigi Pirandello's Lucky Birds (Van Oorschot). The prize for the most extraordinary translation of a children's and children's book was awarded to Lies Lavrijsen and Els Dumez-Blocken....
Det Rijven (1956) feels more vulnerable than 20 years ago: "I am not only afraid of falling. I also realise that my body is like an old bicycle that occasionally plays music and just wants to stop. Or has a flat tyre. That's really more often than before. You never know if the bike is still on the...
It is sometimes said of reviewers that they actually wish they were writers themselves. A cliché, of course, but perhaps also somewhat true. Dieuwertje Mertens (1983), literary critic for Het Parool, laughs affirmatively. "Yes, look, I have written a book, so it is clear that I also want to be an author. But not instead of. I like very much...
The overhead projector. What a beautiful tool in the hands of an artist. There will probably also be someone who does something unexpected with a digital whiteboard, but it cannot be as inventive as what Jilles Flinterman does in ´Boudica'. The play, created under the wings of Utrecht-based theatre group Aluin, tells of a woman who has a statue in England,...
Extreme weather - the novel Malacqua, about how the city of Naples is ravaged for days by heavy rainfall, is more topical than ever not only because of its subject matter. The book may date from 1977, but Nicola Pugliese's tantalising and unusual writing style, also thanks to Annemart Pilon's excellent translation, is still surprising, fresh and modern today. Quirky author The...
Due to sudden injuries, there were some last-minute changes, but today Festival Circolo has unveiled its complete programme. From 13 to 22 October, the Netherlands' biggest circus festival will once again descend on Tilburg for ten days of contemporary circus of the highest quality. Following the announcement of, among others, Circus Baobab's acclaimed "Yé!" and audience favourite "En Attendant...
Can you love someone whose ideas you reject? From 19 October to 15 December, Blind tours the country. In the directorial debut of internationally lauded playwright Lot Vekemans, Helmert Woudenberg and José Kuijpers play a father and daughter who are diametrically opposed in everything. The premiere of this MATZER Theatre production is Saturday 21 October in...
Labour disputes in the Netherlands are on the rise. In 2021, the number of labour disputes increased by 17% overall. This increase will continue in 2022 and 2023, writes nu.nl, among others, based partly on the increased demand for legal aid in labour disputes. The arts and culture sector is certainly no exception. The media regularly show conflicts and abuses within the cultural sector. Add to this...
The associate artist for the 77th Holland Festival in 2024 is Brazilian theatre director, filmmaker and writer Christiane Jatahy (Rio de Janeiro, 1968). Among other things, Christiane Jatahy will present Hamlet, a co-production with Odéon-Théâtre de l'Europe from Paris. Shakespeare's play will have a female title role and is the starting point to reflect on the world we live in, and how...
In False Bitches, Camila Sosa Villada grants the reader an intimate and moving glimpse into the colourful, but also harsh and lonely existence of (Argentine) transsexuals. And thus holds a merciless mirror up to the intolerant, judgmental society. A 'party' 'Being a transvesti is a party' was the motto of Angie, one of Camila Sosa Villada's transgender friends. An incantation...
113 decibels. That's what the elated audience managed to pull off with Nicole Kaandorp (no relation to Brigitte, but at least as talented) at the Pandora. It happened in the first round of the semi-finals in the NK Poetry Slam 2023, the unofficial opening of the International Literature Festival Utrecht, which we call ILFU in English....
Nicole Kaandorp has become Dutch Poetry Slam 2023 champion. After preliminary rounds across the country, eight poetry slammers competed in the 21st edition of the NK Poetry Slam on Saturday night 23 September, during the International Literature Festival Utrecht. Nicole took on Eelco Couvreur in the final battle and captured the national title. The new national slam champion won the...
The work of Colombian writer Laura Restrepo (73) has long been forgotten in the Netherlands. With her new, impressive novel Song of old lovers, she makes a well-deserved comeback. She already has 13 novels to her name. Yet Colombian writer Laura Restrepo, who lives mostly in Spain, is a rather unknown to most Dutch...
This week, photographer Erwin Olaf died, aged 64. Just before his 60th birthday, we interviewed him about his work, life and love. Olaf also spoke candidly about his illness, how it forced him to make choices ánd made him milder. 'I am in renewal,' he said. And: 'In my life, I have done everything I wanted to do.'
Raw and moving is Catelan-Moroccan writer Najat el Hachmi's new novel, Monday We Will Be Loved. An impressive story about the meaning of true freedom, and the price you have to pay for it. 'Monday, Monday, Monday... Monday we will be different. Monday we will be loved.' Every week, young woman Naïma tries to...
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