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The Rolling Stones-Unzipped at the Groninger Museum: dynamic, yet somewhat well-behaved tribute

Fortunately, the Groninger Museum also puts enough focus on the aural aspect; not only are visitors treated to the various Stones songs, culminating in the concert in Cuba in 2016, but they also pass by fragments of der band members themselves and (popular) cultural figureheads such as director Martin Scorsese.

Dance film The Garden shows the very bearable lightness of existence

Dance film The Garden shows the very bearable lightness of existence

The Garden is a new dance film by Sem, now also a dancer with the Dutch National Ballet, which premiered last week. The choreography is by British dancer Pascal Johnson, with five dancers dancing on the roof of artist Jean Dubuffet's famous artwork Jardin d'émail in the sculpture garden of the Kröller-Möller Museum. That in itself is special enough, however, it is the optimism of the dance film that impresses.

Romana Vrede, Photo: Bas de Brouwer

The three-quarters empty hall gives more intimacy than a full hall. HNT always plays; warming and confusing

What impressions, what images stick? Why am I enjoying this so much? The performances during the corona crisis deliver great gratitude: that I get to experience this, that actors, writers, directors and collaborators are faithful to perform for me for weeks or even months on end. The declaration of love is mutual.

Chosen to enjoy magisterial Hans Kesting

The restless head in front of the torso, fists nervously searching for grip under the pale blue jumper. His life a relentless affliction of generations of oppression under factory labour, alcoholism and domestic violence. And deep love nonetheless, between this tormented father and son. Until almost the end of the monologue "Who killed my father?", the high bed remains untouched. Only then do they learn... 

Life has turned into a B-Movie, and no better location could be imagined than 'Sender Boulevard'

Exterior, day. A deserted street in a southern Dutch town, unusually bright daylight. No sound. A man drives up and parks at a vacant power point. He walks to the entrance of a large, empty, modernist building. He is greeted by a very very old veteran, who tells him that "the wife is in for a moment", "she asked me to go on the... 

Taking off and landing softly. That's what Schweigman& offers during Sender Boulevard, and we need it

Boukje Schweigman is an artist this country desperately needs. My deep admiration for her arose with 'Klep', the performance with which she graduated from the Amsterdam mime school long ago. With eight others in a trolley, looking around through very small flaps in a world where sweet creatures are equally curious about you, after which a minimal touch has the impact of... 

Greg Nottrot offers vision of a new future for theatre at the time of Corona with 'Graves'

Ok, the Mauerpark in the real Berlin is more grubby, but what they call the Berlinplein in Utrecht's new Leidsche Rijn centre has something in common with it. Of course, a frayed edge organised by the local government is a bit suspicious, with a megabios as its biggest attraction, but property developers, the biggest abusers of artistic frayed edges, can't do much else on... 

Traveling While Black grabs you by the throat

Traveling While Black touches you deeply and that is exactly the intention. The 20-minute or so Virtual reality film immerses you in the history of institutional racism in the US and especially what it does to people. The location is Ben's Chili Bowl in Washington DC*. We sit at a table in a classic diner with people... 

National Theatre plays on simply brilliantly

Thank God the theatres are reopening to more audiences and The National Theatre is still playing for a while, for instance with the infectious Every Brilliant Thing with Tamar van den Dop or Bram Suijker. At the Theater aan het Spui on Wednesday 1 July, Tamar van den Dop in the afternoon and Bram Suijker in the evening played their first Every Brilliant Thing. It is,... 

That's why concert halls need to reopen as soon as possible. By any means necessary.

What an incredible bucket of guts Lucie Horsch has. Twenty years old. Quite world-famous by now, admittedly. But you just have to dare, in your acceptance speech for the prestigious Dutch Music Prize, to throw the minister's just-expressed words back in her face. Because that is what Lucie Horsch did, with a controlled fury that made a deep impression even from 25 metres away. The... 

The Q of figurehead and bassist

I have always found the Q to be a nice fresh thing. Now unfortunately I am not a synesthete, but my imagination tells me today that the Q feels cheeky. Sounds nice and succinct. The Q qlaps into my qeel and is punchy blue. Or shiny. Not ordi, but tough. Of shiny metallic seventies leather. The Q in a catsuit. Supple now plays... 

#Corona-classics 3: Maxim Shalygin: organ-playing saxophones on CD 'Todos los fuegos el fuego'

A rainy day in #coronaquarantine seems like the ideal time to listen to a CD about fire. So I slide Todos los fuegos el fuego by Ukrainian-Dutch composer Maxim Shalygin into the laptop. 'All fires the fire' is named after Julio Cortázar's collection of eight short stories of the same name. The CD also has eight songs, which together... 

#Corona-classics 2: Liza Lim: disturbing CD 'Extinction Events and Dawn Chorus'

Totally contemporary, this new CD by Australian composer Liza Lim (1966) recently released on Kairos. Automatically you listen to Extinction Events and Dawn Chorus in the context of the corona pandemic. Are we headed for total destruction? The ominous title refers to Lim's concern about the huge amounts of plastic choking the oceans. The fish this... 

Virtual life after death does have a price tag in Amazon Prime's Upload

With amazement, I become aware of the 'sacrificing your elderly fellow man' attitude of many here in the Netherlands. Dor wood. Not money, but the love for it is the root of evil. Right now, I wish a virtual heaven were possible - so that those who have lost someone and may not be able to say goodbye to them either... 

This Was The News is more enjoyable without an audience than Sunday with Lubach

We must continue to get through the already theatre-less weekends this spring and summer without Sunday with Lubach and This Was The News. Their season is over. The latter remained witty without an audience, Lubach in my opinion did not. How did that happen? Five weeks ago, when the shows first recorded it without an audience, it was noticeable that Sunday with... 

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