We Recommend: Performing Arts
And if I were me by Act2 Company Catherine Dreyfus
Mon 27 - Tue 28 May
Imaginate Festival
In a giant transformable cube, three creature-dancers emerge, grow and unfold. A humorous and breathtaking dance performance fizzing with energy, looking at change and metamorphosis, And if I were me examines what makes each individual distinctively ‘me’.
Performing Arts
Kalakuta Republik by Serge Aimé Coulibaly
Thu 30 May - Sat 1 Jun
Barbican
Honouring activist, musical legend and political maverick, Nigeria’s Fela Kuti, Kalakuta Republik is a dizzying fusion of dance and music by Burkina Faso-born Serge Aimé Coulibaly, which speaks of modern-day Africa and the artist as freedom-loving figurehead.
Performing Arts
The Little Bath by Johanny Bert
Sat 1 - Sun 2 Jun
Imaginate Festival
Created for very young audiences, The Little Bath is a show full of white foam, smooth and floating, malleable and fragile. Working with this fascinating material is a dancer who sculpts it, blows it and creates landscapes and ephemeral characters.
Performing Arts
Welcome to the UK by PSYCHEdelight
Tue 11 - Wed 12 Jun
The Cockpit
PSYCHEdelight’s new show, performed by refugees and European performers, is both a satire of immigration policy and an ode to the UK. Expect humour, horror, live music and candy floss.
Performing Arts
The Damned (Les Damnés)
Wed 19 - Tue 25 Jun
Barbican
The Institut français proudly supports the return of the Comédie-Française to London, after an absence of 19 years from the UK, with The Damned, by Luchino Visconti, directed by Ivo Van Hove. Following its triumph at the opening of the Avignon Festival in the Cour d'Honneur of the Palais des Papes and its sell-out run in both Paris and New York, The Damned depicts the disintegration of a society, a drama that finds unsettling parallels today.
Performing Arts
Masterclass with Guillaume Gallienne
Fri 21 Jun
Barbican
Join award-winning actor, director and screenwriter Guillaume Gallienne for a Masterclass hosted by journalist and critic Matt Trueman, alongside Comédie-Française’s production of The Damned, directed by Ivo van Hove.
Performing Arts
10,000 Gestures by Boris Charmatz
Sat 22 - Sun 23 Jun
Tate Modern
Returning to Tate Modern where he brought his Musée de la danse in 2015, Boris Charmatz presents an ephemeral piece composed of 10,000 gestures performed in a torrent of unrepeating movements, questioning the nature of dance’s relationship to time.
Performing Arts
The Great Exhibition Road Festival 2019
Fri 28 - Sun 30 Jun
Exhibition Road
The Great Exhibition Road Festival is a new three-day celebration of the arts and science in the spirit of the Great Exhibition of 1851. A unique programme of creative workshops, talks, exhibitions and performances will connect the area’s iconic institutions, including the French Institute, to create a unique weekend of discovery.
Performing Arts, Talks, Visual Arts
Shubbak Festival
Fri 28 Jun - Sun 14 Jul
Various Venues
This year’s edition of Shubbak features two thought-provoking performances by France-based Syrian artists Ramzi Choukair and Wael Ali: X-Adra and Under a Low Sky as well as French writers Leïla Slimani, Joseph Kai and Inaam Kachachi.
Performing Arts
Jean Paul Gaultier: Fashion Freak Show
Tue 23 Jul - Fri 2 Aug
Southbank Centre
Provocative, exuberant and as funny as ever, fashion’s enfant terrible Jean Paul Gaultier presents new designs alongside his most iconic creations in a performance thought out like a grand party, part revue, part catwalk show – paying tribute to those who inspired him, from Preljocaj to Madonna.
Performing Arts