De komst van Xia (The Coming of Xia)

European culture as we know it – from Plato to 3D printing – has become impotent and inward-looking. It’s time for a change. On Amsterdam’s Java Island, actors collective Wunderbaum performs the first part of their The New Forest series. Joined by a group of Amsterdam people, the actors go in search of an alternative way of living. On their quest, they try to get to grips with two thousand years of Western philosophy, so they can approach the world of tomorrow with an open mind Wunderbaum creates theatre for the future. Programme

Wunderbaum – The New Forest

What will happen after the crisis? This was the question the actors collective Wunderbaum took as their starting point for a series of performances entitled The New Forest, a four-year search for new forms of community. Neither utopia nor dystopia, The New Forest, according to project partner and sociologist Willem Schinkel, is a heterotopia, a place from which to view the world in a different way. Moving between reality and fiction, the project explores the process of change. 

At the Holland Festival, Wunderbaum presents an overview of four years of The New Forest with The Coming of Xia, in which the actors explore the rise of China as a world power; a new piece: The Future of Sex; and a screening of their film Stop Acting Now, a mock documentary directed by Mijke de Jong, in which the actors take a closer look at their own ideals. Wunderbaum’s imagination does wonders to help us understand our changing world.

Edges of Europe

During the first six months of this year the Netherlands holds the Presidency of the European Union. But what is left of the dream of European unity? At the Holland Festival international artists present a series of performances focusing on current European issues and exploring this changing continent. The festival’s opening performance by Estonian directors Ene-Liis Semper and Tiit Ojasoo Die Stunde da wir nichts voneinander wußten shows the diversity and tensions of modern Europe. And in their film Ash and Money they focus on the phenomenon of political populism. Directors Milo Rau (The Dark Ages), Joël Pommerat (Ça ira (1) Fin de Louis), Wael Shawky (Cabaret Crusades: The Secrets of Karbala) and Ukrainian band DakhaBrakha delve into Europe’s past, exploring the effect of some of its history’s darkest chapters. From the heart of Europe, the collective God’s Entertainment stages a test about chauvinism, which is causing the European dream of unity to falter. The Dutch theatre company Wunderbaum responds to European issues in its project The New Forest. A large Syrian orchestra for Arabic music will reunite for a special concert in Africa Express Presents… The Orchestra of Syrian Musicians with Damon Albarn and Guests. Artists may not be able to change the world, but they can change the way we look at it.