At 10 weeks from the FTA opening, the Festival team remains attentive to public health directives and is confident that the measures implemented by the authorities, on Canadian territory and elsewhere around the world, will limit the spread of the coronavirus (COVID-19).
Montreal, Tuesday March 17, 2020 – The Festival TransAmériques is a celebration to shake up collective apathy. This 14th edition takes place at the beginning of a new decade that will be crucial for the future of humanity. While the world as we know it is on the verge of collapse how can 22 dance and theatre shows stimulate new realities? That’s what FTA festivalgoers will discover from May 20 to June 3, 2020 in 13 venues at the heart of Montreal. Creators coming together from twenty cities around the world will take to the stage live to restore precious life in all its astonishing and profoundly moving vitality.
“Artists sense, artists feel. They see with courage and lucidity the state of our despoiled world. They are essential because they propose new ways of imagining. They open up unexpected perspectives, rebuild worlds, worlds that give birth to dreams. Where we might be petrified, they allow us to dance on the ruins of our chaos, often with joy. Standing together, united by art, we can do a lot. Let us use our strength.”
— Martin Faucher, Artistic Director
To launch this edition with appropriate aplomb, make way for the enchanted world of the Greek director Euripides Laskaridis with Elenit, an international Festival coproduction and one of our 8 creations in 2020, along with Stations by Louise Lecavalier, Violence by Marie Brassard, P.O.R.N. (Portrait of Restless Narcissism) by Christian Lapointe and Nadia Ross, Post coïtum by Mélanie Demers, J’ai pleuré avec les chiens (I Cried with the Dogs) by Daina Ashbee, SIERRRANEVADA by Manuel Roque and Contingency by Japanese choreographer Hiroaki Umeda in the Satosphere dome of the Society for Arts and Technology [SAT].
Imagine an oversized aquarium on the Place des Festivals… American artist Lars Jan will amaze thousands of people with Holoscenes, an extraordinary performance which subjects humans to the frightening consequences of climate change.
Several international artists will premiere their works for FTA audiences: choreographers Alice Ripoll, from Rio de Janeiro, and nora chipaumire, a New Yorker originally from Zimbabwe, will respectively present an electrifying new group work Cria and the politically irreverent triptych #PUNK 100% POP *N!GGA; as for theatre, note the luminous presence of Torontonian Jordan Tannahill with Declarations, an ode to his departed mother, of Chilean artist Manuela Infante and all the plants of Estado vegetal, of Belgian Louis Vanhaverbeke with his inventive Mikado Remix as well as the Syrian trio of Omar Abusaada, Mohammad Al Attar and Bissane Al Charif with their heartrending testimonies in Aleppo. A Portrait of Absence, told face to face to one spectator at a time.
Among eagerly awaited returning artists, undoubtedly the celebrated works Requiem pour L. by Fabrizio Cassel and Alain Platel, Romances inciertos, un autre Orlando by François Chaignaud and Nino Laisné, Why? by Peter Brook and Marie-Hélène Estienne as well as La reprise. Histoire(s) du théâtre (I) (The Repetition) by Milo Rau, inspired by a horrific news item, will make the event truly exceptional.
Finally, three shows will be gracing our stages with return engagements: the sound and theatrical jewel Aalaapi | ᐋᓛᐱ imagined by a collective from Nunavik and Montreal, along with Anima / Darkroom by 7Starr and Lucy M. May and Un temps pour tout by Sovann Rochon-Prom Tep, which marks the flamboyant launch of Quebecois hip hop dancers on an FTA stage.
View video excerpts of shows available at: fta.ca
