National Arts Centre To Launch 2024-2025 Season With New Edition Of SPHERE Festival

Canada's National Arts Centre will open its 2024-2025 season with SPHERE, a multi-disciplinary festival highlighting connections between art and the natural world. Presented by the NAC Orchestra and curated by its Music Director Alexander Shelley, SPHERE will engage all the NAC's artistic disciplines, with participation from the NAC Orchestra, Dance, English Theatre, Indigenous Theatre, French Theatre, Popular Music and Variety, and 1 Elgin Culinary Arts. This year's program builds upon SPHERE's inaugural edition in 2022 to explore rivers, waterways, and watersheds through performances, talks, and visual art.

Attendees will be captivated by the diverse lineup of artists and events at SPHERE, including Polaris Prize and JUNO Award winner Jeremy Dutcher in concert with the NAC Orchestra, Québécoise actor and playwright Christine Beaulieu, GRAMMY Award-winning soprano Renée Fleming, and celebrated Indigenous choreographer Tekaronhiáhkhwa Santee Smith. The festival will also premiere a double bill of radio dramas by Canadian playwrights David Yee and Berni Stapleton and feature a specially curated dinner by 1 Elgin's Resident Chef for fall 2024, Chris Commandant. Throughout the festival, the NAC's Kipnes Lantern will showcase an installation by renowned visual artist and microbiologist Chloé Savard, also known as @Tardibabe, to her more than one million Instagram followers.

SPHERE begins on September 10 with the world premiere of UAQUE in Southam Hall, a NAC Dance and NAC Orchestra co-commission that uniquely fuses dance, music and visual art, choreographed by Andrea Peña. UAQUE, meaning "kin, relative, neighbour, friend" in the Indigenous Muisca language from Peña's native Colombia, will take audiences on a contemplative and immersive journey through dance. The piece sets ten performers against a backdrop of stirring photographs by renowned Canadian artist Edward Burtynsky and orchestral selections by the NAC Orchestra led by Alexander Shelley, alternating with works by electronic music producer and composer Eƨƨe Ran.

"I am thrilled to begin my tenth season at the NAC with the second instalment of such a timely and ambitious festival. At the heart of SPHERE is an invitation to celebrate the intellectual and artistic inspiration that Mother Earth gives us and to explore our fragile relationship with her," says Alexander Shelley. "As a hub for performing arts in Canada's National Capital, we will honour the region's three major rivers and its numerous waterways through adventurous, vibrant, and thoughtful programming presented by some of the country's most celebrated and emerging artists. We invite our audiences to journey with us as we consider the future of the natural world and its most abundant resource through song, dance, theatre, and visual art."

The season-opening festival welcomes another significant milestone as Caroline Ohrt introduces her first season as the Executive Producer of NAC Dance.

"I can't think of a better way to begin my inaugural season at the NAC than with the world premiere of UAQUE, a commission for the multi-disciplinary choreographer Andrea Peña," says Caroline Ohrt. "The NAC is honoured to partner with Andrea Peña & Artists to premiere such a meaningful and important work, bringing together dance and music with Edward Burtynsky's striking photographs that speak volumes about our planet's vulnerable state. We invite audiences to pause and reflect on our connection to the earth."

In addition to programming across the NAC's stages, SPHERE includes free events such as panel discussions, live demonstrations, and a day of music and family activities at the Canadian Museum of History.

For more information and a complete festival schedule, visit nac-cna.ca/en/sphere.

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