Tramway Announces April To August 2018 Season

Tramway, the leading international arts-space, presents an exciting range of contemporary visual art and performance from acclaimed and emerging artists this summer.

The world premiere of 1,210 km created by award winning young performance companies, Tramway-based Junction 25 and Berlin's Theater an der Parkaue will be performed during Festival 2018.

1,210 km explores ideas of cross-cultural identity, connection and belonging and the companies are collaborating primarily through a specially developed digital portal, with the young people meeting face-to-face only twice during the run up to the show. The Glasgow performances on 10 and 11 August are taking place as part of Festival 2018, the dynamic cultural programme for the Glasgow 2018 European Championships, before the work tours to Theater an der Parkaue in Berlin in Autumn 2018.

For his solo exhibition at Tramway, Turner Prize-winning artist Mark Leckey has taken inspiration from a small statuette from the Wellcome Collection. In Tramway's main gallery, Leckey reconfigures this statuette to human proportions creating a relatable, abject figure who occupies Tramway's vast gallery. The exhibition is co-commissioned and co-curated by Glasgow International and Tramway and will be presented from 20 April to 1 July.

Tramway also hosts exhibitions by Kapwani Kiwanga and Tai Shani as part of Glasgow International 2018.

The continent of Europe is moving towards Africa at the rate of approximately 2cm per year - eventually it will slide underneath entirely. Paris-based Canadian artist Kapwani Kiwanga takes this fact as a starting point for a new multi-faceted installation, Soft Measures. Through new sculptural works Kiwanga suggests speculative fictions that stretch through a perspective of deep geological time.

For Dark Continent: SEMIRAMIS, Tai Shani creates a large-scale immersive installation that also functions as a site for performance. The work is an experimental adaptation of Christine de Pizan's 1405 proto-feminist text The Book of the City of Ladies. Twelve performers create a twelve-part performance depicting an allegorical city of women, imagining an alternative history which privileges sensation, experience and interiority, simultaneously proposing a post-patriarchal future.

Cassa Pancho's Ballet Black, which celebrates dancers of Black and Asian descent, will return to Tramway on 8 and 9 June with a double bill. A new ballet by renowned British chorographer Cathy Marston based on South African writer Can Themba's moving fable The Suit, which was banned by the then apartheid regime on its publication, is paired with acclaimed Portuguese choreographer, Arthur Pita's Olivier nominated A Dream Within a Midsummer Night's Dream.

Samara Scott will create a large site specific installation in response to Tramway's main gallery inspired by its architecture and open air spaces such as the arcade, market or street. Scott's work is often improvised in situ, using fluid and supple materials that allow her to work at a certain tempo. Body gel, glitter, toilet paper, sponges, milk, nail varnish and food dyes are just some of the many substances that make up her alchemic and sumptuous forms. The exhibition opens on 4 August.

A Children's Exhibition of bold, playful and engaging artwork that will introduce children to ideas and materials commonly used in contemporary art, through tactile experience, digital interaction, and movable shapes and forms opens on 7 July. On the same day, a new immersive installation by young emerging artists will be unveiled in the main theatre: Celebrate ART, created as part of Year of Young People 2018.

Breath Pieces, a new work from Rosanna Irvine that is part dance, part installation, will be performed on 23 June. The work, which is a Tramway commission, includes performance, sound, video, drawing and spoken text.

An evening of animation, film, and reading programmed by Glasgow-based artist Jamie Crewe takes place on 4 August. This event provides a chance to engage with an eclectic body of works that have informed Pastoral Drama, Crewe's new moving image commission for Tramway and KW Institute of Contemporary Art in Berlin, which will form the basis of a solo show at Tramway in September.

From 16 May to 4 June, the festival contemporary performance Take Me Somewhere returns, with performances throughout the city.

Presented by Take Me Somewhere and Tramway on 26 and 27 May, Liquid Sky is a spectacular new piece of visual theatre from Bassline Circus & SUE ZUKI exploring the interface between sonic art and aerial circus within a laser light scenography ideal for children aged 10 and over and their families.

In a new commission for Tramway and Take Me Somewhere, artist Christian Noelle Charles has taken inspiration from pop culture, modern performance techniques and personal experience to create a new performance work CC Time. The work features a performance on 1 June and an exhibition on 2 and 3 June.

Tramway also co-presents as part of Take Me Somewhere, i ride in colour and soft focus, no longer anywhere, a solo performance dance piece taking place on 1 June by Last Yearz Interesting Negro - the solo project of Jamila Johnson-Small, who makes work with 'in-between spaces' - things that exist within cracks in time/memory/attention. On 30 and 31 May, Quote Unquote Collective in association with Why Not Theatre perform Mouthpiece, which follows one woman, in the wake of her mother's death, for one day, as she tries to find her voice.

Dead Centre, Florentina Holzinger / CAMPO, and FK Alexander will also present work at Tramway as part of Take Me Somewhere.

Welsh radical harpist Rhodri Davies and Glasgow-based Lucy Duncombe will perform on 8 April as part of the Counterflows festival.

Y Dance present the annual Project Y, showcasing the talent of some of the country's best young contemporary dancers aged 16 to 21 through four new works created by top choreographers, on 25 July.

Tramway's popular Take Part programme will once again be at the heart of the new season, featuring a family weekend of TRYOUT activities inspired by Glasgow International; a variety of workshops inspired by and taking place in exhibitions, and the start of a new Tramway Philosophy Club for ages 9-12. See tramway.org/takepart

Councillor David McDonald, Chair of Glasgow Life and Deputy Leader of Glasgow City Council, said: "Tramway's new season presents a fascinating selection of contemporary art.

"New work by internationally acclaimed artists will be presented along with commissions from up and coming creatives. There will be inspired opportunities for children to discover and learn more about contemporary art, and Tramway will also host shows as part of some of the most exciting festivals taking place in Glasgow over the next few months.

"Mix this in with the friendly and welcoming atmosphere that you will always find throughout the venue and this makes a visit to Tramway a 'must do' for everyone who lives in and visits our great city."

Tramway is supported by Glasgow City Council and Creative Scotland.

To find out more visit www.tramway.org

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