A philanthropist – one who still genuinely believes in progress – builds a ship. However much like a fable it may seem, Pieter De Buysser’s planetarium production was inspired by contemporary socio-political realities. Take a chance on this border exploration for nationalists, homeland research for cosmopolitans, and cosmology of a new worldview.

In Cinema Dialogue, Monika Gintersdorfer and Knut Klaßen critically examine the United Nations’ ostensibly apolitical Millennium Development Goals. They juxtapose the universalism of the UN programme with the local reality of urban development in Kinshasa between 2000 and the present day.

Trajal Harrell explores a moment in dance history when female artists presented performances on the boundary between entertainment, erotic dancing, and early experiments in modern dance. CAEN AMOUR is structured as a hoochie coochie show. With a seductive performance, scantily dressed ‘hoochies’ lure you around to the backstage area, to reveal the festivities on the ‘coochie’ side.

With a year’s production of her own wool and two performers, Orla Barry addresses our complex relationship with nature. The result is compelling live performance and a video installation, made up of a series of vignettes that reflect upon the primal, poetic and unpredictable bond we have with the natural world.

This brand new production directed by Ivo Van Hove is based on Leoš Janácek’s song cycle that goes by the same name. The result of Janácek’s inspired efforts is a mysterious, deeply emotional and psychological piece on identity, alienation, and an impossible love. Annelies Van Parys – one of the most acclaimed Belgian composers of our time – adds a fi tting contemporary reply.

In 2012 Karthik Pandian and Andros Zins-Browne visited the Atlas Film Studios in Morocco. They rented a group of camels, which they tried to coax into dancing in amongst the old film sets. With Atlas Revisited, the artists take a look back at this quest for an image of freedom – with brand new video material.

Dancer and choreographer Fumiyo Ikeda takes you on a journey to the heart of Morton Feldman’s Piano and String Quartet. This 80-minute composition for piano and strings exudes an aura of tranquillity, in which ‘each is just as much an echo of the other’. Ikeda shares the stage with the soloists of Ictus, as though she herself were the sixth musician.

If it is true that money rules the world, then perhaps time has come for it to account for its acts. It is therefore not in an attempt to bribe a magistrate that Christophe Meierhans is bringing money to court, but on the contrary, in order to offer it a fair trial: Is money itself the culprit for having brought the world to the catastrophic state it is in now, or has it rather been employed to the design of ill-intentionned individuals?

What happens when Shakespeare’s rhythmic and poetic visual language becomes dance? Golden Hours (As you like it) – an encounter between Brian Eno and Shakespeare – draws you into a mildly ironic world, where the characters speak a language that doesn’t need deciphering to be grasped, yet isn’t pantomime.

Beeldend kunstenaar Hans Op de Beeck en schrijver-speler Pieter De Buysser brengen voor honderste keer Book Burning. Hans maakt een object, Pieter schrijft zinnen en spreekt ze uit op de scène. Een object, een tekst, een speler: dat is alles wat nodig is voor dit kleinood dat hart én verstand weet te raken.