Backstage

INTERVIEW with Ntando Cele, by Laura Ginestar

Ntando Cele was born in Durban, South Africa, and currently lives and works in Bern, Switzerland. She studied theatre in Durban and then followed a multidisciplinary training at DAS Arts in Amsterdam. In 2013, she founded the production company Manaka Empowerment Prod. together with Raphael Urweider. Her work crosses the boundaries of theatre, video installations, concerts and performance. With humour and deliberately politically incorrect statements, she makes hidden racism in everyday life visible. She combines music, text and video to dissect prejudices and stereotypes in a cheerful way, confronting the audience with their own prejudices. In February 2020, during the festival It's not that simple in Bern, Cele invited other artists to a satirical debate called Ennemi du progrès (Enemy of Progress), in which she discussed issues of racial freedom and the limitations for artists of colour. Her performances have been seen at Vidy (Switzerland), with Black Off (2019), Go Go Othello (2020) and SPAfrica (2023). SPAfrica, the award-winning production she made with Julian Hetzel, was a SPRING co-production and had its Dutch premiere at SPRING 2023.   In the upcoming edition of SPRING Performing Arts Festival 2025, Cele will be presenting her last work Wasted Land, on Thursday 22nd May at 21h at the Grote Zaal of Stadsschouwburg Utrecht. She will be also hosting the trajectory “Protest & Future Imagination”, in which she will reflect with the participants on what it means to not just "perform" our convictions but to truly "embody" them. Moreover, there will be a guiding question throughout the sessions: what does it take to envision a future that aligns with the values we fight for?

HOT WALK: Why a body’s menopause resembles Earth’s

By: Memouna Aharram In late May, choreographer and artist Keren Levi comes to Utrecht with her performance HOT WALK during SPRING Performing Arts Festival. This multidisciplinary performance, which brings together dance, text, video and music, explores the parallels between the physical changes of the body and the ecological shifts of our planet.Ahead of her new performance HOT WALK, Levi explains how personal experiences form the basis for this layered and surprising performance, in which the physical and the political are inextricably linked.

INTERVIEW with Marina Otero, by Laura Ginestar

In the upcoming edition of SPRING Performing Arts Festival 2025, Otero will be presenting her last work Kill me, on Saturday 24th May at 19h at the Grote Zaal of Stadsschouwburg Utrecht. She will be also facilitating the workshop “I am a body” within the trajectory Embodiment & Physical Knowledge, within SPRING Academy, on Sunday May 25th.

fatigue: A hypnotic journey through exhaustion and desire to slow down

By: Memouna Aharram Hungarian artist Viktor Szeri brings his award-winning solo fatigue to SPRING Performing Arts Festival. It is an intimate, multidisciplinary performance about burnout, slowing down and the pressures of a world that is always “on”. In an in-depth conversation, Szeri shares how personal exhaustion transformed into a universal experience and why his performance invites you to participate rather than watch.

The big stage

World premieres at SPRING 2025

This year, you can be at seven world premieres!

Press release: SPRING 2025: “LET’S SAY IT OUT LOUD. WE ARE EXHAUSTED“

Ten days of dance, theater, installations and more in Utrecht From May 22 till 31, the thirteenth edition of SPRING Performing Arts Festival will take place in Utrecht, with this year’s theme WE ARE EXHAUSTED. Politically, socially, in nature, online, and in our bodies, it can be felt in many ways. Artistic director Grzegorz Reske states: “Shouldn’t we say it out loud? It’s hard not to lose yourself in a world that keeps accelerating and is filled with political and social unrest. But no matter how powerless we feel, we hold the power to bring change.”

SPRING coproductions 2025

Ticket sales has started!

Have you already checked out the program on our website? Good news: ticket sales for SPRING 2025 start today!

Pre programme SPRING

From now on, buy tickets for the pre programme SLOW TV Cinema This year we have a special pre program that will help you get in the mood even before the festival. With all the hustle and bustle around us, we invite you to unwind.

Programme SPRING 2025 is online!

You can find the full programme of SPRING 2025 on the website from now on. In addition, sales for Day Passes and Passe-partouts have started.

SPRING Academy launches a new format!

From coming edition it will be possible to join a multi-day deepened experience of the festival. We present seven different thematic trajectories that the interested participant can choose between. From Protest & Future Imagination to Artistic Research and Vocabularies of the Body. These trajectories are carefully curated and will focus on current relevant topics in connection with the performances of SPRING Festival.