THE first events for this year's Belfast Festival have just been announced.
Now on sale, A 24-Decade History of Popular Music: The WW1 Years and More by New York performance artist Taylor Mac combines live music, theatre, politics and multiple costume changes.
Across three shows at the MAC in Belfast (October 25, 26 and 29), Mac will present his take on music and culture spanning the years before, during and after the First World War (October 25 & 26) and onward to a festival-closing 10-decade spectacular capturing 1916, the Battle of the Somme and the Easter Rising, through to the present day (October 29).
Also on sale is the world premiere of Irish artist Amanda Coogan's Run to The Rock. Opening on October 20 at the MAC, this specially commissioned live art work involves deaf performers from Northern Ireland and South Africa and is based around the 'Robben Island Bible', a copy of the Complete Works of William Shakespeare kept by the inmates of this South African prison during Nelson Mandela’s incarceration.
The production will combine live multi-media messaging, projected images, sound and movements inspired by translations of Shakespeare's texts into sign language.
The final release of this first programme announcement is David Grieg’s contemporary reworking of Greek tragedy The Suppliant Women by Aeschylus, which will be performed by the Royal Lyceum Theatre Edinburgh and Actors’ Touring Company, featuring an amateur chorus of up to 50 women.
:: Tickets and full programme info at Belfastinternationalartsfestival.com.
