London’s leading centre for dance performance and creation The Place is delighted to launch its spring 2023 season, with highlights including Sadiq Ali’s critically acclaimed show The Chosen Haram,National Dance Company Wales’ electric new double bill PULSE and an unmissable event celebrating the legacy of Sir Robert Cohan CBE.

The Place’s spring season kicks off with three works from London International Mime Festival 2023: Through The Grapevine by Not Standing, The Games We Play by Gandini Juggling and The Great He-Goat by Mossoux Bonté.

As well as presenting new work, The Place’s spring season will see the return of audience favourites Léa Tirabasso’s Starving Dingoes and SAY’s the album, which is presented by The Place’s Producing and Touring arm.

“We’re delighted to welcome London International Mime Festival back to The Place this year to open our spring season. The artists who are part of the festival draw on circus and dance, and experimentation with form is a hallmark of the season with shows that draw on digital technology, new music and theatre in the programme. We also celebrate one of the original contemporary dance innovators, Sir Robert Cohan.” The Place Programming Team

On the And: Honouring the Legacy of Sir Robert Cohan CBE will be a very special evening that celebrates the brilliance and impact of Sir Robert Cohan CBE. The evening will see the launch of the Sir Robert Cohan Dance Legacy and will present an exciting programme of works by the late choreographer, featuring guest artists from the Rambert School of Ballet and Contemporary Dance and Yorke Dance Project.

Highlights of the spring 2023 season include:

• The Games We Play by Gandini Juggling (20 – 21 Jan)
• The Chosen Haram by Sadiq Ali (8 – 9 Feb)
• SAY’s the album (11 Mar)
• On the And: Honouring the Legacy of Sir Robert Cohan CBE (24 – 25 Mar)

Programme of work this spring at The Place

In this award-winning pas de deux, Alexander Vantournhout and Axel Guerin, two extraordinary circus/dance artists, play with their physical differences in a stream of endlessly surprising movement. Through The Grapevine by Not Standing is “so ingenious that it is impossible to describe. You can only look with admiration and concentration at the phenomenal physical intelligence exhibited here.” - De Standaard (16 – 18 JAN). Part of London International Mime Festival.

Acclaimed contemporary circus company Gandini Juggling celebrates its 30^th anniversary with The Games We Play. Co-founder/directors Sean Gandini and Kati Ylä-Hokkala invite audiences to enter the joyous, complex world of juggling and choreography. It’s an animated self-portrait of a pioneering duo and their company, with a repertoire of some thirty productions staged more than six thousand times all over the world. The Games We Play is a celebratory exploration that asks what is juggling and what can it be? And what is art and what can art be? (20 – 21 JAN). Part of London International Mime Festival.

A museum comes to life in the depths of night as a gallery of tortured souls and phantoms step out of pictures hanging on its walls. Based on the famous Pinturas Negras (Black Paintings) of 18th century Spanish artist Francisco Goya, The Great He-Goat by Mossoux Bonté is a powerful satire on superstition and fanaticism (27 – 28 JAN). Part of London International Mime Festival.

In The Chosen Haram by Sadiq Ali expect a heady mix of love, drugs and Islam. This unique and complex take on circus, performed on two Chinese Poles, is emotionally candid with moments of humour and joy set to a banging soundtrack. The Chosen Haram follows the story of two gay men and their chance meeting through a dating app, portraying the highs and lows of their relationship and the barriers they face, social, cultural and personal in seeking happiness and personal fulfilment (8 – 9 FEB)

“Elevates a boy meets-boy love story into something dream-like” The Guardian ★★★★

Inspiring, insightful and moving, 40/40 is a celebration of Katherina Radeva’s 40 years as a woman, a migrant and an artist. Claiming space on a dance floor for one, she tells stories of her past, present and future, in speech, in electrical tape and in movement. Supported by three brilliant female choreographers - Liz Aggiss, Lucy Suggate and Rachel Krische - Radeva is an irresistible performer whose authenticity and generosity shines in this life-affirming piece (23 FEB)

Sivan Rubenstein’s Dance No 2° produced by The Place takes you on a timeless journey, redefining our connection to Earth, a dance which brings you home. Rediscovering how human existence is influenced by the water, land, and elements we live with, Dance No 2° is set in an infinite landscape of waves and rolling hills, hypnotic oceans and vivid deserts (25 FEB)

In Empire of a Faun Imaginary, choreographer Simone Mousset creates a cosmos in which things remain in a state of limbo. Inspired by the experience of the pandemic, she asks about possible alternative worlds. How can a melancholic, elusive experience of the world be reopened to the miraculous and the magical? Together four dancers deliver an enchanting meditation on how to deal with an uncanny present (28 FEB)

Starving Dingoes by Lea Tirabasso portrays the urgency to live, furiously and passionately. It is a race for five dancers who, through the body and its language, explore the vital necessity, albeit brutal, to stay together (4 MAR)

Bringing together an explosive mix of everything that inspires them, the album by SAY features fast-paced and slick dance routines to incredible music tracks from artists including UK beatbox champion MC Zani; the unapologetic and raw Juliana Yazbeck; stunning spoken-word artist Holly Williams; South Africa’s hottest new duo Tina Redmxn & L Tune ‘Chillin’ and more (11 MAR)

Tom Dale Company presents a visually stunning double bill where dance meets electronic music.SUB:VERSION, a new group piece, and SURGE, a stunningly immersive solo. SURGE gives life to a future human on the bridge between the digital and organic worlds. SUB:VERSION is a hypnotic journey through an array of electronic music sub-genres to the music of WEN (21 MAR)

On the And: Honouring the Legacy of Sir Robert Cohan CBE is an unmissable event celebrating the legacy of Sir Robert Cohan CBE. The evening will feature a programme of works by the late choreographer, featuring guest artists from the Rambert School of Ballet and Contemporary Dance, Yorke Dance Project, the Royal Swedish Ballet School, and the former Richard Alston Dance Company. This special event will also see the launch of the Sir Robert Cohan Dance Legacy (24 – 25 MAR)

National Dance Company Wales presents PULSE, a powerful evening of dance featuring two physically thrilling dance works to set your pulse racing. Waltz is a new, electrifying, choreographic work from trailblazing Spanish choreographer Marcos Morau. Say Something by SAY explores what it means to 'represent', and the ever-growing expectation to have a voice. Say Something features incredible music tracks from artists including UK beatbox champion MC Zani (4 – 5 APR)