Shanghai Arts Festival: Nearly 90% City Premieres and a New Dance Unit

The 25th China Shanghai International Arts Festival, scheduled from October 17 to November 15, will present 60 stage productions in 168 performances, with nearly 90 percent of them making their Shanghai debuts.

There will also be exhibitions, forums and art cultivation programs during the festival. A new "Dance Reflections by Van Cleef and Arpels" unit will kick off on October 14, three days before the festival officially raises its curtains.

In its inaugural edition, the dance unit of the Arts Festival has gathered dance works by 15 troupes and companies from around the world, including China's TAO Dance Theater and XieXin Dance Theater.

The Beijing-based TAO Dance Theater will bring its "Numerical Series 15 and 18" to Shanghai, while XieXin Dance Theater will join French choreographer Brigel Gjoka to present "When Mountains Cry."

Works by artists from South Africa, Belgium, France, Germany, Greece, Italy, Switzerland, Poland, and the United States will also be presented in turn.

The Lyon Opera Ballet will perform "Dance," a representative work created by Lucinda Childs in 1979. The Trisha Brown Dance Company will also revive the classic pieces of this legendary American choreographer, taking the audience back to the important dance practices of the 1970s.

In "Loie Fuller: Research" by Ola Maciejewska, the artistic explorations of modern dance pioneer Loie Fuller will be brought to the stage. Nacera Belaza will present "La Nuée" at the Power Station of Art in Shanghai.

Other recommended stage works include two masterpieces of aesthetic synthesis by Robert Wilson, who passed away last year: "Dorian" and "Moby Dick," which will be performed by the Düsseldorf Theater.

The Berlin State Opera's "Der Rosenkavalier," the Mariinsky Theater's "Aida," and the Teatro La Fenice's "Tosca" are the three most important international operas that the newly completed Shanghai Grand Opera House will present during the festival.

The Grand Opera House will also host the festival's opening performance on October 17, a concert titled "Shanghai Grand Opera House and Friends," which brings together China's and Shanghai's top conductors, singers, and orchestras.

The festival's closing performance will be the classic "Swan Lake" by the American Ballet Theater.