Photo: Amanda Harput
DO YOU HAVE TO COMPROMISE?
That is the question we ask the artists, ourselves and the audience this edition of Feeling Curious?
We’ve invited performers and makers who are unafraid to take a stand. They explore, confront and express what drives them. Undaunted by what makes them uncomfortable, they use their discomfort to create new space, whether artistic, political or human. We look forward to share this with a curious and engaged audience, believing in the power of imagination and new vistas. Where do you stand? Where do we stand?
This edition pushes the boundaries of disciplines even further. We have added a film program in collaboration with Roffa Mon Amour, installations by visual artist Nástio Mosquito, and music by Gaye Su Akyol, Türkiye’s Queen of Rock. The festival opens with a live performance by Alida Dors, HAYP and Gershwin Bonevacia a theatre statement in music and poetry.
Encounters and exchange take centre stage. In a series of workshops and artist talks, creators interact with the audience, and international performers meet local talent. The power of Feeling Curious? lies in the unexpected and in radical imagination. Are artists the visionaries of our time? Allow yourself to be swept away, prepare to be surprised!
Dave Schwab Head of programming
FRANK CHERISH MENZO / GRIP & THEATER UTRECHT
I.S.M. DANCE ON ENSEMBLE
WED 24 SEP | 19:00 – 20:30
THU 25 SEP | 19:00 – 20:30
TR25 Schouwburg | The Kitchen
After the award-winning JEZEBEL and DARKMATTER, choreographer Cherish Menzo examines the figure of the monster in FRANK – short for Frankenstein. A ritualistic, apocalyptic and carnivalesque performance, where narrated identities are challenged, and flesh can deviate and be corrupted until it bursts and becomes unbearable. In an increasingly unstable world of unlikely and violent events, we are reminded of early horror films and this eerie feeling, the flicker in the dark. FRANK is the final part of a trilogy bringing the black body to the center and attempting to explore the African Diaspora's multi-intersections.
Extra: Artist Talk
THU 25 SEP | 22:15 with Jan Martens & Cherish Menzo
Photo: Bas de Brouwer
I NEVER LIE
AGNESE VALMAGGIA WORLD PREMIERE
I Never Lie is a personal, multi-sensory solo performance about the struggle with expected behaviour. What if you were born at a different time? What else could you have been? Driven by that curiosity, Agnese Valmaggia uses the drums an instrument that historically defied expectations for women - as a lens to explore the invisible norms that confine us. The drums are the beating heart of the performance, accompanied by triggers, electronics, samples, and immersive visuals. A journey into the bittersweet reality of social expectations, inviting us to imagine: what else could I become?
WED 24 SEP | 19:15 – 20:00
WED 24 SEP | 21:30 – 22:15
TR25 Schouwburg | Kleine Zaal
THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER 2.0 JAN MARTENS / GRIP DUTCH PREMIERE
"Open all pores to this gem. And above all, don't forget to breathe," wrote Het Nieuwsblad in 2014 about THE DOG DAYS ARE OVER. The reviews back then spoke volumes: this production marked the breakthrough for Jan Martens. Now, ten years later, he returns with a re-creation featuring a new cast. Eight dancers are subjected to a complex, mathematical, vigorous and exhausting choreography, executed in forced uniformity, they inevitably slip up. And that's when their masks fall. Through the jump, the person behind the dancer is exposed.
WED 24 SEP | 21:00 – 22:05
THU 25 SEP | 21:00 – 22:05
TR25 Schouwburg | Grote Zaal
Photo: Alwin Poiana
Photo: Monica Da Ros
FLESH CAN’T CAN’ T NOT’T ‘TIS FLESH H…
MARIO BARRANTES ESPINOZA DUTCH PREMIERE
FRI 26 SEP | 19:30 – 20:30
TR25 Schouwburg | Kleine Zaal
Extra: CULO SHAKING NIGHT
FRI 26 SEP | 18:00 – 00.00
AJJIT
KHADIJA EL KHARRAZ ALAMI / THEATER ROTTERDAM / DE SINGEL
With AJJIT, storyteller and performer
Khadija El Kharraz Alami explores how music, rhythm, and movement can spark a different kind of storytelling. Together with artist and music producer Reda Senhaji, she delves into the polyrhythms of Moroccan genres such as Ahwach, Gnaoua, and Chaabi. They search for ways to reawaken pre-capitalist bodies and explore their complex, shared identity. AJJIT is an invitation to collective reflection on loss, remembrance, and the role of the performing arts in a world in crisis. This performance is a prologue to SHRINE, premiering in 2026.
FRI 26 SEP | 21:00 – 21:45
SAT 27 SEP | 20:00 – 20:45
TR25 Schouwburg | The Kitchen
Imagine a scifi world shaped by reggaeton, the urban dance perreo, everyday life with a limited understanding of English, and Central Americas historic connection with the export of exotic fruits. This is the world that Flesh can’t can’ t not’t ‘tis flesh h… invokes; a multisensory performance selected for the TheaterFestival in Flanders. From the Jury: “It feels like stepping into a well-hidden queer party: reggaeton pumping through the speakers, lights flashing, and a scenography of chains and sticky matter that is both provocative and inviting.”
Photo : Maryan Sayd
DEAD LEAF
NASSIM BADDAG / LILIAN DAMANGO WORLD PREMIERE
Nassim Baddag has worked with choreographers like Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker among others. He creates a unique hybrid choreographic language that blends breakdance with contemporary dance. In Dead Leaf four performers dive into a raw, organic chaos that shifts back and forth between tension and release. Here, falling becomes a shared act, a necessary movement, never entirely solitary. It’s a cycle: fall, reach the ground, rise again but differently. Dead Leaf is a sensory and visceral experience where falling sets us free, transforms us, and allows breath to return.
SAT 27 SEP | 19:30 – 20:05
SUN 28 SEP | 16:00 – 16:35
TR25 Schouwburg | Kleine Zaal
GAYE SU AKYOL
Gaye Su Akyol, the Türkiye's Queen of Rock, is a singersongwriter who stretches and redefines genres. She is known for her unique blend of Anatolian folk, psychedelic rock, postpunk, and electronic influences. In her live performances she weaves together traditional instruments, like the electro baglama and sazbüş, with electric guitar, bass, and synths. With her latest album, Anadolu Ejderi (2022), Gaye takes a more explicitly political and personal approach. Expect a carefully constructed set, both musically and visually, where poetry, social commentary, and personal reflection come together.
SAT 27 SEP | 21:00
TR25 Schouwburg | Grote Zaal
Photo : Eda Nur Yilmaz
DOUBLE BILL: NEXT PERSPECTIVES
ASTRID SWEENEY & WEIXIN QUEK CHONG / HÉLÈNE VRIJDAG
DUTCH PREMIERE (ONTOGENESIS DREAMS)
TAMBOURINES
TRAJAL HARRELL / ZÜRICH DANCE ENSEMBLE
DUTCH PREMIERE
THU 2 OCT | 21:00 – 22:20
TR25 Schouwburg | Grote Zaal
Inspired by Nathaniel Hawthorne’s novel
The Scarlet Letter, Tambourines is a tribute to all the women who, throughout history, were denied the right to make decisions about their own bodies. Choreographer Trajal Harrell is associate artist at Holland Festival 2025, and recipient of the Silver Lion at the 2024 Venice Biennale Danza. He demonstrates how courage can create a lasting legacy with this deeply moving and subversive dance production. “Another reason to love Trajal Harrell!” The Guardian.
ASTRID SWEENEY & WEIXIN QUEK CHONG
ontogenesis dreams is a collaborative hybrid of performance and installative environment. A being in its seemingly natural habitat embarks on an existential metamorphosis. Disoriented and disassembled, it finds itself falling, sensing, mimicking the movements of plants, machines or insects; a post- or transhuman organism trying to piece together its existence in an ambiguous body. Inspired by queer ecologies, molting and adaptation, the artists explore the body’s impermanence through its relationship with an unruly organic material.
HÉLÈNE VRIJDAG
my sweet nasty lunacy is a solo by Hélène Vrijdag: a live EP where her alter ego Woman Folly takes the mic - a queer and feminist answer to the character of Woman Folly in Erasmus’ book In Praise of Folly. The concert is a collection of hyperpop bangers, an ode to the hysterical femme. In her arena with nothing but moving lights, concert conventions and the voices in her head, Woman Folly sings her soft setlist from sweet sweet hell.
TUE 30 SEP | 20:00 – 22:00 TR25 Schouwburg | Kleine Zaal & The Kitchen
Artist Talk THU 2 OCT | 22:30 with Trajal Harrell
Extra:
Photo : Sara Schoon
Photo : Orpheas Emirzas Photo
BLUE NILE TO THE GALAXY AROUND OLODUMARE
JEREMY NEDD / IMPILO MAPANTSULA
In blue nile to the galaxy around olodumare, choreographer Jeremy Nedd and dance collective Impilo Mapantsula explore the Black diaspora in an Afrofuturistic experience. Inspired by cosmic phenomena, they bridge the spiritual jazz of Alice
DELIRIOUS NIGHT
METTE INGVARTSEN
DUTCH PREMIERE
SAT 4 OCT | 21:00 – 22:00
TR25 Schouwburg | Grote Zaal
Coltrane and Bheki Mseleku with pantsula: the energetic South African dance style that gave an entire generation a voice during apartheid. Known for its virtuoso footwork, pantsula is here connected with echoes of past protests against oppression. The performers reflect on the compression of space and time, and on our illusions of progress toward the future.
SAT 4 OCT | 19:30 – 20:30
TR25 Schouwburg | Kleine Zaal
Nighttime turns into a delirious celebration. It can be a delightful and enjoyable zone, but sometimes also a bewildering and dangerous one. What does the night bring when daily duties and rules are temporarily suspended? A group of nine performers surrender their bodies to a delirious night of dance and music. Oscillating between hedonism and exorcism, joy and sadness, these bodies thrive in an intoxicating mood of collectivity. How can a state of decontrol and excess drive the crowd to act?
Extra: Delirious Closing Night with N8W8 en Klauw
Photo : Bea Borgers
Photo: Bollwein
NÁSTIO MOSQUITO
Nástio Mosquito is the special guest of this edition of Feeling Curious? Born in Angola (1991), raised in Lisbon, and currently based in Ghent and Marrakesh, Mosquito’s practice fuses film, music, performance, spoken word, and visual art. His work interrogates themes of identity, colonial history, cultural construction, language, and our emotional truths - often undercutting the clichés surrounding African identity.
During Feeling Curious? two installations await you in unexpected corners of the Theater Rotterdam building. In the hidden spaces of the toilets, Mosquito offers a quiet yet radical proposal: to listen closely, where we usually rush. In the Erker foyer you are invited into a cinematic ritual of reflection and reckoning, with a live performance and talk on Thursday October 2nd.
SHAPE OF A VOICE / NIGGER’S WORK ( ACT I – ACT XII ) LISTENING STATIONS
24 SEP – 4 OCT
TR25 Schouwburg | Erker foyer
Enter the most private space in public life - and listen. This installation transforms various toilets at Theater Rotterdam into listening stations, where you can experience selections from the podcast series, THEY THE THEM ARE WE. Through audio fragments and printed visual prompts, Mosquito invites the listener to tune into voices and perspectives that are often overlooked, especially in places where silence is expected.
LET ME READ YOU ROUGHLY INSTALLATION
In this film Mosquito reads a story about how to kill a friend and recites two poems by Álvaro de Campos and by the Lebanese mystic Khalil Gibran. For him, this film is a reflection on everything in which he has failed. Although Mosquito says that he failed in his commitment to ‘debunk identity’, debunking identity seems exactly what he continuously wants to draw us towards, while inviting us to ask ourselves some serious questions.
24 SEP – 4 OCT
TR25 Schouwburg | Erker foyer
LET ME READ YOU ROUGHLY PERFORMANCE
It could be a dark stand-up comedy show, if it wasn’t a sitdown reading session: Mosquito reflects on life paths and the relationships we enter into in our lives. The show increasingly becomes a subtle guide to an unusual process – how to kill a friend, effectively. In a quasispiritual atmosphere, accompanied by 6 paravents as scenography, the artist stages a haunting yet cathartic reading performance.
The works are part of Nástio Mosquito’s larger THEY THE THEM ARE WE-project, centering the emotional, mental, and spiritual realities often excluded from public debate.
THU 2 OCT | 19:30 – 20:30
TR25 Schouwburg | Erker foyer
Photo : Christine Clinckx
FEELING EXTRA?
In addition to a line-up of performances, Feeling Curious? presents a context program of installations, talks, films and dance parties. Feeling Extra? offers greater insight into the artists and their work. It’s an invitation to engage more fully with the questions, themes, and urgency the artists bring to the stage.
ARTIST TALKS
Take a deeper dive into the world of the artists after their performance. Over drinks they will discuss the themes that emerged and consider them in a broader context.
THU 25 SEP | 22:15 | Jan Martens & Cherish Menzo
THU 2 OCT | 22:30 | Trajal Harrell
TR25 Schouwburg | Erker foyer
Photo: Amanda Harput
FILM PROGRAM
ROFFA MON AMOUR X FEELING CURIOUS?
A CURATED SERIES OF SHORT FILMS WITH LINKS TO ROTTERDAM
TR25 SCHOUWBURG | HALL THEATER
PROGRAM 2
TUE 30 SEP – SAT 4 OCT
WANDER TO WONDER NINA GANTZ
Mary, Billybud and Fumbleton are three tiny humans who star in a children’s TV show Wander to Wonder. After the creator dies, they find themselves alone in the studio. A sinister stopmotion film with a keen eye for detail.
PROGRAM 1
WED 24 – SUN 28 SEP
PLEASANT HELL
SUZANNE KOOPSTRA
Pleasant Hell follows four young men from Rotterdam who connect through music and creativity as they wander through a life that they experience as a pleasant hell.
CALTHA
ISABEL LEGATE
Caltha is a retelling of the myth of the caltha palustris flower – a vibrant fivepetaled yellow bloom that grows in abundance in the Biesbosch National Park.
MA’MAQUEEN
ESMEE VAN LOON
Esmée van Loon’s film observes the life of young drag queen
Ma’MaQueen/Venus Bijleveld. Vulnerable and open, Venus shares how it feels to live in a society where people still live and think in boxes.
BUBBLING BABY
SHARINE RIJSENBURG
Bubbling Baby is an upbeat feminist ode to the bubbling scene. It documents the origins and evolution of the genre as one of the most fervent expressions of the cultural heritage of the Dutch Caribbean.
DRIFTER
JOEP JANSEN
An astronaut becomes detached from his space station. Kept alive by a mysterious green liquid, he is taken on an infinite drift across the universe. Freed from time and space, DRIFTER is a confrontation with the void.
WHERE DO IDEAS COME FROM JOYSI OLIJHOEK
Joysi Olijhoek uses a split screen with seemingly unrelated archive material to probe the question, “Where do ideas come from?” As the film progresses, we witness the emergence of a new idea.
NEW BABYLON GIDEON VAN DER STELT
An impossible city made up of gigantic rotating rings steers the lives of its lonely inhabitants. New Babylon follows the secluded lives of three separate characters.
QUEER MERCURY
ERIK PETERS
Queer Mercury follows three members of the Dutch ballroom scene during their preparations for the Utopia Ball at Rotterdam’s Kunsthal in 2021.
WHAT HAVE YOU ZINE? WORKSHOP
WED 24, THU 25, SAT 27 SEP THU 2, SAT 4 OCT after the Grote Zaal performances TR25 Schouwburg | Hal
CULO SHAKING NIGHT!
As part of the performance Flesh can’t can’ t not’t ‘tis flesh h… Theater Rotterdam transforms into a Costa Rican queer cantina hosted by your aunties: El Santo Playo (Mario Barrantes Espinoza) and La Terre (Luis Murillo Zúñiga). Get ready to let it all out and venture with us into an emotional crying moment while shaking our booties profusely! In the spirit of family celebrations in Latin America, the Culo Shaking Night is an evening where you can come together - accompanied by food, kitschiness, and music - and meet artists whose work explores narratives around queerness and Latin American themes. We invite you to stay a little longer in the universe of the performance!
FRI 26 SEP | 18:00 – 00:00
Zines have their roots in protests and activist movements. They began as a way for people who felt disenfranchised from dominant media to make their own voices heard. From their origins in feminist, queer, antiracist and punk movements, zines have matured into a powerful DIY medium: cheap, direct and unfiltered.
This free workshop starts immediately after the performance on the main stage and is hosted by an experienced zine maker. Throughout the entire festival the Zine corner will be set up for the audience. Put together a zine, and use the special button maker machine to make your own pin button, either from the buttons in the program booklet or based on your own design.
FEELING ROTTERDAM? WORKSHOP
Especially for local dancers, the festival offers a fiveday workshop rooted in the creative philosophy of Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui. Led by longtime collaborator Nick Coutsier, this workshop is a unique opportunity to dive into Larbi’s artistic legacy and explore your own creative voice as a dancer or maker. Nick will be joined by Astrid Sweeny and Nassim Baddag, both former dancers with Larbi who have since grown into independent choreographers and are presenting their own work during Feeling Curious?
Check the website for more information, the fee, and how to apply. The application deadline is 7 SEP.
TR25 Schouwburg | Hal SAT 27 SEP – WED 1 OCT
DELIRIOUS CLOSING NIGHT
Close Feeling Curious? with a BANG: an evening full of conversation, performance, and celebration together with KLAUW.
TALK DELIRIOUS CLOSING NIGHT
Feeling Curious? present a program related to Mette Ingvartsen’s Delirious Night. Asking the question, Do you have to compromise? we explore the night as a space for freedom, desire and resistance. What does it mean to be uncompromising within the context of nighttime culture? When the lights go out, what is left?
SAT 4 OCT | 19:00 – 20:30 TR25 Schouwburg | Hal
KLAUW X FEELING CURIOUS?
CLOSING PARTY
KLAUW invites you to the magical closing night. Join our curious crowd for an evening of hypnotic beats, surprising performances, and unexpected encounters. Come as you are, let others do the same and who knows what new inspiration you’ll take home.
SAT 4 OCT | 23:00 – 03:00 Time is the New Space
Photo: Amanda Harput
DATES AND TIME
Please note that changes in the program may occur.
WEDNESDAY 24 SEPTEMBER ongoing INSTALLATIONS NÁSTIO MOSQUITO
THURSDAY 25 SEPTEMBER
19:00 – 20:30 FRANK CHERISH MENZO / GRIP & THEATER UTRECHT I.S.M. DANCE ON ENSEMBLE
20:00 – 20:30 OPENING ROFFA MON AMOUR X FEELING CURIOUS?
–
FRIDAY 26 SEPTEMBER ongoing INSTALLATIONS NÁSTIO MOSQUITO
21:00 – 21:45 AJJIT KHADIJA EL KHARRAZ ALAMI / THEATER ROTTERDAM / DE SINGEL
SATURDAY 27 SEPTEMBER
ongoing INSTALLATIONS NÁSTIO MOSQUITO
ongoing FILM PROGRAM 1: ROFFA MON AMOUR X FEELING CURIOUS?
& TOILETS
19:30 – 20:05 DEAD LEAF NASSIM BADDAG / LILIAN DAMANGO WORLD PREMIERE KLEINE ZAAL
20:00 – 20:45 AJJIT KHADIJA EL KHARRAZ ALAMI / THEATER ROTTERDAM / DE SINGEL
21:00 GAYE SU AKYOL
SUNDAY 28 SEPTEMBER
ongoing INSTALLATIONS NÁSTIO MOSQUITO
ongoing FILM PROGRAM 1: ROFFA MON AMOUR X FEELING CURIOUS?
& TOILETS
16:00 – 16:35 DEAD LEAF NASSIM BADDAG / LILIAN DAMANGO KLEINE ZAAL
TUESDAY 30 SEPTEMBER ongoing INSTALLATIONS NÁSTIO MOSQUITO
ongoing FILM PROGRAM 2: ROFFA MON AMOUR X FEELING CURIOUS?
&
20:00 – 22:00 DOUBLE BILL: NEXT PERSPECTIVES DUTCH PREMIERE ASTRID SWEENEY & WEIXIN QUEK CHONG / HÉLÈNE VRIJDAG KLEINE ZAAL / THE KITCHEN
THURSDAY 2 OCTOBER
ongoing INSTALLATIONS NÁSTIO MOSQUITO
& TOILETS ongoing FILM PROGRAM 2: ROFFA MON AMOUR X FEELING CURIOUS?
19:30 – 20:30 LET ME READ YOU ROUGHLY NÁSTIO MOSQUITO ERKER
21:00 – 22:20 TAMBOURINES TRAJAL HARRELL / ZÜRICH DANCE ENSEMBLE DUTCH PREMIERE
22:20 WORKSHOP: WHAT HAVE YOU ZINE?
22:30 TALK TRAJAL HARRELL
SATURDAY 4 OCTOBER
ZAAL
ongoing INSTALLATIONS NÁSTIO MOSQUITO ERKER & TOILETS
ongoing FILM PROGRAM 2: ROFFA MON AMOUR X FEELING CURIOUS?
19:00 – 20:30 TALK DELIRIOUS CLOSING NIGHT FEELING CURIOUS?
19:30 – 20:30 BLUE NILE TO THE GALAXY AROUND OLODUMARE JEREMY NEDD / IMPILO MAPANTSULA
ZAAL
21:00 – 22:00 DELIRIOUS NIGHT METTE INGVARTSEN DUTCH PREMIERE GROTE ZAAL
22:00 WORKSHOP: WHAT HAVE YOU ZINE?
23:00 – 03:00 CLOSING PARTY KLAUW X FEELING CURIOUS?
Feeling Curious? is the international multi-day performance festival of Theater Rotterdam. The program, packed with boundarypushing performances, talks, workshops, films, parties and exhibitions, gives a platform to artists with a radical perspective on today’s world. In their performances they challenge established systems, imagine alternatives, and present sometimes confrontational visions of the future. In times of polarization and collective uncertainty, we ask ourselves, the artists, and the audience: Do you have to compromise?
Immerse yourself in Feeling Curious? with a stacking discount 2 performances = 10% discount 3 (or more) performances = 20% discount
Up to 30 years-discount = big hall shows €12,50 | other shows €10,00
FEELING CURIOUS? CREW
DAVE SCHWAB, RENEE DE WILDE, BART HUISKENS, SHEREE LENTING, LENA EILERS, MERANO KALPOE, SABRINA SCHOUTEN, MEREDITH DAENEN, DANIELLE HIELCKERT, MARIEKE VAN OOSTEN, DAAN VAN DOREMALEN, FLOORTJE JONGKOEN, AMY ROMBOUT, SEFTON GEUBBELS
DAVID TEEKENS AMANDA HARPUT, HEREWEGO / STUDIO VANDIESEN, NOA MÜLLER, JONATHAN FAEMS AND EVERYBODY AT THEATER ROTTERDAM
WITH THE SUPPORT OF: