LIFT, the leading London biennial festival of international theatre, has today announced the programme for June 2020 – its first under new Artistic Director/CEO Kris Nelson and Executive Director Stella Kanu.
In a time where we are redefining our relationships with the rest of the world, Kris and Stella present a line-up of daring, topical and compelling work which challenges and ruptures convention, sparking vital social and political conversations concerning communities across the country. LIFT 2020 brings together a myriad of voices from Kenya to Australia and Tottenham to Azerbaijan who will present extraordinary and ground-breaking experiences in a festival rich in ideas, unusual perspectives and exhilarating experiences right across the city.
Kris Nelson says, “In 2020, LIFT declares FACT & FANTASY as our theme. Giving audiences artistic and aesthetic experiences of FACTS – memoir, testimonials, theatre that’s ripped from the headlines and FANTASIES – unusual, sensorial, imaginative interpretations of the world we live in and could live in. We are delving into where action, hard truth and proof clash with shifting perceptions, the dissonance between fact and fiction and beautiful lies. Audiences will get opportunities to be playful with what they believe and want to believe in.”
Acts of telling and retelling stories, the fallibility of these accounts, and the impact this has on identity and our understanding of gender and power relationships are explored in The Argonauts, Is This a Room? and The Second Woman.
Ruth Wilson says, “I am absolutely thrilled, and a little scared to be part of Nat Randall and Anna Breckon’s truly unique theatrical experience. I have a feeling that The Second Woman will challenge all norms of what it means to be actor and audience, to be performer and observer. And what better place to be breaking the mould, than at the Young Vic, in partnership with LIFT Festival. Please come share this weird and wonderful journey with me.”
Rebellious voices from London to Nairobi are brought to the forefront as their visions for what our community can be forms the heart of LIFT. Togetherness is celebrated in a night of revelry at Master Shipwrights House on the Thames, whilst our hospitality is put to the test with an outdoor interactive installation that passers-by are invited to help create.
The 2020 Festival marks the cap stone of the LIFT Tottenham project, which over the past five years has seen local schools, artists and young people collaborate with international artists and companies to produce critically acclaimed commissions that celebrate the spirit and heart of the borough. SESSION, a Tottenham Original project in collaboration with Still House, Steppaz and Empire Sounds, will return for LIFT 2020 following a national tour. New commission Balthazar’s Treasure: The Cocao Quest, a real-world adventure conceived and directed by digital artist and experience designer Imwen Eke in collaboration with The UpLIFTers – young people from two Tottenham based schools – will unearth the hidden history of the borough and its links to Balthazar Sanchez, the Moor who first brought chocolate to the UK.
The Full LIFT 2020 Line up can be found here
