The first wave of the UK in Japan 2019-20 programme has been announced by British Council, with more activity planned for the full year starting in September 2019.
The programme includes highlights from BBC Proms Japan, BFI and National FIlm Archive of Japan, British Library, Jason Bruges Studiuo, Graeae Theatre Company, Royal Court Theatre, Scottish Ensemble and Anna Meredith, The Royal Opera, Philharmonia Orchestra and more.
The place to be every August is Edinburgh. Both the Edinburgh International Festival and Festival Fringe are a vast collection of UK and overseas talent in performing arts across all its forms, both traditional and innovative or original.
British Council has announced the artists-in-residence for the first-ever at Ise Jingu, the spiritual home of the Japanese people.
The artists are:
William Fowler, curator of Artists' Moving Image at the British Film Institute, was invited to China to give a series of talks on the BFI/LUX This is Now touring programme. He tells us more about the trip and about the appetite for artists' moving image in China.
Acclaimed Italian theatre director Pippo Delbono opens his "theatrical ode to joy, surprise and enchantment", La Gioia, at Hong Kong Arts Festival on 22–23 March 2019.
La Gioia highlights the consequences of living without understanding. It brings anguish and ecstasy to the stage, accompanied by paper boats, flamenco dance, flowers by the thousand and a circus parade.
Delbono is described as one of Europe's most distinctive artistic voices, in the firmament of Pasolini, Beckett, Bausch and Kantor.
In mid-January 2019, British Council launched the first edition of SPARK: The Science and Art of Creativity festival, taking place at Tai Kwun Centre for Heritage and Arts in Hong Kong.
SPARK celebrates creativity across the arts, sciences and education, and offers a platform for cultural exchange between the UK and Hong Kong. With more than 30 events over three days and over 50 creative and education partners from the UK and Hong Kong, SPARK provided a series of interactive experiences, provocative performances, stimulating talks and other innovative happenings.
The National Gallery will loan around 60 masterpieces to Japan for the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. This will include Van Gogh's classic Sunflowers, its first time in Japan.
The works will be displayed, in partnership with media organisation The Yomiuri Shimbun, at the National Museum of Western Art in Tokyo on 3 March–14 June and the National Museum of Art in Osaka on 7 July–18 October in 2020.
British Council has now appointed Jean Cameron as Creative Director for UK/Italy Season 2020, starting in February 2019. Jean will work with British Council teams in UK and Italy, as well as directly with the UK cultural sector to create a high-impact, cost-effective season of UK cultural activity in Italy in autumn 2020.
When Oscar Wilde died in 1900, the few obituaries that appeared were miserable: The Times concluded that death had brought an end to ‘what must have been a life of wretchedness and unavailing regret’, while The Sunday Times thought ‘no sadder record of a life wilfully blighted can be found… ’ And yet—more than a century later—Wilde’s star burns brighter than ever, and as Matthew Sturgis writes in his new biography (Oscar: A Life) ‘the position he holds is an extrao
London International Mime Festival, directed by Helen Lannaghan and Joseph Seelig, is a unique event in the theatre calendar, a once a year chance to see the very best and newest contemporary visual theatre that embraces cutting edge circus-theatre, juggling, puppetry, live art, mime and physical theatre.
