12th edition of the Holland Dance Festival closed successfully

Holland Dance Festival celebrates 50 years of the Nederlands Dans Theater
Great public interest in dance; world premieres and young talent excel.
    
The twelfth edition of the Holland Dance Festival, that was held from 28 October though 15 November in The Hague, closed successfully Sunday evening with the nearly sold-out performance of Concerto by the Dutch National Ballet. The total number of visitors to this festival was over 34.000, including 3250 professional and amateur dancers who participated in workshops, the Dansparade, and the DansFabriek. 7000 people stood along the route and at the finale of the Dansparade in spite of the pouring rain. The average attendance at the performances was 72,6%, 17 of the 63 performances were sold out. An additional 11.000 spectators are expected for the Holland Dance on Tour performances and the ‘Nutcracker in the Grote Kerk’ in coproduction with De Dutch Don’t Dance Division.   

Diverse programming and public’s favorites
Again, the Holland Dance festival presented a wide range of national and international dance performances, this edition being completely dedicated to the 50th anniversary of the Nederlands Dans Theater. New creations and young talent burst on to the scene, surprising public and press alike; the young dancers of the dance academies from Rotterdam, The Hague, and Amsterdam gained praise with fragments from the Grand Masters of the dance Hans van Manen and Jiří Kylián and were the public’s favorites. The Holland Dance Production Queen Lear, a world premiere by Michael Schumacher and Sabine Kupferberg was largely sold out and received rave reviews, as did the trilogy Small Hour, a new Korzo production by Václav Kuneš/420people.

Holland Dance Activities
Van Manen/Kylián for young dancers! will be on tour through February 2010 throughout the Netherlands. The Holland Dance and De Dutch Don’t Dance coproduction Nutcracker in the Grote Kerk will be showing from 26 December 2009. In 2010 The Match by Lonneke van Leth will reprise for a national tour, one of the public’s favorites of the 2003 Holland Dance Festival. The first Holland Dance Event in the Lucent Danstheater is Artifact by the Royal Ballet of Flanders on 21 January 2010. For playlists, see www.hollanddancefestval.com