A beautiful production by Simon Mcburney and Complicité that brings olga Tokarczuk’s Drive Your Plow Over the Bones of the Dead into life in a spectacular manner.

#theworm Gripping, intrusive and alienating mother-son talk.

One of the best things I’ve seen for a long time. Psychedelic and metaphysic trip.

Very impressive and surreal to realize what things this place has seen. Right soundscape to contemplate on.

I'm so impressed by this work. Wow. Just wow 🔥👏

Incredibly wonderful multimedia experience. Was for a moment completely out of this world while being confronted with its contemporary madness. ❤️

We have seen Sigur Rós play many times, both here in Amsterdam, and also several times in Reykjavík, but last night it was the first time we saw them performing with a full orchestra. What a fantastic concert!

Such beautiful and important work and where stone becomes the sky.

#whatthefuck U have created something amazing! When I get the chance, I will definitely visit again.

Hilarious and moving theatre. A queer interpretation that does right by Evelyn Waugh's famous book. Beautifully played by theatre group De Warme Winkel.

Thank you @hollandfestival for this enchantingly beautiful show by @meredithmonk. Special to see and hear this in real life. Goosebumps.

I’ve seen many Romeo Castellucci productions. Each one comes with its own level of uncomfortableness. He’s an amazing artist who goes deep into his themes. I was not prepared for his production of “Bros”. His imagery is gorgeous. His ingenuity is boundless. But this production rattled me to the core. Theatrical trauma. Physical and psychological battering. I’ll never forget it. Congratulations @hollandfestival!

ANGELA (a strange loop) is visually stunning. As blank as the artificially speaking characters are, so stunning is Markus Selg’s visual spectacle. 
- de Volkskrant

I’ve rarely seen performances where lethargy is enacted so tangibly and convincingly. Ixchel Mendoza Hernández shines in the way she enacts Angela’s estranged, affected relationship with the world, holds that hollow ball up in the air for one and a half hours, never letting it slip from her hands. (…) An incredible vision all in all, which might seem a bit lifeless in the making, but then goes on to be entirely captivating.
- Theaterkrant

A thrilling dialogue about love. (...) An own, personal version of the story about friendship and unspoken love.
- NRC ★★★★★ 

Different styles of theatre are mixed: empathic acting combined with actors exploring themselves and talking about it. (...) Watching this kind of theatre is pleasantly unsettling due to how the story can suddenly hit home at times.
- Trouw ★★★★

A generous and very vulnerable portrait of two people constantly navigating between shame and hope.
- de Volkskrant ★★★★

In the mysterious and intriguing theatre piece Bros, non-professional actors follow orders they receive through earpieces. As a spectator, you almost feel complicit in the stylised violence unfolding on-stage.
- NRC ★★★

Eight trumpets that only play a D note for half an hour. Engaging? Yes. The Holland Festival devoted a long portrait concert to Chacon in which he showed himself to be a radical, highly imaginative conceptualist and an heir to Cage and other American experimentalists from the 50s and 60s. Not always pleasant, but fascinating.
- NRC ★★★★

Glorious acid trip for adepts (...) Everything about the dance piece Dragons is right: the choreography, music, set and costumes (...) You, too, know that you don’t want to be anywhere else this evening. Only here, only now.
- Parool

The piece references the entire history of dance, both Eastern and Western. Not as a monument, not perfunctorily or seriously, but in playful references with great energy (...) where joy is the guiding principle, with large parts of the audience coming out of the venue with a smile on their face.
- Cultuurpers

An eco-thriller that never gets preachy. The facial expressions, the brilliant timing of the entire piece which, thanks to the steadfast execution of director Simon McBurney, fits together like clockwork.
- Trouw ★★★★★

Accessible piece about human cruelty. [Leading actress] Hadingue is witty and sure-footed. The microphone is her friend, and she manages to keep the performance from sounding perfunctory for even a second during its three-hour duration.
- NRC ★★★★

An hour at Bimhuis with three improvisation artists and one voice artist, with Basquiat’s painting Eroica I as inspiration. The combination of delicately performed, unusual sounds is intriguing. (...) Here, too, it’s the search for sound and rhythm that commands attention.
- Het Parool

These life-size scenes are splendidly filmed and brilliantly performed. (...) Don’t let this smashing experience pass you by.
- De Groene Amsterdammer

It’s one of those art events, or ‘total experiences’, where you feel blessed to have been there. (...) The central theme is the question why capitalism remains so appealing, despite the destructive effects we see all around us. Heavy stuff, but (...) it also has a lucid side that is often both witty and moving, thanks to its exceptional defamiliarising effects.
- Opus Klassiek

The ritualistic dance piece Exótica is an ode to the ‘exotic’ dancers of the Parisian avant-garde. (...) The tone is friendly and sincere, not confrontational, even if Piña stresses how great it feels to present Exótica in 'Amsterdam’s Stadsschouwburg, the stage for elite dance par excellence’.
- de Volkskrant ★★★☆☆

The evening’s apotheosis is a beautifully choreographed group snake dance, followed by a politically charged song full of recognisable, present-day beats.
- Theaterkrant

Humour, beauty and innovation: ballet innovator William Forsythe has it all. Three rock-solid choreographies from ballet innovator William Forsythe. (...) Call it a love letter to ballet, to ballet dancers, to the history, practice and technique of ballet.
- NRC ★★★★★

The Dutch National Ballet and Ballet Orchestra performed recent and early Work of William Forsythe, and it was first-rate. (...) Forsythe’s three-parter is a prime example of explosive power.
- de Volkskrant ★★★★

Wallworth aims for empathy, even in a story about the destructive effects of sectarian beliefs, which she once fell victim to herself. (...) This story builds bridges, but is disconcerting at the same time. Because while we may be all too familiar with cult leaders’ seduction and indoctrination techniques, Wallworth makes crystal clear how the sway they hold over large parts of the world’s population through social media is a great cause for concern.
- Cultuurpers

Indra’s Net is a cheerful celebration of unity with voices seemingly capable of anything. Theatre maker Meredith Monk manages to skilfully weave her uplifting message into the performance.
- de Volkskrant ★★★★ 

A compact, well-thought out ritual of song, stylised movement, video projections and subtle, minimalist music. (...) Monk has an extensive repertoire of sounds: teeth chattering, tongue clicking, growling, overtone singing. She makes a kind of pseudo-folk music, both complex and primitive, with surprising, at times delightfully atonal harmonies.
- NRC ★★★★ 

Besides Pankaj Tiwari, Bel asked for the Polish performer-voice artist Maria Magdalena Kozlowska, also active in the Netherlands, for the Holland Festival. Bel gave them a script, a set of rules and video excerpts, but they were free to interpret the rest themselves. (...) Tiwari’s focus on the hypocrisy behind Bel’s sustainable theatre makes this piece particularly urgent.
- Trouw ★★★

Choreographer Lukas Avendaño manages to portray the rebirth of the ‘third gender’ in spectacular fashion. I’ve rarely seen an opening of a large group piece that builds up in such a slow and beautiful way. An hour later, it turns into a spectacular rave with live drums, vocals and flute, and outrageous masked dancers.
- de Volkskrant ★★★★

Audiences lose their mind when the curtain falls. There’s a woman jumping and hollering beside me, as if her life depends on it.
- Theaterkrant

Deeply moving, with plenty of humour. Laurie Anderson (...) brought down the house in a sold-out Carré. (…) Every song feels like it’s precious to her, with fresh new arrangements. 
- Cultuurpers

The New York-based Anderson had eager audiences screaming and meditatively moving around. (...) You can hear the art scene of Laurie Anderson’s New York in the music. Glass’ minimal music remains the main point of reference, but it sometimes also channels David Byrne. Spiritually present as well is Lou Reed, Anderson’s husband who passed away in 2013.
- Het Parool

In ÔSS, a collaboration with the inclusive company Dançando com a Diferença from Madeira, Marlene Monteiro Freitas taps into her unique dancers’ strengths. Freitas’ equally theatrical and punk dance concert remains faithful to her distinctive vocabulary, where limitations only serve to inspire material. Six stellar performers draw us into an elusive world full of extremes.
- Theaterkrant

Smashing theatre with Amazon queen as a rock star. Penthesilea is a new milestone in director Eline Arbo’s oeuvre: a musical tragedy in which lust and violence vie for dominance. She movingly shows a search for vulnerability and freedom in a universe where aggression is always looming in the background.
- NRC ★★★★ 

Eline Arbo turns a tragedy from 1808 into a gem that is both sexy and toxic. (...) [She] expresses (...) primal force and love, but also distrust and power. (...) The nine-piece cast shines from beginning to end under her dynamic direction.
- Het Parool

Wonderful madness and unwavering solidarity in a dance about an Ivorian transgender community. The performance may be a bit drawn-out, but shows their fighting spirit. (...) Beugré’s ‘folles’ are a wonderfully mad, unashamed bastion of sisterly solidarity (...) in a patriarchal society.
- NRC ★★★

With a brash barking scene, it’s as if queers from Ivory Coast are saying: we’re here, and we’re not going anywhere. More than a dance performance, Prophétique (on est déjà né.es) is a vibrant plea for accepting difference.
- Het Parool

Tan Dun’s ‘Requiem for Nature’ is truly incredible, defying all genre distinctions in a one and a half-hour tour de force of imaginative vitality. (...) The work might sound a bit hodge podge on paper: choral music with ‘Western’ harmonies and striking ‘Chinese’ gliding tones, a dancing solo for pipa (Chinese lute), theatrical scenes from Buddhist mythology, Mongolian throat singing, some pseudo-Bejing opera, quasi-Gregorian singing, dripping water, glorious percussion, oh, and snatches of sultry orchestral music played with careless class by the Concertgebouw Orchestra. But it works.
- NRC ★★★★★

Theatre maker Toshiki Okada manages to serve up Armageddon with a sense of humour. The living room in the musical theatre piece ‘Metamorphosis of a living room’ is a metaphor for the earth, which is headed for catastrophe.
- de Volkskrant ★★★★

It’s estranging, bizarre, inscrutable. And fascinating, too. (...) Fuijkura’s composition is beautiful. (...) But the music is constantly interrupted by the actors saying their lines, at length, with hypnotic repetitions. (...) Theatrically, it worked very well.
- Theaterkrant

The South African Johanni van Oostrum sang the [moon song] in the performance with a rapturous soprano voice, tenderly accompanied by the Royal Concertgebouw Orchestra. (...) The American mezzo Raehannan Bryce-Davis’ robust figure and colossal voice made her an impressive modern-day witch in this frightening magical aria. 
- Opera Magazine

The decor by Heike Vollmer and Philipp Stölz, and the costumes by Anne Winckler provided the perfect backdrop and made (...) Rusalka (...) a visual success. 
- Basia con fuoco

A wonderful evening. Sigur Rós makes for dreamy music that never gets boring, as it’s more layered than the earth itself. So, too, is the voice of Jón Þór “Jónsi” Birgisson, which, in its androgyny, is even more captivating than ANOHNI’s (...) And don’t even get me started on (...) The London Contemporary Orchestra: Young classical musicians all, as diverse as the city of London. I’ve never seen such a fresh, hip and colourful orchestra with such wonderful people, who also play with equally great precision and enthusiasm. (...) Sheer delight for the eyes and ears.
- Cultuurpers

Tenebris Suspiria Naturae - There’s a slowness in their physicality which, with the soundscape, becomes almost trance-like. The combination of costumes, make-up and scenography is both raw and in your face, but precise and detailed at the same time.
- Theaterkrant

The Way We Are - The lead singer (...), with her 62 years of age, like the blonde bass player of at least the same age, is the perfect example of the kind of lady you’d like to see at boring family gatherings. The catchy punk rock (...) had Holland Festival audiences rocking in their seats.
- Cultuurpers

ANOHNI presented an impressive afternoon for reflecting on past and present, and for telling stories. (...) Journalist and presenter Marga van Praag spoke about how her mother was arrested during a raid and stood before a Nazi on Euterpestraat. (...) It was with this harrowing history in mind that William Basinski’s The Disintegration Loops was played (...) an intense sound loop that is both elusive and melancholy. (...) The setting, talks and grey skies gave the work a deep emotional intensity that will stick with me for some time.
- Cultuurpers

We come closer together digitally, while also becoming more alienated from each other. This is The Worm’s central theme. In the telephone conversation, Atkins’ mother talks extensively and fragmentarily about the difficult relationship with her own parents. (...) The Worm is fitting for a performing arts festival like the Holland Festival, as the film is like an insistent monologue - albeit a double monologue, that of a tormented mother and son.
- NRC ★★★★

With a large cast of actors, dancers and singers, four child actors and recordings of the Opera Ballet Vlaanderen symphony orchestra, the 30-year-old director portrays this pitch black family epic with a steady hand. The synergy between acting, dancing and singing is often impressive.
- de Volkskrant ★★★

This might make Houbrechts’ piece sound heavy-handed, but that’s not the case. The equally humorous relatability of human ineptitude (...) and Bach’s beautiful music give the dark piece a silver lining.
- Theaterkrant

Accompanied by a string quartet, a saxophonist/clarinettist, pianist and beat boxer, CocoRosie managed to channel a world of sounds. From tranquilly meditative to wildly swinging. (...) The icing on the cake, which really added to the concert, were the short intermezzos in which the clarinettist did some wonderfully melancholy solos and the string quartet calmed things down with classical-sounding compositions.
- Trouw ★★★★

The dynamic between the performers was heart-warming without feeling gooey, mainly thanks to the obvious joy of everyone on stage and in the venue. 
- Cultuurpers

With Wuthering Heights, the Holland Festival brought first-rate British theatre to Amsterdam’s DeLaMar Theatre for a full week. This English-spoken production from director Emma Rice is bursting with creativity, speed and theatrical ideas.
- de Volkskrant ★★★★

Director Rice tells this story in an epic manner, with a visual vocabulary that keeps surprising. (...) The performance includes puppetry, slapstick and music, too. (...) Rice keeps her audience on their toes with humour and visual spectacle. Vicki Mortimer’s set design is a sight to behold. (...) This delightful version of Wuthering Heights is raging with emotion. 
- NRC ★★★★