Sydney Festival 2027 Unveils Groundbreaking Dance Lineup Featuring 11 International Premieres

Sydney will host a once‑in‑a‑lifetime dance program this January, featuring 11 international works from France, Belgium, South Africa and elsewhere that will have their Australian premieres.

The program, which triples the dance offerings of the previous Sydney festival, will bring 174 performers and crew to the city. Its highlight is Rachid Ouramdane’s acclaimed 2024 piece Outsider, performed by 21 dancers from the Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève alongside four elite athletes, who maneuver through a cat’s‑cradle of high wires and slack lines to the spare, avant‑garde score of Julius Eastman.

Outsider will take place in a purpose‑built 720‑seat theatre at the newly renovated Cutaway in Barangaroo, marking the venue’s debut for theatrical performances. The same space will also present Christos Papadopoulos’s My Fierce Ignorant Step, a double bill of works by Tao Ye and his TAO Dance Theatre, and a new creation by the genre‑bending collective (La)Horde, known for collaborations with Madonna, Sam Smith and Rosalía.

Announced under the Sydney Festival banner, with the full program revealed on 19 October, this marks the first Southern Hemisphere edition of Dance Reflections—a globally touring festival backed by French jeweller Van Cleef & Arpels that has previously appeared in London, New York, Hong Kong and Seoul.

Kris Nelson, Sydney Festival director, said, “Dance Reflections has truly transformed the creation and dissemination of dance on this scale,” noting that he saw the inaugural London edition’s impact while working there.

In Sydney, Nelson says, it will be a once‑in‑a‑lifetime chance for dance fans to see the Australian premieres of works by Ouramdane, (La)Horde and rising star Leïla Ka—who has choreographed for Beyoncé—as well as a return visit from Belgian master Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker and her company Rosas, plus a new piece from Indigenous and intercultural troupe Marrugeku.

It has been over a decade since Sydney’s last major dance festival, Spring Dance. Launched by the Sydney Opera House in 2009, it ran for four years, showcasing stars such as Akram Khan and Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui, before being discontinued in 2013 for financial reasons. At the time, Opera House CEO Louise Herron described the city’s dance audience as “relatively small but passionate.”

Nelson is optimistic that this has shifted. “I’m not daunted,” he said, citing the viral rise of dance on TikTok and the pop‑culture projects of choreographers like (La)Horde and Leïla Ka, whose work springs from queer club culture and street dance.

The festival will make 10,000 A‑Reserve tickets available at $49 each, while two works will be free to the public: Trisha Brown’s seminal Roof Piece, presented in the Art Gallery of New South Wales’ gallery spaces, and Belgian choreographer Cassiel Gaube’s house‑music tribute Soirée d’études, staged at Carriageworks.

Nelson added, “I’m thrilled to offer a broad sampler of dance—from the fiercely classical to the acrobatic, from club‑infused and queer pieces to personality‑driven works with bold stage characters, and productions that showcase astonishing bodily geometry. This is your opportunity to experience it.

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