La Biennale di Venezia has Reappointed Sir Wayne McGregor as Artistic Director of the Dance Department for the years 2025 and 2026

Sir Wayne McGregor has been reappointed as the Artistic Director of the Dance Department of La Biennale di Venezia for the two-year term 2025/2026. The decision was made by the Board of Directors, chaired by Pietrangelo Buttafuoco. Wayne McGregor was appointed Director of the Dance Department by the preceding Board of Directors in 2020, an appointment that was to expire after the 18th International Festival of Contemporary Dance, We Humans, to be held in Venice from 18th July to 3rd August 2024.

Pietrangelo Buttafuoco, President of La Biennale di Venezia: “Wayne McGregor was successful in building a far-reaching project for Biennale Danza, wielding a remarkable sensibility that looks with attention to the younger generations on the world stage. Seeing him at work in the past weeks, studying his prodigious imagination and his efforts as a Maestro in the exclusive school that is the Biennale Danza College, allowed me to understand that his work deserves more time to consolidate practices and visions that are important to our institution. Wayne McGregor and I, in the name of a new fact of art, have agreed to meet in Venice once again, and so I am pleased to announce that he has been reconfirmed for the two-year term 2025-2026.”

Sir Wayne McGregor: “It has been a great honour and creative pleasure curating the last four years of Biennale Danza. During this time, we have been able to grow the dance festival into a three-week international event inviting and commissioning extraordinary artists and companies from six continents who have thrilled and inspired our broadening audiences. Continuing our mission over the next two years to invest in new contemporary dance talents, platforming their voices through Biennale College and our bespoke developmental programmes. I look forward to working with the brilliant Biennale team to drive forward an evolving and powerful vision for dance today.”

The 18th International Festival of Contemporary Dance, titled We Humans will include 7 world premieres, 2 European premieres and 11 Italian premieres from iconic dance world leaders to emerging, innovative new voices. Over 160 artists will perform in Venice with more than 80 events across 17 days.

This fourth year as Director of Dance in Venice for Wayne McGregor culminates in an epic festival exploring the very nature of what it is to be human. Unwrapping the great complexity, contradictions and mystery that is human life is a career-long preoccupation for the movement creatives invited to Biennale Danza 2024. For thousands of years, bodies moving rhythmically has been the main form of communication. According to McGregor, our desires have been expressed through our bodies historically. Furthermore, he believes that dance is within us and cannot be replaced by words alone. The 2024 artistic programme celebrates the body’s ability to communicate when our feelings are too strong, too complicated or too much to bear. In those moments, it is the body that provides relief and solace.

Cristina Caprioli has been awarded the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement and Trajal Harrell has received the Silver Lion. The  Lions were awarded by the Board of Directors of La Biennale di Venezia upon recommendation of the Artistic Director of the Dance Department of La Biennale di Venezia, Wayne McGregor. The Lions for Dance Awards Ceremony will take place on 21 July at 6pm CST.

Biennale College Danza connects young talent with unrivalled learning, training, mentoring, and creating opportunities. The past four years has seen these young talents mentored by internationally respected artists including Pite, Forsythe, Xie Xin, Teshigawara, Forti, McGregor and others. This year again sees 16 young dancers from around the world and 3 young choreographers, selected from over 400 applications, who will be resident at Biennale Danza 2024 for three months, taking classes, workshops, repertory and vitally, creating new work. Golden Lion, Cristina Caprioli and Artistic Director, Wayne McGregor will lead the Biennale College Danza programme in 2024.

In a special large-scale, site-specific commission, Biennale Danza Director Wayne McGregor will create a collaborative work with the young artists alongside his Company Wayne McGregor (in residence for Biennale Danza 2024) in the monumental Sala Grande in the Palazzo del Cinema on the Lido. A high tech, high touch collaborative project.