Dublin Dance Festival 2026 doesn’t just look inward – it throws the doors wide open. Alongside a powerhouse lineup of Irish premieres, this year’s programme brings some of the most compelling international dance artists to Dublin stages and spaces, offering audiences a chance to encounter work that is daring and inventive. It’s a snapshot of global movement right now: restless, questioning and alive.
Festival glamour meets subversive wit as Les Ballets Trockadero de Monte Carlo embark on their 50th Anniversary Tour (30 April & 1 May, 7:30pm), returning to Bord Gáis Energy Theatre to open the festival. Affectionately known as “The Trocks,” the iconic company blends virtuosic pointe work with sharp comedy, reimagining classical ballet with anarchic flair and delivering what is, quite simply, pure theatrical joy.
At the Abbey Theatre, Greek choreographer Christos Papadopoulos returns to the festival with his latest work My Fierce Ignorant Step (7 – 9 May, 7pm), which connects intricate movement with a vibrant soundscape to capture the euphoria of being alive. Ten dancers move, breathe and listen as one, as rhythms accumulate and swell into something close to song. Created following Papadopoulos’ Rose International Dance Prize win, it’s a piece that leans into hope, reclaiming a youthful sense that everything is still possible.
Meanwhile, Project Arts Centre hosts two strikingly intimate works. From Italy, Silvia Gribaudi’s Suspended Chorus (12 & 13 May, 7:30pm) flips expectations with humour and disarming honesty. Taking her own 50+ body as the starting point, Gribaudi invites audiences into a space of shared vulnerability and joy. Referencing pioneers like Isadora Duncan and Pina Bausch, the work dismantles rigid ideas of beauty, celebrating instead the collective, the imperfect and the fully human.
In Puff (15 & 16 May, 7:30pm), Brazilian artist Hiltinho Fantástico, guided by choreographer Alice Ripoll, draws on samba, capoeira and Passinho to explore how cultural memory survives through the body. It’s a solo that feels both fleeting and deeply rooted – an embodiment of traditions that refuse to disappear.
The festival also spills outdoors, with Spanish company LaCerda bringing The Dance of La Zurda to Wolfe Tone Park (2 May, 1pm & 4pm) and South King Street (3 May, 1pm & 4pm). Inspired by dance marathons and Latin rhythms, it’s a free, high-energy celebration of movement, connection and release.
At IMMA – Irish Museum of Modern Art, Choy Ka Fai’s In Search of the Tragic Spirits (30 April – 20 May, 9:30am – 6:30pm) screens continuously on Europe’s largest digital screen, Living Canvas. Exploring shamanic dance as resistance among the Buryat diaspora, the film offers a meditative reflection on identity, grief and cultural survival.
Together, these works position Dublin as a vital meeting point for global dance in 2026, where ideas collide, bodies speak and audiences are invited into something bigger than themselves. For the full programme and to plan your festival journey, visit dublindancefestival.ie.
Lead Image: My Fierce Ignorant Step by Christos Papadopoulos © Pinelopi Gerasimou
