Bebel Gilberto and Asian Dub Foundation among NYUAD Arts Centre's new season line-up

The annual performance season will feature film screenings and dance productions

Asian Dub Foundation will bring their heaving rhythms to NYU Abu Dhabi Arts Centre. Photo: Alex Sudea / Rex Features

Concerts, dance performances and film screenings will feature in NYU Abu Dhabi Arts Centre’s new season.

Beginning on August 31 and running until May, the ninth season will also see the return of the popular two-day music event, the Barzakh Festival.

“Over the past nine years, the Arts Centre has been committed to creating a platform for audiences to discover unfamiliar disciplines, artists and works, with a promise of inspiration, stimulation, reflection, and fun,” says the centre's executive artistic director Bill Bragin.

“We are proud to once again commission new works of regional relevance and international significance that showcase the richness of our programming and the development of the UAE’s cultural output, bringing several world premieres and even more regional premieres to the nation.”

Here are some of the main highlights of the centre’s programme, with more artists to be announced at a later date.

Arts and Dance

The season features several arts exhibitions an dance performances, with some to be revealed later in the year.

Opening event Now Is When We Are (the stars), is an immersive exhibition featuring 5,000 individual points of light and a 496 channel sound system.

Taking place from August 31 to September 3 and September 5 to 10 at The Black Box, an unseen narrator guides audience members through the various spaces as they light up the rooms with their movements.

Also announced is Mehek, the latest work by British-Indian choreographer Aakash Odedra and acclaimed Indian Kathak dancer Aditi Mangaldas.

Exploring society’s conceptions of love, the performance will take place at The Red Theatre on February 7 and 8.

The concerts

During the latest season, a number of artists will be making their UAE debut.

The Asian Dub Foundation will bring their jungle rhythms and sharp bass lines to The Red Theatre on September 22.

Known for their 1998 Mercury Prize nominated album Rafi’s Revenge, the group will hit the NYU Abu Dhabi stage with new songs to play courtesy of latest album, 2020’s Access Denied.

Some of the storied history of bossa nova music will be celebrated in a concert by Bebel Gilberto on September 30 at The Red Theatre.

The Brazilian singer will perform a collection of songs dedicated to her father, Joao Gilberto, who has been accredited as one of the pioneers of the popular genre.

The home-grown world music event, Barzakh Festival, returns to The Red Theatre on March 1 and 2.

Tunisian singer-songwriter Emel Mathlouthi and Egyptian folk music collective Mazaher will also perform, with the full eclectic line-up to be revealed later in the year.

More concerts will also be announced in the future.

A film concert

There is also a new classic film experience accompanied by live music that is scheduled to take place at The Red Theatre on October 5.

The experience will have the Philip Glass Ensemble score the 1982 movie Koyaanisqatsi, which has an original score by Philip Glass.

The experimental film is hailed as a masterpiece of its form and consists primarily of slow motion and time-lapse footage of cities and natural landscapes in the US.

For the full list of announced shows and ticket prices, visit www.nyuad-artscenter.org