© Sacha Grootjans
After the successful remount of audience favourite Clowns (2016) in 2024, choreographer Hofesh Shechter returns to NDT with a fierce and unapologetically raw world premiere. Renowned for works that probe what stirs beneath the surface—within us and in the world around us—Shechter explores the friction between identity, the constructions of the mind, and the living body. In his new creation, dreamlike sequences unfold alongside sudden interruptions of reality, pushing the dancers to their limits. As Shechter describes, ““Your mind is a flickering light that forgot its source, images collide and fail to agree.” Navigating the space between the epic and the immediate, the work weaves arresting imagery, pulsing music, and stark physicality into a surreal journey that fully immerses you.
Credits
- Choreography
- Hofesh Shechter
- Assistant to choreographer
- Kim Kohlmann
- Music
- New composition by Hofesh Shechter
Includes fragments of:
Henry Purcell: The Gordian Knot Untied, Ill. Rondeau Minuet.
Johann Sebastian Bach: Cantata No.199, Tief Gebueckt und voller Reue.
Frédéric Chopin: Op 10, No.1 in C Major. - Lighting design
- Tom Visser
- Set design
- Tom Visser and Hofesh Shechter
- Costume design
- Yolanda Klompstra, realization NDT Costume Department
- NDT rehearsal directors
- Lucas Crandall
- Financers
- This production is co-sponsored by Ammodo Art
- Duration
- ±38 minutes
- Premiere company
- NDT 1
- World premiere date
- Sept. 24, 2026
- World premiere location
- Amare, The Hague
About 'Tunnel Vision'
© Rahi Rezvani
Dancer's experience...
Nathanaël Plantier
"Tunnel Vision is a shedding. It feels like a collective descent into the unlearned, the unruled.
The layers of what makes us interact as humans are slowly stripped to reveal the essence that lays under. Underground, under our skin, under the concrete.
Something pure and uncontrollable, that we can all connect to, the naivety of a child, the clumsiness of a cave man, the innocence of not mastering everything.
As we forge deeper and deeper through the piece we reach a point of complete oblivion, where all has been liberated, narrowing everything down to the purity of existence."
© Rahi Rezvani
Dancer's experience...
Barry Gans
"Just behind the eyes, right where the outside and the inside meet, lies a crossroad. One path takes us slightly in and up, coasting not too far from its origin, and settles gently between the ears. The other, veering off to the left, meanders slightly, then dives into the recesses, becoming jagged and irregular. Here, in the dark, before the friction of thoughtfulness can interfere, is where I imagine the swamp.
This swamp, full of thick and slippery oil, starts to pull us in slowly, until we’re completely submerged.
Suddenly, trap doors open at the bottom of the swamp and we free fall further down the passage. Familiar images flash past, distorting more and more with every level.
We drop into a buoyant bubble, jolted by the sudden halt of momentum and feeling cradled by its pressure. On this level, space swells and shrinks, shapes tilt and duplicate, and time dilates at will. Our eyes adjust to see a world built for things bigger than us, and we realize we're kids once again.
Down here, I start to remember being little and feeling invincible, when the world around me was crafted of reality and make-believe. I remember when quicksand and the dark were my greatest fears, and how heroes would save the day. I remember believing in good and evil, and wishing to jump higher and land softly. I remember play, and precious little things, and what it felt like to fall forever."
© Rahi Rezvani
Out of the stillness
This work is part of the NDT 1 programme Out of the stillness
