Artsadmin’s Spring/Summer ’26 Season

Image: Memory of Birds by Tania El Khoury at the Fisher Centre, New York, 2023. Photo by Maria Baranova

Inspired by the real lives of the artists behind the work, our programme is set to stir hearts and spark imaginations…

After captivating audiences in Riga, Dublin, Poland and Belgium last year, one of our longest standing touring projects The Making of Pinocchio kicks off our Spring/Summer season at It’s The Real Thing Festival in Basel 26 – 27 March. The piece by Cade & MacAskill has been described by audiences as ‘unmissable’, ‘breath-taking’, ‘phenomenal’, ‘showstopping’ and ‘the queer love story of the year’.

Closer to home, following a preview at Southbank Centre last November which audiences described as “powerful”, “emotional” and “brilliant”, Tink and Abra Flaherty’s new show Gen X Gen Z has already hit the ground running. This season it heads to Brighton Fringe as part of caravan assembly on 10 May and to Cambridge Junction a few days later on 14 May. Featuring real life parent and child Tink and Abra, the show uses verbatim conversations and invites the audience to have a peek into their lives over the years, exploring their relationship with each other and the world around them.

From 2-4 July, Tania El Khoury’s Memory of Birds invites you to lie amongst the trees at the Belluard Bollwerk festival in Fribourg, Switzerland and take part in a quiet, reflective experience in nature. Taking the form of an immersive sound installation, and created in collaboration with a trauma therapist, the piece gently guides participants through a somatic experience. Drawing on the imagery and movement of migrating birds as a poetic metaphor, the work invites listeners to reflect on themes of displacement, memory, and the lasting impacts of political violence.

Later in the summer, the outdoor sensation Dominoes by Station House Opera is finally coming home to the UK, making its way through Newcastle Upon Tyne at NOVUM festival on 9 August, before heading to Kaapstad festival in Tilburg, Netherlands on 23 August. Dominoes has brought together local people in countries around the world, creating a city-wide celebration as thousands of breeze blocks topple onto one another, to trace their way through local sites.

Throughout the season, we’re proud to support artists at Toynbee Studios by providing opportunities to connect, learn, and grow. Morning Creatives continues to make space for practitioners working in contemporary and live art to come together each month. For those of you interested in applying for an Arts Council England (ACE) Project Grant, we’re hosting a Homework Club every week throughout April, to give you solid time and space to work on your application and troubleshoot with peers, all facilitated by our fantastic team of producers. The first session takes place online and we’ll be joined by Lucy Richardson, Relationship Manager at Arts Council’s London Theatre team. Look out for the open call for our next Lab artist residency programme in June and be sure to attend the Lab 2026: Online Information Session on 20 May which outlines the application process and what you can expect if selected.

Set in a fictional film studio, you are invited to go behind the scenes of Cade & MacAskill’s creative process and their relationship, and question what it takes to tell your truth.

Artists and lovers Rosana Cade and Ivor MacAskill began creating The Making of Pinocchio in 2018, developing alongside Ivor’s gender transition. In this ‘funny, clever and thoughtful two-hander, rich in playful imagery’ (The Guardian) their tender and complex autobiographical experience meets the magical story of the lying puppet who wants to be a ‘real boy’.

With an ingenious scenography designed by Tim Spooner, layered with sound by Yas Clarke, lights by Jo Palmer and cinematography from Kirstin McMahon and Jo Hellier, the show constantly shifts between fantasy and authenticity, humour and intimacy, on stage and on screen.

26 – 27 March | It’s The Real Thing Festival | Basel, Switzerland

Tom of Finland. Breastfeeding. Men. Raving at the Hacienda decades apart. Just the usual parent and child catch-up. For Tink (parent) and Abra (child), it’s just another Tuesday. Gen X Gen Z eavesdrops into their real-life conversations. This is a show about parenting, being parented and the ongoing process of becoming who you are, no matter your age, with your family as your witness.

10 May | Brighton Dome

14 May | Cambridge Junction

Memory of Birds is an interactive sound installation that takes place in trees, created in collaboration with a trauma therapist and migrating birds. The work explores political violence that literally and figuratively gets buried in contested lands. It centers the artist’s complicated relationship with the land—one that holds trauma, mass graves, and toxicity, a repository of political struggle, a record of power dynamics, and a site of various species migrating for survival.

A guided somatic experience, Memory of Birds is a work that eats itself, designed to be forgotten.

2 July – 4 July | Belluard Bollwerk | Fribourg, Switzerland

Dominoes takes as its starting point the simplest of ideas, a line of dominoes. Thousands
of breeze blocks are used to create a moving sculpture which unfolds across the entire
city.

On streets, in parks, through buildings and even on water, occasionally disappearing and
then resurfacing, the domino line threads its way through historic and everyday parts of
the city, linking its diverse communities in a chain of cause and effect. Hundreds of
volunteers and audience members gather together to make this exceptional and unique
event.

Dominoes creates an alternative vision of the city, counterpointing, complementing and
subverting the architecture, and for a brief moment reclaiming the city streets for its
inhabitants. Dominoes was created in London and has travelled to more than 20 cities including Copenhagen, Marseille, Ljubljana, Ghent, Hull, Toronto and Melbourne.

9 August | NOVUM Festival | Newcastle Upon Tyne City Centre, UK

23 August | Kaapstad Festival | Tilburg, Netherlands

On the first Wednesday of every month, we invite freelance artists, creatives, and producers working in contemporary performance and live art to join us at Toynbee Studios for a relaxed morning of connection, conversation, and creative exchange.

It’s an informal networking space to meet fellow practitioners, spark new ideas, and share what you’re working on. Bring your own brunch, settle in, and make the morning your own.

Wednesday 1 April

Wednesday 6 May

Wednesday 3 June

Artsadmin’s Homework Club is a welcoming co-working space for performance-based and multi-disciplinary artists, producers, and creatives to come together, learn, and make progress on their projects.

This Homework Club series focuses on the Arts Council England (ACE) Project Grant, supporting artists and creative practitioners to develop and deliver ambitious projects.

8 April | Online Introduction | Online

15 April | Project Design | Toynbee Studios

22 April | Budgeting | Toynbee Studios

29 April | Touring | Toynbee Studios

Join us for an introductory online session to learn more about our 2026 Lab Residency Programme.

Artsadmin Lab is a curated residency programme hosted at Toynbee Studios that supports the early stages of artistic development. It offers, space, time, and resources to artists working in live or interdisciplinary practices to explore new ideas and approaches.

In this online session, the Artsadmin’s Programme team will walk you through the aims and benefits of the programme, how to apply, and what to expect if selected. There will also be time for a Q&A.

Wednesday 20 May | Online

Meanwhile, we’re delighted to share more about some new partnerships…

We’re excited to be working on LabXL, a programme collaboration with Creative Migration/Bangkok 1899 thanks to British Council’s Connections Through Culture programme. As part of the peer exchange, Susannah Tantemsapya, a climate-focused cultural producer based in Thailand and the US, and Raidene, our Artistic Director, will host public events, sector dinners, artist-led discussions and workshops.

Thanks to a new collaboration with PROJEKT EUROPA, there’s an opportunity to join IMMERSION LAB: a five-day Lab guided by migrant artists, which is built for participants to create new work by exploring archives and documentary materials. We’ll dive into the approaches of international practitioners and develop processes unique to each artist, with the hope to enrichen future work. If you’re interested in joining the Lab starting on 29 June, bookings will open on 15 April. Register your interest to get an email once the Lab is open for bookings.

We’re thrilled to be working with Ray Young on the 40-minute sound piece THIRST TRAP, which explores the potential climate change could have on the future of our planet. In contrast to a traditional theatre or venue, the piece takes place somewhere more familiar: your bathtub. Guided by a meditation-style narrative, audiences follow prompts that shape the experience as it unfolds, creating a moment of reflection that is both personal and immersive. We’re currently looking for partners to get this brilliant project out into the world.

Finally, we’re delighted to be a part of Whitechapel Gallery’s Backyard Biennial, a cross-venue festival which celebrates the rich history and culture of London’s East End. The festival features a one-off sharing of Riwa Saab‘s new work How I Grew a Moustache. There’ll also be an opportunity to join Diasporas Now to create a performance from conception to public sharing through exploring diasporic identity, memory and belonging. More details about the full line-up of events will be announced in May, so be sure to subscribe to our newsletter to stay updated.

We hope to see you this spring/summer, whether online, abroad or at Toynbee Studios.

With support from the British Council’s Connections Through Culture grant, Lab XL brings together Creative Migration/Bangkok 1899 and Artsadmin for a peer exchange between cultural producers and leaders in Thailand and the UK.

Susannah Tantemsapya, a climate-focused cultural producer based in Thailand and the US, and Raidene, our Artistic Director, will host and contribute to public events, sector dinners, artist-led discussions and workshops.

Hear from Susannah and Raidene in their conversation about the project

In partnership with Artsadmin, PROJEKT EUROPA is thrilled to launch IMMERSION LAB — an evolution of our long-running PRACTICE LAB and a rare opportunity to dive deep into distinct global methodologies that expand your creative toolkit through embodied research, multilingual practice and fearless experimentation.

Our first IMMERSION LAB (29 June–3 July) is an intensive, hands-on laboratory where you’ll generate new work by activating archives, documentary material and verbatim interviews, guided by migrant artists working across cultures and disciplines.

Across five energising days, international practitioners will share powerful approaches that transform historical traces and lived testimony into bold, embodied performance. Each facilitator brings a singular artistic language, equipping you with fresh strategies for creating from imagination, multiplicity and new perspectives.

This is an exciting, accessible chance to supercharge your practice, connect with a vibrant community of artists, and make work that feels urgent, alive and unapologetically relevant.

There’s two opportunities to join the five-day Lab, starting on 29 June and 5 October. Bookings will open 15 April.

Fee: £300 per participant

Part-narrative and part-meditation, THIRST TRAP is a 40 min sound piece for audiences to listen to in the bath along with an experience pack of resources to change their physical environment, connecting closely with their personal atmosphere and relationship with their bodies.

THIRST TRAP delves into the possible outcomes of rising temperatures and the correlation between social and climate justice. A sister piece to their swimming pool performance experience BODIES, THIRST TRAP continues Young’s investigation into water as a key character in our collective conversations on climate justic

Find out more

19 March 2026 Categories: Stories