NOW WE ARE EARTH / An Orchestra

Nicole Beutler Projects
Wed 24 Sep and Thu 25 Sep
Wed 24 Sep 2025
and
Thu 25 Sep 2025

NOW WE ARE EARTH/ An Orchestra is a multifaceted vision of the future. At a time, when polarisation and successive crises leave us drifting apart, the performance highlights that which unites us. This dance opera seeks a new balance with everything that lives. Human, animal, plant, fungus, bacteria and technology: NOW WE ARE EARTH/ An Orchestra is a future dream in which all elements live in peace and coherence with the planet.

Inspired by the endless and inextricable bonds of fungal threads in a fungus flake, all performers build together a polyphonic, resonant web full of colours and sounds, like an eternally repeating and branching pattern.

The boundaries between stage and audience are literally stretched and you experience a performance in which music, song, dance and set merge into an eco-futuristic “singing together for greater cohesion”. The voices of the performers and a many-member city choir led by young composer Timo Tembuyser, together with Lena Newton’s set and composer Gary Shepherd’s electronic, futuristic soundscapes, form a Gesamtkunstwerk that resonates like a collective, vibrant breath.

Alongside the performance, we are running an impact programme comprising of various installations and activities, such as an audio introduction, a reading table, a short film and a meet and greet with a climate psychologist.

NOW WE ARE EARTH/ An Orchestra is the third and last part of RITUALS OF TRANSFORMATION (towards a new humanity). In this trilogy, Beutler designs visions and future scenarios for the planet in relation to the worldwide climate crisis.

In the media

THEATERKRANT
“Alles klopt in dit derde deel (…) mysterieus waar het moet intrigeren, kernachtig ritmisch op energieke momenten.”

HET PAROOL
“Beutler weet te raken. (...) Een begeesterd werk waarin het publiek wordt omhelsd door een nieuwe energie, en de mensheid nieuwe rituelen en nieuwe vormen van verbinding vindt.”

DE VOLKSKRANT
“Timo Tembuyser (...) geeft stem aan een hemels gevoel van saamhorigheid. In haar regie betrekt Beutler de lokaal geworven zangers slim en effectief bij deze ‘muzikale en belichaamde reis naar een nieuwe samenklank’.”

Credits

concept, regie, choreografie Nicole Beutler | performers Felix Schellekens, Timo Tembuyser, Margarida Constantino, Hillary Blake Firestone, C'Cesirhe Sedney, Abigail Vrede, Anna Herrmann (Dance On Ensemble), Lia Witjes Poole (Dance On Ensemble) | muziek Gary Shepherd | vocale composities Timo Tembuyser | koor lokale stadskoren | tekst coach / advies / editing & fragmenten Peter Verhelst | dramaturgie Igor Dobričić | decor Lena Newton, Noa Helder | licht Minna Tiikkainen | kostuums Jessica Helbach | productie Nicole Beutler Projects, Opera Ballet Vlaanderen | coproductie Dance On Ensemble/Büro Ritter, O. Festival for Opera. Music. Theatre, Opera2Day | residenties Grand Theater Groningen, Opera Antwerpen, Opera Gent | met steun van Fonds Podiumkunsten, Amsterdams Fonds voor de Kunsten, Ammodo, Fonds 21 | met dank aan Internationaal Theater Amsterdam, Het Goethe-Instituut Amsterdam

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