HELIOS [AOTEAROA NEW ZEALAND FESTIVAL OF THE ARTS] (2026)

For one week only, step into the glow of Helios, a breathtaking, larger-than-life artwork created by renowned UK artist Luke Jerram. 

Helios fills the Concert Chamber with a kind of quiet astonishment, the sort that settles over you before you even realise you have stopped talking. The room itself is usually a cool, echoing space, but with Luke Jerram’s six‑metre sun suspended at its centre, it feels transformed. The glow is the first thing you notice. A warm, steady radiance that softens the chamber’s edges and pulls you toward it like a tide.

Up close, the illusion falters a little. You can see the seams, the joins, the practicalities that hold the sphere together. The surface becomes less celestial and more engineered. But take a few steps back and the magic returns. The lighting inside the sphere creates slow, hypnotic movements that ripple across the surface, giving the impression of a living star. The warmth it casts is not literal, yet it feels strangely real, as if the chamber has been gently heated by its presence.

The installation invites lingering. Chairs and beanbags are scattered around the space, encouraging visitors to sit, recline, wander, or circle the sphere from every angle. The ability to view it from the gallery above adds another layer, offering a sense of orbiting rather than observing. Each vantage point reveals something different. From below, the sun feels monumental. From the side, it becomes a textured landscape. From above, it looks almost serene.

The atmosphere shifts again at lunchtime when musicians from the Auckland Philharmonia take their place beneath the sphere. Strings, oboe, or improvisational quartets play for an hour each day, and the effect is remarkable. The music wraps around the installation, turning the chamber into a sanctuary. Even outside of performance hours, the ambient soundtrack creates a sense of calm that encourages people to slow down. The cold, formal architecture of the room dissolves into something warm and meditative.

Helios is both scientific and poetic. Knowing that its surface is built from hundreds of thousands of images, drawn from NASA data and astrophotography, adds a sense of awe. You are looking at something real, yet reimagined. Something familiar, yet unreachable. The installation’s scale, combined with the subtle animated lighting and immersive soundscape, creates an experience that feels both intimate and vast.

In a week of unpredictable weather, the chance to sit beneath a sun that never burns out feels like a small gift. Helios offers a moment of stillness, a reminder of the beauty and complexity of the star that sustains us, and a rare opportunity to see it in a way that feels both monumental and gentle.

Helios was created by renowned UK artist Luke Jerram 

This event is free! You do not need to book tickets; you can just show up.

Helios is available March 7-16, 11am - 5pm at Aotea Centre, Auckland

DUCKPOND [AUCKLAND ARTS FESTIVAL] (2026)

The world’s most romantic ballet is reimagined as a circus spectacular, bursting with Circa’s signature physicality, cheeky humour and infectious energy.

Duck Pond does not ease you in. It grabs you by the hand like an overexcited friend and drags you straight into a world where fairy tales have been cracked open, shaken around, and rebuilt with circus bodies, glitter, and a wicked sense of humour. The whole thing feels alive in a way that is hard to fake. There is a youthful spark running through every moment, the kind of energy that makes you lean forward without realising you have done it. You can feel the performers enjoying themselves, and that joy becomes contagious.

The story is a playful mash of The Ugly Duckling and Swan Lake, but it never pretends to be a faithful retelling. Instead, it treats the narrative like a trampoline. A prince wanders around in a crown that looks like it came from a fast-food birthday party. A cupid in a black and white tutu flits around stirring trouble. The ugly duckling glows with hints of gold as she tries to figure out who she is. The black swan struts in with burlesque confidence, all smirks and red stilettos. The plot is simple enough to follow, especially with the synopsis handed out beforehand, but the show is not really about the story. It is about the feeling of watching these characters collide, flirt, fight, and eventually find something that looks like freedom.

The acrobatics are where the show becomes breathtaking. Human towers rise with a steadiness that seems impossible. You watch the porters at the base, muscles locked, faces calm, and you realise how much trust is being exchanged in every second. Flyers arc through the air with a grace that feels almost reckless. When two towers stand side by side, four bodies high, the audience goes silent in that instinctive way that happens when everyone is holding their breath at once. The balancing acts are equally mesmerising. One arm handstands, bodies stacked in improbable shapes, toes hooked onto hips and shoulders. It is the kind of skill that makes you forget to blink.

What makes these feats land so powerfully is the performers’ attitude. They are not solemn about their abilities. They grin at each other. They tease. They celebrate tiny victories mid‑routine. The athleticism is extraordinary, but the humanity is what makes it beautiful. You feel like you are watching a group of people who genuinely love what they do, and that warmth radiates outward.

The aerial sequences add another layer of magic. Silks unfurl like waterfalls. Ropes twist and spiral. Rings spin with a hypnotic rhythm. Each aerial moment feels like a breath being held in midair. The choreography moves between intimate duets and full ensemble patterns with quick, playful shifts. There is a looseness to the movement that keeps everything feeling spontaneous, even though the precision is razor sharp.

Humour is everywhere. The duck army is a highlight, waddling in with yellow flippers and oversized clown trousers to comfort the heartbroken duckling. Their mop routine is pure slapstick, and the audience laughs with the kind of delight that comes from being genuinely surprised. The cupid character darts around causing chaos. Even the more provocative moments, like the black swan stepping over a nearly naked performer in her red heels, are delivered with such cheek that they land as bold comic punctuation rather than tonal shocks. The show revels in contrast. Sweetness sits next to absurdity. Innocence brushes up against flirtation. Elegance shares the stage with silliness.

The design elements support this playful spirit. Costumes lean into black and white, with glittering unitards, tiny tutus, and flashes of gold. The ducklings’ yellow outfits pop against the pale strips of fabric hanging around the stage. The set is simple, almost bare, which gives the performers room to fill the space with their bodies and personalities. The soundtrack blends shards of Tchaikovsky with looping, suspenseful arrangements that stretch out the feeling of suspension. The music becomes a kind of invisible partner, nudging the action forward.

The choreography is full of clever details. Group sequences ripple across the stage with fast paced shifts in formation. Duets melt into trios, which then expand into full ensemble moments. Swan motifs appear in subtle gestures, in the curve of a neck or the sweep of an arm. The movement language blends circus technique with dance inspired phrasing, creating a hybrid style that feels fresh and playful.

Late in the show, the tone shifts. The performers begin stripping the stage bare. They roll up the floor, remove costumes, and dismantle the set in full view of the audience. The Swan Lake storyline has already resolved, so what follows feels like a series of bonus acts. A hoop routine. A Cyr wheel sequence. A few other tricks that feel like they belong to a different show. The shift is abrupt, but the performers’ charm carries it. Even when the cohesion wobbles, the entertainment never falters. The audience stays with them, buoyed by the cast’s enthusiasm.

What lingers after the show is not just the skill, although the skill is extraordinary. It is the feeling of being invited into a world where playfulness is taken seriously. Where strength and silliness coexist. Where a fairy tale can be retold with feathers, glitter, and human towers. Circa’s performers are astonishing athletes, but they never hide behind technique. They let the audience see the camaraderie, the trust, the shared mischief. The result is a production that feels warm, generous, and full of life.

Duck Pond is breathtaking in places, wildly creative throughout, and above all, infused with a youthful spirit that makes the whole experience feel fresh. It is a reminder that circus can be both technically brilliant and irresistibly fun. The performers soar, tumble, flirt, and laugh their way through a world that feels familiar and entirely new at the same time. You leave the theatre buzzing, feathers still floating somewhere in your imagination.

Performances of Duck Pond run from March 12-15 at Auckland's Kiri Te Kanawa Theatre, Aotea Centre. For show information & tickets head to Auckland Arts Festival

WAIORA TE ŪKAIPŌ – THE HOMELAND - AUCKLAND THEATRE COMPANY [AUCKLAND ARTS FESTIVAL] (2026)

Set in the summer of 1965, Waiora follows Hone, who brings his whānau from the East Cape to the South Island in search of a better life.

Waiora: Te Ūkaipō – The Homeland returns to the stage nearly three decades after its debut, carrying with it the weight of its legacy and the resonance of its themes. This new Auckland season, directed by its playwright Hone Kouka, arrives with the expectation that time has only sharpened its relevance. And in many ways, it has. The production remains a deeply felt portrait of a Māori family navigating dislocation, cultural pressure, and the uneasy promise of a “better life” far from home. Yet despite its emotional sincerity and the clear affection the audience holds for it, this staging doesn’t always land with the urgency or dramatic tension one might expect from a work so steeped in conflict.

Set in the mid‑1960s, the play follows a whānau who have uprooted themselves from their ancestral home and resettled in the South Island, where the patriarch has taken work in a timber mill. The premise is simple: a birthday celebration on a beach, shared with Pākehā guests, becomes the catalyst for buried tensions to surface. But the story’s simplicity is intentional. Rather than relying on plot twists or high‑stakes theatrics, the play focuses on the subtler fractures that appear when a family is caught between the world they come from and the world they’re expected to assimilate into.

The production leans heavily into this sense of cultural in‑betweenness. Te Reo Māori is woven throughout the performance; not as ornamentation, but as the emotional backbone of the piece. For fluent speakers, these moments are rich and grounding; for those without the language, they may create a sense of distance. Yet that distance feels purposeful. The play is, after all, about what is lost when language and identity are eroded, and about the ache of trying to hold on.

The cast brings a lived‑in quality to the family dynamic. Regan Taylor’s portrayal of the father figure captures a man shaped by generational trauma and the pressures of providing in a world that was not built for him. His volatility is tempered by flashes of vulnerability, hinting at a man who wants the best for his family but has inherited the worst tools for achieving it. Erina Daniels, as his partner, offers a grounded counterbalance; her performance is understated but quietly commanding, especially in moments where her character must navigate the expectations placed upon her as both mother and mediator.

The younger performers, Rongopai Tickell, Tioreore Ngatai‑Melbourne, and Te Mihi Potae, bring energy and emotional clarity to their roles. Their characters embody the tension between youthful hope and the weight of inherited struggle. Their scenes together feel particularly genuine, capturing the rhythms of sibling relationships with warmth and occasional bite.

The tīpuna (ancestors), embodied by a small ensemble, provide a spiritual and symbolic presence throughout. Their movement, song, and watchfulness create a sense of continuity between past and present, reminding the audience that the family’s story is part of a much longer lineage. These sequences are among the production’s strongest, offering moments of beauty, gravitas, and humour that transcend the literal action onstage.

The staging at ASB Waterfront Theatre is clean and evocative. The beach setting is suggested rather than literal, allowing the performers’ physicality and the sound design to fill in the sensory details. The lighting shifts between naturalistic warmth and more stylised, ritualistic tones, guiding the audience between the everyday and the ancestral.

Music plays a crucial role. The waiata and haka sequences are powerful; confident, resonant, and emotionally charged. They stand in stark contrast to the snippets of Pākehā pop music that appear throughout the play, which feel intentionally flimsy by comparison. This juxtaposition underscores the central tension: the whānau’s Māori identity is strong and deeply rooted, yet they are constantly asked to mould themselves into something smaller, softer, more palatable.

Despite its strengths, the production doesn’t always maintain dramatic momentum. The stakes, while thematically significant, don’t always translate into gripping theatre. Much of the conflict unfolds in quiet exchanges or simmering resentments, and while this subtlety reflects real family dynamics, it can leave the narrative feeling somewhat flat. For viewers seeking a more propulsive or emotionally volatile experience, the pacing may feel too gentle.

There is also a noticeable restraint in the portrayal of racism. While the script acknowledges the prejudice the family faces, the performances, particularly from the Pākehā characters, stop short of embodying the full ugliness of that reality. Whether this is a deliberate choice to avoid caricature or simply a softness in the performances, the result is that the systemic forces pressing on the family feel more conceptual than visceral.

One of the most striking aspects of the evening was the audience’s reaction. There were frequent bursts of laughter, applause, and audible recognition; moments where the crowd clearly connected with the humour, nostalgia, or cultural specificity of the piece. For many, the play is a homecoming, a reminder of stories they grew up with or experiences they recognise intimately.

For others, that connection may be harder to access. If you don’t share the cultural touchpoints or the linguistic fluency, the emotional beats may feel more distant. That doesn’t diminish the play’s value, but it does shape the experience. In many ways, Waiora isn’t trying to be universal. It’s speaking directly to those who carry the history it depicts, and inviting others to listen in.

What lingers after the curtain call is not the plot, but the themes: the ache of leaving home, the pressure to adapt, the quiet erosion of identity, and the resilience required to hold onto what matters. These ideas remain painfully relevant in Aotearoa today, where debates about land, language, and belonging continue to shape the national conversation.

Even if the production doesn’t always ignite emotionally, its cultural and historical significance is undeniable. It stands as a reminder of how far we’ve come, and how far we still have to go.

Waiora: Te Ūkaipō – The Homeland may not have swept me up in the way I hoped, but its sincerity, its cultural grounding, and its intergenerational resonance give it a quiet power. It’s a play that speaks most deeply to those who recognise themselves in it; and perhaps that is exactly as it should be.

Performances of Waiora Te Ūkaipō - The Homeland run from March 6-22 at Auckland's ASB Waterfront Theatre.
For show information & tickets head to Auckland Arts Festival

WEREWOLF [AUCKLAND ARTS FESTIVAL] (2026)

Three ill-equipped wardens keep watch over a makeshift community (that’s you, the audience) who must learn to work together. When night falls — who do you trust? 

A gripping, communal, and surprisingly funny descent into collective paranoia, Werewolf takes the familiar shape of an emergency lockdown and twists it into something far stranger. What begins as a lightly satirical nod to the rituals we all learned during the COVID years becomes an increasingly tense, atmospheric, and deeply social experience. What we experience is a show that thrives on audience energy without ever forcing anyone into the spotlight, and the result is a night that feels less like watching theatre and more like being swept into a shared event.

The experience starts before anything “begins”. Being scanned into the auditorium carries a different weight now, and passing through a security portal sets the tone. Inside, the Loft has been transformed into a containment unit lined with silver sheeting. Brightly lit seats face forward in tight formation, each with a Public Information Booklet waiting like a government-issued survival kit. Cargo boxes stamped with ambiguous logos reinforce the sense of an organised, entity involved. A single monitor shows a murky darkness beyond the safehouse walls, hinting at whatever threat lurks outside.

Once the final person enters, the doors seal. The wardens take charge. They are warm, competent, and reassuring at first, with a knack for crowd management and a veneer of calm authority. Stella Reid, Hannah Kelly, and Joel Baxendale play versions of themselves, which adds a playful meta-layer. They feel like the kind of people you’d want in charge during a crisis. But as the minutes tick by, cracks appear. Their confidence wavers. Their unity fractures. The safehouse begins to feel less safe.

The premise is simple: a new outbreak has swept the country, and we must isolate for seven days. The word “werewolf” is never used, replaced instead with the more clinical “lycanthropy”, which somehow makes it worse. The threat is both absurd and unsettling, and the show leans into that tension.

One of the show’s strengths is how it handles audience involvement. Every seat has a small card outlining a role, and eight audience members are quietly deputised as monitors for wellbeing, safety, time, and other categories. But the structure is gentle. You can speak up or stay silent. You can follow your booklet to the letter or simply observe. The show never demands performance; it invites it.

This low-pressure approach creates a space where people feel comfortable contributing. Some audience members become enthusiastic collaborators, especially the group in tin foil hats convinced that 5G is to blame. Others remain quiet but attentive, feeding the atmosphere with their presence. The wardens are skilled improvisers, responding to interruptions, weaving audience comments into the narrative, and maintaining a delicate balance between humour and dread.

The social aspect is central. You share snippets from your booklet with your neighbours. You compare notes. You try to decide what’s real and what’s rumour. The show becomes a living network of whispered theories and half-truths. It’s a clever reflection of the misinformation cycles we all lived through, and it lands with a mix of recognition and unease.

The production design is minimal but potent. The silver sheeting creates a claustrophobic bunker. The forward-facing seating arrangement means the threats can move around unseen in the dark. Lighting shifts signal day and night, and the sound design fills the space with eerie ambience, distant howls, and the unsettling quiet of a world gone wrong.

The periods of complete darkness are the show’s most memorable feature. When the lights cut out, the room becomes a void. You can’t see the person in front of you. You can’t tell if someone is moving. The violin score slices through the silence, and you find yourself straining to hear footsteps or breathing. The tension builds slowly, then snaps with sudden flashes of light and bursts of sound that send jolts through the audience.

On some nights, a grainy infrared feed monitors the door outside the safehouse. Watching the screen becomes its own kind of suspense. Is something moving? Is the threat approaching? The ambiguity is delicious. These sensory elements are used sparingly but effectively. They never overwhelm the experience; they heighten it. The darkness becomes a character in its own right.

Despite the tension, the show is genuinely funny. The wardens deliver dry one-liners, awkward pep talks, and bureaucratic jargon with impeccable timing. The karaoke wellness session is a highlight, a moment of absurd levity that feels both ridiculous and strangely comforting. The humour doesn’t undercut the horror; it makes the darker moments hit harder.

This blend of tones mirrors the emotional whiplash of real crises. One moment you’re laughing at a silly pun, the next you’re questioning whether the person next to you might be infected. The show understands that fear and comedy often sit side by side, and it uses that interplay to keep the audience off balance.

What makes Werewolf memorable is how it transforms a room full of strangers into a temporary community. You enter as individuals and leave as a group who have weathered something together. People linger afterwards, comparing theories, debating what was staged and what was improvised, recounting the moments that made them jump or laugh or doubt their neighbours.

The show taps into something deeply human: our instinct to band together in uncertainty, our susceptibility to suspicion, and our desire to make sense of chaos. It echoes the shared trauma of lockdown without feeling exploitative. Instead, it reframes that experience through a playful, theatrical lens.

The content warnings are well-earned. There are loud noises, flashing lights, and long stretches of darkness. The show is designed to unsettle. But it’s also designed to welcome. Whether you’re a game-lover eager to participate or someone who prefers to sit quietly and observe, the structure accommodates you.

Werewolf is a sharp, inventive piece of interactive theatre that understands the power of collective imagination. It uses simple tools to create rich tension, and it trusts its audience to help shape the experience. The result is a night that feels alive, unpredictable, and strangely cathartic. It’s horror-comedy with heart, a social experiment wrapped in a thriller, and a reminder of how quickly a room can shift from safety to suspicion.

If you enjoy theatre that blurs the line between spectator and participant, or if you’re drawn to stories that play with fear and humour in equal measure, this is a show worth seeking out. It’s not just something you watch. It’s something you live through.

Performances of Werewolf run from March 5-8 at Auckland's Loft, Q Theatre.
For show information & tickets head to Auckland Arts Festival

RED PHONE [AOTEAROA NEW ZEALAND FESTIVAL OF THE ARTS] (2026)

An audience-to-audience performance experience by Boca Del Lupo

There’s something quietly delightful about stumbling into a piece of theatre that asks so little of you and yet reveals so much. Red Phone is exactly that kind of surprise: fun, interactive, and an unexpectedly charming way to break up your day if you’re even a little bit curious.

You step into a beautifully crafted vintage red phone booth, lift the receiver, and suddenly you’re both performer and audience in a tiny world built for two. A teleprompter sits between you and the unseen voice on the other end, who might be a friend, a partner, or a complete stranger, guiding you through short, scripted dialogues written by world-class playwrights, including Aotearoa’s own Victor Rodger ONZM. It’s intimate, a little mischievous, and strangely revealing, like being caught singing in the shower and realising you don’t mind.

Boca del Lupo, the internationally acclaimed Canadian company behind the installation, has toured this work through Canada, Norway, and Latin America, and now it’s tucked into Tāmaki Makaurau for a brief window from March 4–7. It’s free, it’s small-scale, and it’s the kind of participatory theatre that feels more like a social experiment than a performance; a reminder that conversation itself can be a form of art.

Not everything lands perfectly. The audio is on the quiet side, and because you’re reading instructions while trying to listen, the experience leans more toward concentration than immersion. You’re aware of the mechanics even as you’re inside them. But the uniqueness of the setup; the handcrafted booth, the red phone, the thrill of speaking scripted words to someone you can’t see; still carries a certain magic.

What lingers is the simplicity: two people, one phone line, and a script that becomes a tiny, shared moment. Whether you go with someone you know or take the plunge with a stranger, Red Phone offers a gentle, curious reminder that even the smallest conversations can become theatre.

Red Phone was conceived by artistic directors Sherry Yoon and designed by Jay Dodge, with technology by Carey Dodge 

This event is free! You do not need to book tickets; you can just show up. If there are a lot of people, you may need to wait for your turn.

Red Phone is available March 4-7, 11am - 5pm at Aotea Centre, Auckland

WHITE NOISE - TOUCH COMPASS

WHITE NOISE turns the gaze back on the audience. Emerging from creator Alisha McLennan Marler’s lived experience as a mother with disability, the work is an intimate yet defiant exploration of communication. 

If Abilitopia opens the evening with playfulness and imaginative freedom, White Noise brings the night crashing back into the body; into the weight of lived experience, into the strain of being seen and unseen, and into the relentless labour of communicating in a world that often refuses to listen. The shift in tone is immediate and unmistakable. Where the first work delights in experimentation, the second demands attention with a quiet ferocity, drawing the audience into a space that is intimate, uncomfortable, and profoundly human. Created and performed by Alisha McLennan Marler, the solo performance unfolds as a raw excavation of what it means to navigate motherhood, disability, and identity under the constant pressure of misinterpretation.

The stage is stripped back, dominated by a wheelchair, a microphone, and a soundscape and fractured set of mirrors that Alisha manipulates live. These elements become extensions of her body; tools, obstacles, amplifiers, and sometimes adversaries. Early in the performance, she begins to explore the microphone not as a device for speech but as a tactile instrument. She drags it across the metal of her chair, presses it against wheels and footrests, and uses it to summon a palette of sounds that range from grating irritation to rhythmic monotony to moments of unexpected calm. Each sound feels like a fragment of an internal world made audible, a translation of sensations that words alone cannot hold. The repetition of looped audio becomes a central motif, capturing the exhausting cycle of trying to be heard, of repeating oneself, of pushing against the static that so often surrounds disabled voices.

As the loops accumulate, the atmosphere thickens. Layered, pulsing, sometimes overwhelming, the sound design mirrors the emotional terrain of the work. Frustration builds, not theatrically but viscerally, as the audience is drawn into the relentless effort required simply to communicate. Yet the loops also shift, later in the piece, into something gentler: echoes of connection, of being understood without needing to fight for clarity. These moments of warmth are fleeting but deeply felt, reminders that communication is not only a struggle but also a site of profound intimacy.

One of the most striking aspects of White Noise is Alisha’s determination to move beyond the confines of her wheelchair. Much of the performance is spent out of it, her body working with fierce precision and vulnerability as she navigates the stage. This choice is not framed as triumph or inspiration; instead, it becomes a reclamation of agency, a refusal to let the chair dictate the boundaries of her expression. Her movement is sometimes fluid, sometimes strained, and it carries a complexity that resists easy interpretation. It is not a performance of overcoming but of existing fully, with all the contradictions and tensions that entails.

Motherhood threads through the work as both anchor and amplifier. Alisha’s gestures, breath, and vocalisations evoke tenderness and exhaustion in equal measure. The piece acknowledges the universal challenges of caregiving while also illuminating the additional layers of negotiation required when disability shapes how one is perceived and how one must navigate the world. There is a palpable sense of love woven through the performance, but it is love sharpened by the realities of being misheard, underestimated, or dismissed. The personal becomes political not through narrative, but through the sheer clarity of lived experience made visible.

Visually, the performance is stark yet striking. Digital design and lighting carve the space into shifting emotional landscapes, while reflective surfaces distort and refract Alisha’s image, echoing the theme of visibility and misrecognition. The aerial sequence, performed with a white silk hammock, introduces a moment of suspended tension, a literal elevation that complicates the grounded physicality of the rest of the work. It is both beautiful and unsettling, a reminder of the precariousness of balancing strength, vulnerability, and expectation.

The emotional impact of White Noise is undeniable. For some, it will be confronting; an unfiltered look at the daily negotiations that many disabled people must navigate, often unseen. For others, it will be a revelation, a powerful articulation of resilience, agency, and the right to define one’s own narrative. Throughout the performance, the audience is held in a state of heightened awareness, compelled to witness rather than simply observe. The effect is cumulative and, for many, overwhelming. It is no surprise that viewers were moved to tears; the work does not merely present emotion, it transfers it.

What makes White Noise so potent is its refusal to soften its edges. It does not offer easy catharsis or tidy conclusions. Instead, it leaves the audience with questions about communication, about identity, about the structures that shape whose voices are amplified and whose are drowned out by static. It is a piece that lingers long after the lights fade, not because it shocks, but because it tells the truth with clarity and artistry.

As the second half of the double bill, White Noise stands in deliberate contrast to the playful experimentation of Abilitopia. Together, the two works form a compelling dialogue: one celebrating the boundlessness of imagination, the other grounding us in the lived realities that imagination alone cannot erase. Where the first half invites us to dream, the second insists we reckon with the world as it is. And in that tension, Touch Compass delivers an evening of dance-theatre that is not only artistically rich but emotionally and politically resonant.

White Noise was the second part of a disability-led double bill performed at the Te Pou Theatre from 26-28 Februiary 2026. White Noise ran for later latter half of a 1hr 35-minute performance after a 20-minute interval.

Check out future performances at the Te Pou Theatre here

Find out more about Touch Compass here

ABILITOPIA - TOUCH COMPASS

ABILITOPIA is a 45-minute black-box dance-theatre work that stages a live encounter between humans, artificial intelligence, and art. 

Abilitopia, the opening work in Touch Compass’ disability-led double bill, unfolds like a mischievous invitation into a world where imagination is allowed to run unchecked. Rather than building toward a narrative destination, the piece revels in the joy of exploration, treating the stage as a sandbox where bodies, machines, and ideas collide in unpredictable ways. What emerges is a performance that feels more like a series of creative experiments than a conventional dance-theatre work, and its charm lies in that looseness. Even when the pacing dips or a vignette stretches itself thin, the overall experience remains buoyant, playful, and full of inventive possibility.

The show announces its intentions from the moment the lights come up. Before any dancer steps forward, an AI-enabled robot trundles into the audience, its blinking camera eye sweeping across the room with unnerving enthusiasm. It snaps photos, projects them onto the back wall, and offers cheeky guesses about each person’s occupation or net worth. The effect is both funny and disarming, a reminder of how easily technology can slip from novelty to intrusion. It’s a clever opening gambit: the audience is implicated before the performance even begins, transformed into raw material for the machine’s imagination. That early jolt of being observed lingers throughout the work, colouring every subsequent interaction between human and robot.

Once the dancers join the robot onstage, the performance settles into a rhythm of short, self-contained scenes (around nine in total) that each explore a different facet of human-machine collaboration. The structure feels intentionally fragmentary, as though the artists are inviting us to watch them test the edges of what bodies and technology can do together. Some scenes are tightly crafted and visually striking, while others drift or repeat themselves without quite finding a centre. But the unevenness is part of the texture: this is a work that values curiosity over polish, and its willingness to try, fail, and try again gives it a refreshing sense of openness.

The performers, Duncan Armstrong, Raven Afoa‑Purcell, and Julie van Renen, move through these vignettes with a sense of discovery that keeps the piece alive. They stretch and reshape their bodies using props, intertwine their limbs in unexpected configurations, and experiment with how their movements can be captured, distorted, and reimagined through live cameras and AI-generated projections. Some of the most memorable moments come when the dancers’ silhouettes morph into digital creatures or abstract landscapes, as though the machine is dreaming in response to their gestures. These sequences highlight the show’s central fascination: creativity as something that emerges through interaction rather than isolation.

The robot itself becomes a fourth performer, not a gimmick or a silent prop but an active presence that shifts the dynamics onstage. At times it behaves like a playful companion, rolling alongside the dancers or responding to their movements with surprising sensitivity. At other moments it feels more like an authority figure, its unblinking gaze reminding us of the power structures embedded in technology. The dancers treat it with a mix of affection, curiosity, and resistance, and that ambiguity gives the work much of its emotional texture. The robot is never fully friend or foe; it is simply another intelligence in the room, shaping and being shaped by the humans around it.

Although the tone of Abilitopia is light and often humorous, the disability-led perspective underpinning the work adds a quiet depth. Rather than presenting AI as a futuristic marvel or a looming threat, the piece frames it as a force that reorganises participation and agency. The dancers’ interactions with the robot emphasise interdependence; creativity as something shared, negotiated, and co-authored. Armstrong’s performance is especially compelling, blending humour with precision and offering a grounded counterpoint to the robot’s mechanical logic. Afoa‑Purcell and van Renen bring contrasting movement qualities that keep the ensemble dynamic shifting, ensuring no single body or mode of expression dominates the space.

The show’s episodic structure allows it to move fluidly between moods. One moment the stage is filled with prop play and contemporary dance; the next, the performers slip into meditative sequences that resemble yoga or breathwork. Some scenes are deliberately obscure, inviting the audience to sit with ambiguity, while others offer moments of tranquillity or wonder. The variety keeps the piece lively, though it also means that not every vignette carries the same weight. A few sections feel stretched, repeating an idea without deepening it, and the pacing occasionally sags as a result. But even these weaker moments contribute to the overall collage-like feel of the work, acting as pauses between more vivid bursts of creativity.

What ultimately lingers after Abilitopia is not a story but a sensation: the sense that imagination, when given room to roam, can produce forms of beauty and strangeness that don’t need to be justified by narrative logic. The performance celebrates experimentation, embraces imperfection, and treats technology not as a threat but as a collaborator in the creative process. It’s a reminder that art can be a space where different kinds of bodies and intelligences meet on equal footing, and where play is a legitimate form of inquiry.

As the first half of the double bill, Abilitopia sets a tone of curiosity and openness for the evening ahead. It may not always be narratively deep, and it certainly has moments where the content feels thin, but its spirit is infectious. The work invites the audience to imagine without boundaries, to see creativity as something that thrives in the spaces between disciplines, and to embrace the joyful messiness of making art in a world where humans and machines are increasingly intertwined.

Abilitopia was the first part of a disability-led double bill performed at the Te Pou Theatre from 26-28 February 2026. Abilitopia ran for later former half of a 1hr 35-minute performance before a 20-minute interval.

Check out future performances at the Te Pou Theatre here

Find out more about Touch Compass here