Scirocco: Death in Venice, Bridge of Sighs

World-class dancers, experience as power
WINNDance, founded by Slava Tutukin and Marijn Rademaker, brings together an exceptional ensemble of internationally renowned dancers over 40. Dancers such as Igone de Jongh, Diana Vishneva, Polina Semionova, Silvia Azzoni, Kayoko Everhart, Mara Galeazzi, Gil Roman and Marijn Rademaker have made their mark with some of the world’s leading ballet and dance companies. In Scirocco, that experience becomes the point of departure: physical knowledge, artistic maturity and the depth of performers who have spent a lifetime dancing at the highest level. The result is not a retrospective, but a new perspective on beauty, presence and expressive power in dance.

For this special Amare co-production, WINNDance works with an impressive artistic team. Choreographers John Neumeier, Imre & Marne van Opstal, Omar Román De Jesús and Rainer Behr bring together classical craftsmanship, contemporary dance and cinematic imagination. The costumes by fashion brand Boss form a stylish connecting thread throughout the evening, giving each chapter its own distinct presence.

Venice, desire and the warm wind from the Sahara
Scirocco will have its world premiere at La Biennale di Venezia 2026 and its Dutch premiere at Amare in December. The performance consists of two works in dialogue with one another: Death in Venice and Bridge of Sighs. The title refers to the Scirocco, the warm wind that blows from the Sahara across the Mediterranean towards Venice. A wind of dust, salt and oppressive heat, it seems to settle like a veil over the city, stirring thoughts, skin and heartbeat. In this performance, the Scirocco becomes an inner landscape: a source of desire, unrest and creative tension.

Death in Venice draws on the central themes of Thomas Mann’s 1912 novella. The ageing writer Gustav von Aschenbach travels to Venice and becomes entangled in an existential crisis. The films by Javier De Frutos provide the narrative frame, while Imre & Marne van Opstal, Omar Román De Jesús and Rainer Behr translate the inner tension into a charged physical language. In Bridge of Sighs, John Neumeier takes inspiration from the history of Venice’s Bridge of Sighs, a reflection on love by Augustine of Hippo and the dark, mysterious sound world of Dmitri Shostakovich. The bridge, which leads in only one direction, evokes images of a final glance, an irrevocable farewell and the longing for what can no longer return.

A Dutch premiere at Amare
With Scirocco, WINNDance presents an evening of dance in which major names, mature artistry and powerful visual language come together. A performance about the traces time leaves in the body, about farewell and memory, and about dancers who fill the stage not despite their experience, but precisely because of it. Presented at Amare as a Dutch premiere and Amare co-production.