Florentina Holzinger, A Year Without Summer, Dansens hus, Stockholm
It was a great year for dance. At Dansens hus, Austrian artist and choreographer Florentina Holzinger pulled out all the stops – and then some. A Year Without Summer, Holzinger’s opera-cum-musical-cum-choreography, brought together an intergenerational ensemble of performers and body artists. A genre-bending tour de force, the piece stayed close to the body, an exquisite body in fact: Frankenstein, evoked to reflect the ageing body, the politics projected on that body, and the very limits of that body, in ways that felt both abject and tender. The years without summer were 1816, when a volcanic winter event shrouded the world in darkness and Mary Shelley wrote Frankenstein, and 2025, when the return of fascism and ongoing genocidal violence rendered the world’s skies pitch-black.
My Wild Flag, wild at heart and weird on top, Hallen, Stockholm
The festival My Wild Flag is an anchor in the Swedish dance and performance calendar. The 2025 edition, titled wild at heart and weird on top, took place at Hallen in the Stockholm suburb Farsta, and was co-curated with artists. The effects of that decision were undeniable. During the evening I was there, the space was filled with sand – a manège meets sandbox in which myriad performances unfolded. There was deep movement research, from the exquisitely delicate to the bestially volatile. The festival managed to transform the performing bodies into something other, a body unrecognisable.
MDT – Moderna Dansteatern, annual program, Stockholm
There are very few spaces for performance in Sweden that surprise, challenge, and innovate the way that MDT does. I want to celebrate its entire annual program, because it’s fresh as a peach in spring. Just this year alone: Teo Ala-Ruona, Alex Baczyński-Jenkins, Marikiscrycrycry, BamBam Frost, Escarleth Romo Pozo, and many, many more. This is where young artists and dancers make space. This is where dance is thought through in different ways. This is where community is built and sustained. This is where critique is formed and then discussed. This is where I want to keep coming back.
– Hendrik Folkerts is Curator of International Contemporary Art and Head of Exhibitions at Moderna Museet in Stockholm. In February 2026, he will take up the role of Chief Curator of Programme at Kunsthaus Zürich. His final projects at Moderna will be Karol Radziszewski: The Classroom and House of Nisaba: New Stories of Painting, both scheduled for spring 2026.
For this year’s contributions to the Advent Calendar, see here.
