ORBIT 2026: Future History + [gameboy]

Two works in one night of boundary-pushing contemporary dance.

Presented by Burrinja, Sydney Dance Company, Dancehouse and Australian Dance Theatre

Future History

By Gabrielle Nankivell

Future History is a new ritual for a world in a constant state of flux. 

Nankivell and her collaborators locate the body within cycles of global uncertainty, extinction, conflict, epidemic and catastrophic climate events to create a dance that thrives on the edge of oblivion. 

Illuminating the vulnerability and resilience implicit on life on Earth, Nankivell uses every facet of her physicality to embody everything from the jittering of microscopic organisms to seismic ecological shifts. 

Future History connects the personal and universal in a thrilling and urgent exploration of what it means to live here now, then and in the future. 

Lead Artist Gabrielle Nankivell 
Creative Collaborators Luke Smiles, Martin del Amo, Kristina Chan, Joshua Thomson, Rasmus Ölme & Vânia Vaneau 
Composer Luke Smiles 
Dramaturg Martin del Amo 
Costume Concept & Realisation Harriet Oxley 
Set and Lighting Realisation Meg Wilson 

[ gameboy ]

By Amy Zhang

Two avatars are dropped into a series of escalating challenges. As they complete each level, they’re asked to consider how far they’ll go to ‘win’. 

Choreographer Amy Zhang brings her signature of fusion of street styles and contemporary to explore the collision between the real and the virtual in a work that is as irreverently fun as it is physically virtuosic. 

Taking inspiration from Japanese game shows, The Sims, and the strangest corners of the internet, [ gameboy ] is a raucously renegade work that steps inside the screen and slyly looks back. 

If life is a game, who’s holding the controllers? 

Director & Choreographer Amy Zhang 
Collaborators & Performers William ‘Billy’ Keohavong and Ko Yamada 
Sound Designer Jackson Gracia 
Contributing Composer Maxwell ‘Thv Flood’ Douglas 
Lighting Design Theodore Carrol 

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ORBIT has been assisted by the Australian Government through Creative Australia, its principal arts investment and advisory body and delivered in partnership by Australian Dance Theatre, Dancehouse and Sydney Dance Company.

The creative development of Future History has been generously supported by the Government of South Australia Arts South Australia, Australian Dance Theatre’s International Centre for Choreography, The Mill’s Emerging Producer Xchange, Stockholm University of the Arts, Lieues Lyon and Legs on the Wall.

[ gameboy ] was developed with the support of Critical Path, Metro Arts and Mad Dance House.