Iungo South Africa 2026

After earlier editions in places including Beijing, Japan, Hong Kong, Brazil, Indonesia, Colombia and the Netherlands, a new version of the inclusive choreography Iungo by Adriaan Luteijn will be created in South Africa, in collaboration with Flatfoot Dance Company, featuring guest performers Thapelo Kotlolo and Eva Eikhout.

For this edition, Luteijn is working with a mixed cast consisting of professional dancers from Flatfoot Dance Company and guest dancers Joseph and Eva. In 2022, Luteijn already collaborated with Joseph and Eva in Benoni, South Africa, on the ballet Pro Forma. He also created a version of Iungo with students from the University of Cape Town in 2007. Iungo brings together different physical realities, ages, gender identities and dance backgrounds, combined with academically trained dance. The result is always unique and inspiring: an encounter in which diverse worlds come together on one stage.

Iungo South Africa 2026 has been made possible with the support of the Dutch Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Dutch Embassy in South Africa.

As in every edition of Iungo, fixed artistic principles are central: the bench, as a place where the dancers meet; the music, the Larghetto from Chopin’s First Piano Concerto; a set of fixed dance combinations and patterns; and the cast, which consists of a mix of professional dancers and dancers from diverse social, cultural, physical and age backgrounds.

Iungo is the Latin word for ‘I connect’, and that is exactly what Introdans choreographer Adriaan Luteijn does like no one else. In his series De Ontmoeting (The Encounter), he has been bringing together people with different physical, social, cultural and intellectual backgrounds with academically trained professional contemporary dancers for more than twenty years. The aim is to show that dance is for everyone, and that even dancers who do not represent the standard image can deeply move and surprise audiences.

The new version of Iungo will be performed in Durban on 5, 6, 9 and 10 September 2026 at the Elizabeth Sneddon Theatre during the JOMBA! Festival. In addition to this ballet, Introdans will also perform Mano a Mano and excerpts from In Memoriam and Flatland in the same programme, while Flatfoot Dance Company will perform the duet Brightest Darkness. Introdans teaching artists will also give several dance workshops at schools. Read more here.