Dans! van Manen
Het Nationale Ballet | Introdans | Ballett am Rhein | NDT | Companhia Nacional de Bailado

Hans van Manen | NDT
The Moon on the Trapeze

The Moon on the Trapeze (1959): Man can never realise his highest ambitions or his most tender desires. Even when fate places every opportunity within his grasp, he is unable to seize them. He feels powerless and inadequate in the face of happiness.
Based on Benjamin Britten’s music Diversions for the Left Hand, Hans van Manen translated this theme into the theatrical sphere to give it form as a pas de deux.
The Moon on the Trapeze is a poetic fantasy set in a circus. A man, known as ‘the Clown’, dreams of achieving the unattainable.

Together with Giovinezza (Rudi van Dantzig), Feestgericht (Hans van Manen) and Four Times Six (Benjamin Harkarvy), this ballet was performed during NDT’s first production, which took place in Ostend in 1959.

Wubkje Kuindersma | Companhia Nacional de Bailado
Entanglement

Kuindersma's Entanglement is a duet exploring interconnectedness between two people. Inspired by quantum entanglement, the choreography transposes the phenomenon into human entanglement, tracing the subtle forces that draw two bodies together. The phenomenon becomes a metaphor for human connection, and how we influence, mirror, and remain intertwined. Through what Wubkje describes as physical emotion, the dancers' inner landscapes and evolving relationship become palpable.

Wubkje Kuindersma choreographed Entanglement for Companhia Nacional de Bailado for the program Only Duos.

Hans van Manen | Introdans
Polish Pieces

During the Nederlandse Dansdagen 2026, Introdans presents Polish Pieces in the Hans van Manen program; one of his most effervescent and colourful works, which has been part of the company’s repertoire since 2012. Set to powerful, driving music by Henryk Mikołaj Górecki, Van Manen lets twelve dancers in garishly coloured tunics storm the stage with constantly fresh dance combinations and a fantastically clear play of lines. The group sections are tightly choreographed, full of energy, pulsating, and in the duets, the stakes are raised even higher.

Hans van Manen | Het Nationale Ballet
Simple Things

Hans van Manen created the dynamic quartet Simple Things in 2001 for the young dancers of NDT 2. It is a wonderfully natural-looking creation for two couples. The ballet opens and closes with an overwhelming duet for two men, in which one watches whilst the other dances. In between, they perform various pas de deux with two women, in which the relationships between two people are expressed through movement. With this work, Van Manen proves himself to be a master of simplicity.

Hans van Manen | Ballet am Rhein
Dances with Piano

In this choreography, Hans van Manen once again unfolds an infinite wealth of emotional states, telling us—without bringing a concrete plot to the stage—of closeness and attraction as well as keeping one’s distance and repulsion, but he does so without any sentimentality or overt emotional pathos, instead with the mature pride and depth of six strong personalities whom he brings together —beyond all psychological fragility or instability—with an incorruptible grandeur that also knows humor.