MAI Montréal arts interculturels

The 2020-21 season at MAI: politically, poetically charged shows & art

“Their creative practices are often rooted in care… and also freedom to not care.”

Montreal performing arts centre MAI (Montréal, arts interculturels) has unveiled the programming for its 2020-21 season, which begins on Sept. 24. The box office is already open for their diverse series of solo performances, co-productions and art exhibitions, and with tickets priced at $10, it’s nothing if not accessible.

As for pandemic concerns, MAI is abiding by mandatory public health directives and has reconfigured their space with Paul Chambers, a Montreal-based lighting specialist and visual artist, to accommodate 20 people at a time.

The theme of the programming for MAI’s 2020-21 season — which features artists including Kama la Mackerel, Diana Léon, Daphne Boyer and a co-production with Imago Theatre — is “care, don’t care.”

“The artists featured as part of 2020–2021 also navigate between several poles, without restricting themselves to either one. Their creative practices are often rooted in care. Care for the earth, for the other, for the body, for history (personal as well as political). Care for experiences and narratives, be they steeped in darkness or full of light. Taking care to listen, to convene. Care for insurrection. Care for words, for memory. Caring for the audience, being attentive to its consent to partake, to receive. And also freedom to not care. Refusal to become emotionally involved, refusing to give a damn. Letting be, letting slide, letting go. No future. This season’s featured artists refuse to choose. They find one in the other, kindness in nihilism, pleasure in anxiety, refusal in consent, ritual in protest, intimacy in remoteness.”

—MAI (Montréal, arts interculturels)
MAI (Montréal, arts interculturels)

For more about the MAI (Montréal, arts interculturels) 2020-21 programming, please visit their website.


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