Performing Arts of our Era: Montreal's Festival TransAmériques
Travel the world of the performing arts while in Tiohtià:ke, Mooniyang, Montréal. Your classroom will take place in the biggest contemporary international dance, theatre and performance festival in North America: Festival TransAmériques.
Photo by Maryse Boyce
About the program
This 16-day intensive summer course, held during the extraordinary Festival TransAmériques (May 27–June 11, 2026, in Tiohtià:ke/Mooniyang/Montreal), invites you to experience cutting-edge contemporary choreography, theatre, and performance from around the world.
Throughout this immersive field school, you’ll attend seven groundbreaking performances by visionary national and international artists. Participate in public lectures, terrain de jeux, master classes, and post-show discussions with renowned creators. Each encounter encourages you to think, feel, and move differently — to experience performance from the inside out.
Guided by artists and scholars through critical performances and theoretical input, you’ll develop essential tools to observe, interpret, and reflect on performance and performativity, the language of the body, dramaturgy, audience participation, ethics, and aesthetics. This immersive setting at the festival’s headquarters connects you directly to Montreal’s vibrant artistic community, inspiring both your creative practice and critical voice.
Students will meet daily for a three-hour class at the festival headquarters, with two days off scheduled in accordance with the festival program. The course embraces diverse perspectives — queer, feminist, decolonial, and ecological — and explores topics such as:
- Interdisciplinary and transdisciplinary creation
- Decolonial approaches in choreography
- Dramaturgy and creative process
- Performativity, corporeality, and representation
- Audience relationships and spatial dynamics
- Socio-historical contexts and aesthetics
- Artistic practice in today’s global landscape
Complementing the program, curated readings inspired by the festival’s themes introduce decolonial, feminist, and queer approaches, bridging theory and art to expand your understanding of contemporary creation in the performing arts.
Dates & courses
Class dates: May 27, 2026- June 11, 2026
Students will attend seven groundbreaking performances artists, participate in public lectures, terrain de jeux, master classes, and post-show discussions with renowned makers. Discuss with guest-speakers from the festival.
Course
Course: FAFS 398/660/860; DANC 398
Estimated cost
Concordia will charge program participants for the 3 credits of undergraduate or graduate tuition for the host and $210 for the tickets to 6 performances in the festival. Note that the Festival organizers offer the seventh performance free of charge. Concordia International will purchase the tickets on behalf of the participants.
Application process
To be eligible to participate in the field school, you must meet one of the following criteria.
- Be enrolled in a Bachelor’s degree program, with a minimum 2.7 cumulative culmative GPA (CGPA) and have completed at least 24 credits toward your current degree program by the time you leave for the program.
- Be enrolled in a Master’s degree program, with a minimum 3.0 cumulative GPA (CGPA) and have completed at least 9 credits toward your current degree program by the departure date.
- Be enrolled in PhD degree program, have a 3.7 cumulative GPA (CGPA) and have completed at least 9 credits toward your current degree program by the departure date.
- Faculty can override GPA requirement on an individual basis as part of the selection process.
- Student may not repeat this Field School for credit.
All students interested in applying to this program must attend an information session given by Concordia International prior to submitting an application.
Date: Tuesday, January 27, 2026
Time: 1:30 p.m.
Zoom meeting: https://concordia-ca.zoom.us/j/3654810697
Concordia Students
- Submit the Concordia Field School Abroad Application by the application deadline of February 9, 2026. The application can be accessed through the Concordia International CSEP Mobility Portal.
Your application must also include:
- A copy of your most recent transcript. An unofficial Concordia transcript.
- A letter of intent and an artist statement of 500 to 700 words.
- Admissions decisions will be communicated by e-mail after the application deadline.
- The courses offered on this program are subject to change based on final enrolments.
- By March 6, 2026, admitted students must make a non refundable full payment of $210 CAD on their Concordia student account for the cost of the Field School.
All information on this website is subject to change without notice; the program is subject to a minimum enrollment of 16 students to take place; and it may be cancelled at any time and for any reason.
Have a question?
Academic Inquiries
Associate Professor, Department of Contemporary Dance