The Dark: PS21’s fearless winter festival of live performance radiating across Columbia County
The Dark is a new annual festival from PS21 : Center for Contemporary Performance that celebrates and elevates the depths of winter. Taking place February 16–22, 2026, the festival will unfold at PS21 and across Columbia County—in theatres, restaurants, libraries, saunas, and outdoor public spaces. Featuring more than 60 international artists and over 80 performances, The Dark offers a packed week of world-class contemporary performance, installation, music, dance, and theatre—all exploring winter as a time of community and solitude, fire and ice, darkness and light. A major new attraction for the region, the festival positions Columbia County as a year-round cultural destination—not just a summer one.
It is a light in the dark—and The Dark is the light.
Explore all the performances below
DANCE
Trisha Brown Dance Company
In Plain Site
more info
LaJuné McMillian
Constellations
more info
sweat variant / Okwui Okpokwasili & Peter Born
my tongue is a blade
more infoTHEATRE
Sister Sylvester
Drinking Brecht
more info
Bert & Nasi / Tim Etchells
L’Addition
more info
Autumn Knight
Nothing #62: a bluff
more info
Julian Brave NoiseCat
We Survived the Night: A Coyote Story in Four Parts
more info
Sophia Brous & Gundega Laiviņa
Songs for the Dark
more info
Alex Harvey & Victoria Finney
The Willows
more infoMUSIC
Raven Chacon & David Lang / Williams College ensembles
Voiceless Mass and the little match girl passion
more info
Sarah Hennies & Tristan Kasten-Krause
Prisoner’s Cinema
more info
Kara-Lis Coverdale
A Series of Actions in a Sphere of Forever
more info
Natural Information Society
Perseverance Flow
more info
Emahoy Tsegué-Maryam Guèbrou / Thomas Feng
Night Prayers
more infoFILM
Robert Aiki Aubrey Lowe
Nsenene / Grasshopper Republic
more info
Music by Peni Candra Rini with Andy McGraw / Director Garin Nugroho
Setan Jawa
more info
David Lang & Bill Morrison / Ensemble Contemporaneous
darker
more infoINSTALLATIONS
Andrew Schneider
NOWISWHENWEARE (the stars) Open Universe
more info
John Fitzgerald
The Vivid Unknown: CloudQatsi
more info
Andrew Schneider
NOWISWHENWEARE (the stars) Guided
more infoAUDIO/VISUAL EXPERIENCE
Ant Hampton & Time Based Editions
Borderline Visible
more info
Sister Sylvester & Deniz Tortum
Shadowtime
more info
Ant Hampton with Tim Etchells
The Quiet Volume
more info
Ant Hampton with Tim Etchells
Not to Scale
more info
Sister Sylvester
Constantinopoliad
more infoGROUNDS ACTIVITIES
Ice Skating at PS21
more info
Community Bonfires
more infoThe Dark: PS21’s fearless winter festival of live performance
radiating across Columbia County from February 16—22, 2026.
DANCE • THEATRE • MUSIC • FILM • INSTALLATIONS • SAUNAS • ICE SKATING • BONFIRES
Explore THE DARK