Fierce returns for 2015

Festival headliners announced.

Of Riders and Running Horses at Fierce Festival

An ambitious eight UK premieres will be presented in Birmingham during one weekend as part of Fierce Festival 2015.

Fierce returns to the city from 7th-11th October 2015 with a mix of live art, music, dance, installation and the infamous Fierce parties.

Fierce Festival 2015 will be the last Festival for its current Directors Laura McDermott and Harun Morrison, who have been at the helm since 2009.

A highlight of the weekend is Sleep with a Curator at Eastside Projects, where audiences are invited to bring a sleeping bag and spend a night in the Digbeth gallery before enjoying a communal breakfast. Curator Gavin Wade will join in the sleepover, reading a selection of bedtime stories and cooking bacon pancakes in the morning.

The weekend is marked with eight UK premieres by artists from across the world – from Brazil and Canada to Belgium and Germany. Simone Aughterlony will present Supernatural, a dance piece exploring gender roles that has been well received at festivals in Europe and the USA, and is hotly anticipated in the UK.

In Happiness Forgets, performer Season Butler will re-enact the opening sequence of all seven series of 1990s TV classic The Cosby Show, which feature the Huxtable family doing a series of dance moves.

Music forms an important part of Fierce 2015. The DJ Who Gave Away Too Much Information sees the Canadian company PME-ART sharing personal stories connected to their vinyl collection during a ‘listening party’ at COW Vintage clothing store in Digbeth.

Fierce would not be Fierce without its infamous parties. For 2015, DJs and performers Anklepants, Gazelle Twin, Sarah Farina and Miguel Gutierrez’s Deep Aerobics will perform into the early hours on Friday and Saturday nights, complete with animatronic masks, neon sports wear, face-paint and lots of dry ice.

This will be the last Fierce Festival for Directors Laura McDermott and Harun Morrison, who will leave the organisation in autumn 2015 to pursue new creative projects. Since their appointment in 2009, McDermott and Morrison have filled the city with performances, including in Edible Eastside, an urban allotment in Digbeth, and last year in the beautiful Moseley Road Baths. The new Director of Fierce will be appointed later this year.

Further details will be released during the summer. Tickets go on sale Wednesday 1st July at www.wearefierce.org