ADE Arts & Culture reveals new crossovers for 30 YEARS ADE
30 YEARS ADE
Over the past 30 years, the connections between electronic music and other art forms have become increasingly visible within the wider cultural landscape. Different art forms have continually influenced one another, shaped by the spaces and communities around them. For 30 YEARS ADE, Arts & Culture brings these relationships to the foreground and explores how electronic music can be experienced beyond sound alone.
Movement & Performance
These programs explore the relationship between electronic music and movement, with the body at the center of performance and participation.
White Space @ ICK Dance Amsterdam
Space for Dance Art presents ‘White Space’ by Matthias Oostrik, an interactive installation where a rotating sculpture of light transforms collective movement into evolving rhythms, sound and light. The program also features ‘SMILE’, Oostrik's AI installation that transforms your portrait into an eerily perfect version of yourself.
Completing the evening is ‘DONS’, an immersive club opera by Robin Coops. The work brings Mozart together with dark electronic music and explores identity within a shared club experience, dissolving the boundaries between audience and performer. Experience the full program on ADE Friday, with tryouts for White Space on ADE Thursday.
UK Sounds Influencing House Culture @ ITA
Rooted in Culture returns to ITA Amsterdam on ADE Saturday for its fifth anniversary edition. This year's program explores the journey of house music to Europe and the crucial role the UK played as its first European home.
The evening features a dance workshop led by an international guest from the UK house dance scene. Cultural critic and DJ Lynnée Denise leads an in-depth session, followed by a closing jam session from DJ collective Chill on Tuesday.
House Dance Beginners Battle - 2nd edition @ Toekomstmuziek
The House Dance Beginners Battle returns to Toekomstmuziek for its second edition on ADE Sunday. Created specifically for beginners, the event starts with a workshop on battle culture and floor etiquette before moving into the battle itself.
Wesley Romney and Patricie Bendova join an international guest on the jury, with music by DJ Soulmathetics.
Movement & Performance
These programs explore the relationship between electronic music and movement, with the body at the center of performance and participation.
White Space @ ICK Dance Amsterdam
Space for Dance Art presents ‘White Space’ by Matthias Oostrik, an interactive installation where a rotating sculpture of light transforms collective movement into evolving rhythms, sound and light. The program also features ‘SMILE’, Oostrik's AI installation that transforms your portrait into an eerily perfect version of yourself.
Completing the evening is ‘DONS’, an immersive club opera by Robin Coops. The work brings Mozart together with dark electronic music and explores identity within a shared club experience, dissolving the boundaries between audience and performer. Experience the full program on ADE Friday, with tryouts for White Space on ADE Thursday.
UK Sounds Influencing House Culture @ ITA
Rooted in Culture returns to ITA Amsterdam on ADE Saturday for its fifth anniversary edition. This year's program explores the journey of house music to Europe and the crucial role the UK played as its first European home.
The evening features a dance workshop led by an international guest from the UK house dance scene. Cultural critic and DJ Lynnée Denise leads an in-depth session, followed by a closing jam session from DJ collective Chill on Tuesday.
House Dance Beginners Battle - 2nd edition @ Toekomstmuziek
The House Dance Beginners Battle returns to Toekomstmuziek for its second edition on ADE Sunday. Created specifically for beginners, the event starts with a workshop on battle culture and floor etiquette before moving into the battle itself.
Wesley Romney and Patricie Bendova join an international guest on the jury, with music by DJ Soulmathetics.
What happens when listening becomes spatial, physical or connected to the natural world? Across The Stargate and TestTafel, these programs explore different ways to experience electronic sound.
The Future is Sound @ The Stargate
The Stargate is a historic chapel surrounded by water and nature, offering a unique setting for spatial sound, ambient music, deep listening, experimental performance and multisensory experiences. The Future is Sound brings London’s leading future-focused music and cultural series to The Stargate on ADE Thursday, pairing immersive performances from experimental artists with the chapel’s unique surroundings.
Bass / Body @ The Stargate
A full-body haptic and low-frequency music experience by Bass / Body on ADE Friday at The Stargate, bringing sound beyond the ears and into the body. Using cutting-edge haptic mats, participants experience music through deep vibrations and tactile sound, exploring the relationship between sound, vibration and physical sensation in a collective listening experience. Become the bass becoming the body.
Trippin Jaguar & Stacey Griffin - Live Spatial Ambient Performance @ The Stargate
Trippin Jaguar and Stacey Griffin come together on ADE Friday at The Stargate for a spatial sonic journey exploring the boundaries between music and consciousness. Moving through deep frequencies, atmospheric textures, rhythm and silence, the performance uses The Stargate’s immersive sound environment to turn the space itself into an instrument.
The Future Sound of Nature & Community Kitchen @ TestTafel
An intimate ADE Saturday evening in a glasshouse on the Amsterdam waterfront, where electronic artists make music alongside nature. Birdsong, whale calls, melting ice and forest soundscapes become instruments and collaborators. A community kitchen joins the bill, extending TestTafel’s 100% plant-based table to the heart of the gathering. Slow down during ADE with an evening exploring what interspecies collaboration sounds like. Free entry, presented by EarthSonic, Future Sound of Nature and DJs for Climate Action.
Zero BPM @ Thomaskerk
ZERØBPM takes over De Thomaskerk for a three-day ‘Ambient Meditation Ritual’, bringing together 33 international artists for an extended exploration of ambient music and meditation. Each day centers on a different theme, moving from the deep sea on ADE Friday and the cosmos on ADE Saturday to Mother Earth on ADE Sunday.
At the center of each ritual, Anouk Romee Schmitz, Helena Ho (Van Anh) and Laura Jibra'eel take turns as Master of Meditation, holding the silence for 16.5 hours non-stop. Artists including Claudio PRC, Nadia Struiwigh, Human Space Machine, Sunju Hargun and Pianeti Sintetici guide the experience through sound. Tickets are available per timeslot, with the possibility to continue listening from the balcony afterwards, subject to capacity.
What happens when listening becomes spatial, physical or connected to the natural world? Across The Stargate and TestTafel, these programs explore different ways to experience electronic sound.
The Future is Sound @ The Stargate
The Stargate is a historic chapel surrounded by water and nature, offering a unique setting for spatial sound, ambient music, deep listening, experimental performance and multisensory experiences. The Future is Sound brings London’s leading future-focused music and cultural series to The Stargate on ADE Thursday, pairing immersive performances from experimental artists with the chapel’s unique surroundings.
Bass / Body @ The Stargate
A full-body haptic and low-frequency music experience by Bass / Body on ADE Friday at The Stargate, bringing sound beyond the ears and into the body. Using cutting-edge haptic mats, participants experience music through deep vibrations and tactile sound, exploring the relationship between sound, vibration and physical sensation in a collective listening experience. Become the bass becoming the body.
Trippin Jaguar & Stacey Griffin - Live Spatial Ambient Performance @ The Stargate
Trippin Jaguar and Stacey Griffin come together on ADE Friday at The Stargate for a spatial sonic journey exploring the boundaries between music and consciousness. Moving through deep frequencies, atmospheric textures, rhythm and silence, the performance uses The Stargate’s immersive sound environment to turn the space itself into an instrument.
The Future Sound of Nature & Community Kitchen @ TestTafel
An intimate ADE Saturday evening in a glasshouse on the Amsterdam waterfront, where electronic artists make music alongside nature. Birdsong, whale calls, melting ice and forest soundscapes become instruments and collaborators. A community kitchen joins the bill, extending TestTafel’s 100% plant-based table to the heart of the gathering. Slow down during ADE with an evening exploring what interspecies collaboration sounds like. Free entry, presented by EarthSonic, Future Sound of Nature and DJs for Climate Action.
Zero BPM @ Thomaskerk
ZERØBPM takes over De Thomaskerk for a three-day ‘Ambient Meditation Ritual’, bringing together 33 international artists for an extended exploration of ambient music and meditation. Each day centers on a different theme, moving from the deep sea on ADE Friday and the cosmos on ADE Saturday to Mother Earth on ADE Sunday.
At the center of each ritual, Anouk Romee Schmitz, Helena Ho (Van Anh) and Laura Jibra'eel take turns as Master of Meditation, holding the silence for 16.5 hours non-stop. Artists including Claudio PRC, Nadia Struiwigh, Human Space Machine, Sunju Hargun and Pianeti Sintetici guide the experience through sound. Tickets are available per timeslot, with the possibility to continue listening from the balcony afterwards, subject to capacity.
From Egyptian film and cassette culture to questions around memory, these exhibitions look at the cultural stories that exist around sound.
Dreams of Films – Films of Dreams @ Van Eesteren Museum
99 years ago, 'Layla', the first Egyptian feature film, marked the beginning of a film culture that became a shared language across the Arab world. 'Dreams of Films - Films of Dreams', presented by Van Eesteren Museum and Moataz Rageb (better known as Disco Arabesquo), revisits this era through original cinema posters, hand-painted billboards, rare cassette tapes and memorabilia.
The exhibition explores how Egyptian film music travelled beyond the silver screen, taking on a life of its own through cassette culture. From cinema facade to cassette deck, discover how image and sound travelled together, and continue to do so today.
Exhibition: The Nature of Remembering @ W139 Gallery
Initiated by artist Lawil Karama in conversation with historian Megan Hoetger, The Nature of Remembering is a group exhibition shown throughout ADE week.
The exhibition brings together multimedia research projects that interrogate normative memory politics and experiment with environmental and more-than-human bodies. Collectively, the works ask who or what frames and enlivens acts of remembering violence that have been rendered invisible, unspeakable and unthinkable.
Listening session: DARKMATTER presents: Sapodilla @ W139 Gallery
DARKMATTER's 'Sapodilla', named after a fruit from the tropical Americas, is their signature electronic music event, where they reimagine club culture as a space where electronic sound, artistic experimentation and community converge, centring marginalised voices and diasporic perspectives. They will be hosting a listening session on ADE Friday inside W139 with local and international artists, an activation that mirrors the themes for 'The Nature of Remembering'.
BBTCOR presents: A Soft Guide to Chill @ W139
An intimate ADE Saturday exhibition exploring slowness, listening culture and collective presence through ambient live performances and DJ sets. A Soft Guide to Chill revisits the chill-out room as a space for memory, experimentation and communal experience.
LNR, Archetype and Gizem Öz perform throughout the evening, with Archetype presenting his new album 'Nothing New Under The Sun'.Sarah Saleh, co-founder of BBTCOR, closes with a mix of ambient, dub, downtempo and psychedelic sounds.
From Egyptian film and cassette culture to questions around memory, these exhibitions look at the cultural stories that exist around sound.
Dreams of Films – Films of Dreams @ Van Eesteren Museum
99 years ago, 'Layla', the first Egyptian feature film, marked the beginning of a film culture that became a shared language across the Arab world. 'Dreams of Films - Films of Dreams', presented by Van Eesteren Museum and Moataz Rageb (better known as Disco Arabesquo), revisits this era through original cinema posters, hand-painted billboards, rare cassette tapes and memorabilia.
The exhibition explores how Egyptian film music travelled beyond the silver screen, taking on a life of its own through cassette culture. From cinema facade to cassette deck, discover how image and sound travelled together, and continue to do so today.
Exhibition: The Nature of Remembering @ W139 Gallery
Initiated by artist Lawil Karama in conversation with historian Megan Hoetger, The Nature of Remembering is a group exhibition shown throughout ADE week.
The exhibition brings together multimedia research projects that interrogate normative memory politics and experiment with environmental and more-than-human bodies. Collectively, the works ask who or what frames and enlivens acts of remembering violence that have been rendered invisible, unspeakable and unthinkable.
Listening session: DARKMATTER presents: Sapodilla @ W139 Gallery
DARKMATTER's 'Sapodilla', named after a fruit from the tropical Americas, is their signature electronic music event, where they reimagine club culture as a space where electronic sound, artistic experimentation and community converge, centring marginalised voices and diasporic perspectives. They will be hosting a listening session on ADE Friday inside W139 with local and international artists, an activation that mirrors the themes for 'The Nature of Remembering'.
BBTCOR presents: A Soft Guide to Chill @ W139
An intimate ADE Saturday exhibition exploring slowness, listening culture and collective presence through ambient live performances and DJ sets. A Soft Guide to Chill revisits the chill-out room as a space for memory, experimentation and communal experience.
LNR, Archetype and Gizem Öz perform throughout the evening, with Archetype presenting his new album 'Nothing New Under The Sun'.Sarah Saleh, co-founder of BBTCOR, closes with a mix of ambient, dub, downtempo and psychedelic sounds.