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Premiering from 1-4 July, FUTURE NOW marks the culmination of our BA (Hons) Dance (Contemporary) students’ three-year preparation for entering the profession as contemporary dance artists.
Every year, we connect with and commission three artists known for their distinctive voice and artistic flair that sets them apart to create new work with and for our students.
This year, students perform a specially curated programme created by award-winning and innovative NSCD alumni as part of our 40th anniversary celebrations. This exciting programme includes new works created by award-winning NSCD alumni, Gary Clarke, Glenda Gheller and restaged repertoire by internationally acclaimed Akram Khan.
Find out more about them below.
Tickets for FUTURE NOW 2026 can be purchased here.
Gary Clarke is a multi-award winning British Choreographer, Director, Performer, Mentor, Teacher and Facilitator who has been contributing to the UK dance scene for over 25 years. In 2017, Gary was awarded an inaugural Honorary Fellowship from Northern School of Contemporary Dance. Gary is currently the Artistic Director and joint CEO of Gary Clarke Company, where he has created 3 major mid-scale works that have toured extensively both nationally and internationally to critical and audience acclaim.
Originally from Asiago, Italy, Glenda started her professional training in various dance programs all around Italy. She then decided to moved to the UK, where she continued her education at Northern School of Contemporary Dance.
She graduated in 2018 with a First Class Honours Degree, and in the Autumn of the same year, she became a member of VERVE19 directed by Matthew Robinson.
In August 2019, she completed her MA Degree in Contemporary Dance Performance.
In January 2020, Glenda became a company dancer of Scottish Dance Theatre, Dundee. During her artistic career, Glenda has performed works by Sharon Eyal, Maxine Doyle, Noa Zuk, Emanuel Gat, Roser Lopez Espinosa, Sofia Nappi, Botis Seva, Joan Clevillè, Ben Wright, Theo Clinkard, Colette Sadler, Mele Broomes, Janine Harrington and Meytal Blanaru.
In June 2023, Glenda joined Komoco, the Italian company directed by Sofia Nappi, performing internationally in four productions: Chora, IMA, PUPO and Wabi-Sabi.
Since 2020, Glenda has been developing her teaching practice, leading classes and workshops around Italy and the UK.
Over the past few years, she has been developing her own artistic voice as a choreographer. In 2022, she created her first full-length work, Achilles’, commissioned by the Sicilian company Ocram Dance Movement, for whom she later created a new duet, Love Parade (2025). That same year, she premiered Camaré, a solo work featuring dancer Mattias Amadori, produced with the support of Teatro del Lemming, Operaestate, and Scenario Pubblico [Centro di Rilevante Interesse Nazionale].
She was also commissioned by the Institute of the Arts Barcelona (IAB) to create Double Folk for their graduating class.
In spring 2026, she created la figlia femmina, a work commissioned by Il Balletto di Calabria (IT) and performed by dancer Francesca Scalercio.
Akram Khan is one of the most celebrated and respected dance artists of today. In over 25 years, he has created a body of work that has contributed significantly to the arts in the UK and abroad. His reputation has been built on the success of imaginative, highly accessible and relevant productions such as Thikra: Night of Remembering, GIGENIS: the generation of the Earth, Jungle Book reimagined, Outwitting the Devil, XENOS, Until the Lions, Kaash, iTMOi, DESH, Vertical Road, Gnosis and zero degrees.
As an instinctive and natural collaborator, Khan has been a magnet to world-class artists from other cultures and disciplines. His previous collaborators include the National Ballet of China, actress Juliette Binoche, ballerina Sylvie Guillem, choreographers/dancers Sidi Larbi Cherkaoui and Israel Galván, singer Kylie Minogue, indie rock band Florence and the Machine, visual artists Anish Kapoor, Antony Gormley and Tim Yip, writer Hanif Kureishi and composers Steve Reich, Nitin Sawhney, Jocelyn Pook and Ben Frost. Khan’s work is recognised as being profoundly moving, in which his intelligently crafted storytelling is effortlessly intimate and epic. Described by the Financial Times as an artist “who speaks tremendously of tremendous things”, a highlight of his career was the creation of a section of the London 2012 Olympic Games Opening Ceremony that was received with unanimous acclaim.
Khan has also built close collaborations with leading ballet institutions, including English National Ballet, for which he created Dust, his acclaimed reimagining of Giselle, followed by Creature, and more recently The Royal Danish Ballet on Lady Macbeth.
Khan has been the recipient of numerous awards throughout his career including the Laurence Olivier Award, the Bessie Award (New York Dance and Performance Award), the prestigious ISPA Distinguished Artist Award, the Fred and Adele Astaire Award, the Herald Archangel Award at the Edinburgh International Festival, the South Bank Sky Arts Award and ten Critics’ Circle National Dance Awards for his Company (AKC). Khan was awarded an MBE for services to dance in 2005. In 2022, he was announced as the new Chancellor of De Montfort University, and he is also an Honorary Graduate of Royal Conservatoire of Scotland, University of London as well as Roehampton and De Montfort Universities, and an Honorary Fellow of Trinity Laban and the Hong Kong Academy for Performing Arts. Khan is an Associate Artist of Sadler’s Wells and Mountview Academy of Theatre Arts, London as well as Curve.
This restaging for FUTURE NOW 2026 is supported by Rehearsal Directors Sadé Alleyne and Angela Tower.
