Every year, the Festival Tweetakt in Utrecht lets a wide audience experience how meaningful, surprising, accessible and exciting contemporary (performing) arts for young viewers and audiences can be. The festival presents theatre, dance, spoken word, performance, music, visual arts, short films, installations and everything in between. Tweetakt targets all youth age groups, from toddlers to young adults. At the same time, the festival is an invitation to adults to experience how engaging and fulfilling youth art can be. Tweetakt attracts some 35,000 visitors annually: children and their parents/carers, grandparents, primary, secondary and vocational school pupils from the Utrecht region, students, (performing) arts professionals and programmers.
Tweetakt attracts thousands of children and their parents/guardians, grandparents, pupils from primary, secondary and vocational schools in the Utrecht region, students, (stage) art professionals, and programmers each year.
Festival Tweetakt takes place at multiple locations, on the Domplein and in Utrecht theatres such as Theater Kikker (our festival heart in the city), Stadsschouwburg, Podium Hoge Woerd, Akademietheater, and Het Filiaal, as well as at Fort Ruigenhoek, a green historic fortress island on the edge of the city.
The 2026 festival starts on Friday, June 5th and runs until June 14th.
Tweetakt annually celebrates the quality of (Dutch) youth art, but not by listing highlights and audience successes from the previous season. The festival selects based on artistic innovation and accessibility. To excite a wide and diverse audience for contemporary youth art, every program element must be accessible and understandable even for young people without prior experience of viewing art.
The festival aims to challenge the notion that art is boring and complicated. Therefore, Tweetakt programmes avoid theatre with lots of text, favouring works that appeal through visual language, musicality, energy, and dynamic interaction with the audience.
Tweetakt believes that art can contribute to identity formation in young people, deepen understanding, and help them gain perspective on life, providing tools for active participation in society. A key principle in programming is that selected works express personally driven, socially relevant ideals, and depict complex themes in clear communication aimed at the intended audiences. The festival reflects diverse societies and tells new stories drawn from that diversity with empathy and insight as core parts of artistic innovation. The artists invited expand perspectives on what’s possible, with “putting oneself in another’s shoes” as an essential element. At a time when public debate is becoming more polarized, and differences between cultural groups grow, art for children and young people plays a vital role in showing nuance and easing divisions. With programme elements that give young audiences an active role, the festival enhances their creative engagement.
One of Tweetakt’s special locations is Fort Ruigenhoek. Only during the festival is this historic fortress island (part of the Dutch Waterline and a UNESCO World Heritage Site) opened to the public. There, Tweetakt presents an annual visual art exhibition for children, along with a continuous programme of performances and music, both outdoors and in mobile theatres. The café terraces between fort bunkers are enlivened with traditional children’s and family games like giant Jenga, a carousel, and ride-on plush animals that kids can move themselves. On the enclosed fortress island, children can roam freely in nature while enjoying art.
When assembling the visual art exhibition on the fortress island, Tweetakt aims for a wide variety of art forms: such as sculptures, moving kinetic objects, light art, installations, tapestries, and spatial art interventions. These works are created by young and experienced, Dutch and international artists. On Fort Ruigenhoek, these works engage with the exciting, half-shadowy bunker spaces and the open natural landscape of the island. Tweetakt ensures that many artworks are also interesting for, and appeal to young audiences, even if originally made for adults. Some pieces are created specifically for chosen sites on the island.
There are always participatory works that visitors can interact with. For example, in 2024 English artist Chris Kenny’s Twig People invited children and companions to find twig shapes resembling human figures and place them in a mound of sand inside a bunker. In the darkened bunkers, short artist films were also shown.
Tweetakt’s focus for this exhibition is on the direct experience. There are no extensive information boards at the artworks. Visitors receive a map showing where all the artworks can be found. In the “mailroom,” visitors can respond to what they’ve seen with a postcard to an artist. Children can take part in a scavenger hunt around the island, where Tweetakt, in collaboration with nature organizations, also raises awareness of the plants, animals, and birds on the fortress island.
Every theatrical production programmed by Tweetakt offers young audiences a rich experience. Many productions are accessible to everyone because they are highly visual. The festival seeks out theatre makers who build productions from everyday objects and materials, letting their imagination run wild in front of the audience. This approach mirrors how children play. A good example is the Belgian artist collective Hanafabuki, which tells stories with stylised figures and abstract forms. In 2024, visitors could arrange their own island shapes at table stations and share what they saw.
One of the best ways to involve young audiences in theatre is through productions where peers take on full roles. A staple of Tweetakt’s programming is theatre with children and young people as full performers. Tweetakt regularly features theatre and dance productions from Belgium that specialise in innovative works with young performers. For example, at Tweetakt 2025 the dance piece The Round (8+) featured eight Belgian children performing an energetic choreography in an outdoor wooden theatre on Fort Ruigenhoek.
For the youngest audiences, Tweetakt includes theatre made by international makers that physically involves toddlers and preschoolers in original ways. For instance, in productions where children wear small backpacks with speakers and explore sound by passing objects to one another.
Festival Tweetakt gives ample space to young performing artists and new talent. Their work is programmed equally alongside productions by experienced theatre companies and artists from the Netherlands and abroad. Every year, Tweetakt includes graduation productions from theatre and art students from Utrecht and other cities.
Tweetakt also commissions theatre makers to develop special youth productions for the festival. They may be emerging or recently graduated, and sometimes experienced makers are invited to create for young audiences for the first time. These commissioned works often continue to tour after the festival.
Each year, many foreign programmers come to Utrecht to see performances at Festival Tweetakt. For them, the festival arranges a multi-day international visitors’ programme with productions suitable for international presentation. Programmers receive information on the makers in advance, and if a production contains Dutch text, translations are provided. Many artists receive invitations to perform abroad after appearing at Tweetakt.
Festival Tweetakt has extensive experience in developing and delivering educational programmes. The core principle is that art education should not explain artworks but teach young and inexperienced audiences to view and respond autonomously. The basic educational package includes two classroom lessons preparing students for visits to a performance or the Fort Ruigenhoek exhibition. Tweetakt aims to introduce each group of students to multiple art disciplines and combines theatre visits with creative workshops. In recent editions, about 3,500 students from primary and secondary schools participate.
To engage youth further, Tweetakt organises ‘Festival Days’ at Fort Ruigenhoek, where secondary and vocational students take part in workshops related to festival performances and present their own small creations.
Around theatrical performances, Tweetakt holds post-show discussions and public debates with artists featured in the festival programme. This allows audiences to connect more deeply with the creators and learn more about the works. Debates explore themes recurring across performances and issues such as working methods, creative struggles, identity, and parent–child relationships.
The dates for upcoming Festival Tweetakt editions are:
