THEATRE PREVIEW

DECEMBER 2025 | Volume 258

 

Theatre Replacement & Company 605 Present HOLD ON LET GO
February 3-7, 2026 at the Russian Hall
Festival Passes and Tickets on Sale Now at holdonletgo.ca 

Theatre Replacement and Company 605 are thrilled to announce the program for the 2026 edition of HOLD ON LET GO, taking place Tuesday, February 3 to Saturday, February 7 at the Russian Hall in East Vancouver.

Curated by Maiko Yamamoto, Josh Martin and Lisa Mariko Gelley, HOLD ON LET GO is an annual, independently produced festival showcasing contemporary performance work by Vancouver and Canadian artists.This beloved festival has solidified its place as a vital space for artists and audiences to come together in the sharing of new, experimental works that seek to challenge what performance is and can be.

Now in its 16th season, this year’s program celebrates the persistence and imagination of independent theatre, dance, and performance at a moment when the very possibility of making this kind of work is under pressure. This is the fragile, necessary space that experimental artists and gatherings like HOLD ON LET GO have always protected: a space for contemporary performance that asks artists and audiences to lean into uncertainty, stay with complexity, and dream new possibilities for a world in visible collapse.

Mainstage works include it is for when you meet me by Anjela Magpantay;Today is the evening to strike lightning / Aaj To Bijiliyan Girane Ki Shaam Hai by Justine A. Chambers and Simran Sachar; Sleep Has Her House: A Live Score by Magazinist; and a special workshop presentation of End of Greatness by Theatre Replacement / Maiko Yamamoto and musician/composer/theatre maker/performer Veda Hille. The two in-development sharings of new works at this year’s festival includes Frankenkenstein by ellis cheadle and lost season by Conor Wylie.

These visionary works will move audiences – zooming out and in and out again, drawing attention to what is right here and what still feels impossibly far away in this current cycle of reconstruction. Seen through the eyes of the artists in the program, collapse can reveal many things – transformation, connection, and renewal.

In addition to these performances, HOLD ON LET GO will host a series of Festival Gatherings, including an Opening Night Party featuring Veda Hille Sisterhood; an artist talk by Sarah G. Stanley(Ontario/Nova Scotia) and Dylan Robinson; and a special edition of Not Quite Ready – a collage party while listening to new or unfinished songs.This year’s festival will also see the return of the Emerging Artist Series, curated and hosted by Theatre Replacement’s Creative Producer Intern, Amanda Sum.

All Access Passes for HOLD ON LET GO are $55. Emerging Artist All Access Passes are available for $35. Single tickets range in price from $20 to $30.All passes and tickets are available online as of today at holdonletgo.ca/tickets.

For the complete festival program, please visit holdonletgo.ca.

About Theatre Replacement:
Theatre Replacement exists to create new, experimental and intercultural works of performance, led by Artistic Director Maiko Yamamoto, in collaboration with resident, associate and collaborating artists. The company’s work is known for its love of formal inventiveness and conceptual play, often drawing from autobiography and biography in making work that searches for playful, immediate, and authentic ways of bringing audiences and performances together. The company also supports the practice of making and sharing new work through our public programs — opportunities for mentorship, residency, professional development, and networking. theatrereplacement.org

About Company 605:  
Led by artistic co-directors Lisa Mariko Gelley and Josh Martin, Company 605 is an arts organization based in Vancouver, on the traditional, unceded  territories of the Musqueam, Squamish, and Tsleil-Waututh First Nations. Producing various dance projects and performances through shared creative process, the artists place emphasis on rigorous choreographic propositions and movement exploration — juxtaposing raw with precision, and highlighting effort, risk, and interconnection. 605 is an ongoing exchange between separate people, bodies and ideas, with each project seeking and celebrating their own unique forms of togetherness. Valuing collaboration as a critical path for new directions in dance, Company 605 continues to transform and build on an ever-evolving aesthetic, with multiple choreographic voices in pursuit of an embodied art form derived from the human experience. company605.ca 

 

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