Schwarzman Centre Presents Major New Season Marking 250 Years of American Independence
Following the public opening of the Stephen A. Schwarzman Centre for the Humanities at the end of April, which saw 12,000 people visit the building during the free one-day Open House festival, Oxford’s new arts and academic institution presents its first major cultural season Unfinished Revolutions (May to June 2026).
This focussed themed season explores the living legacy of 1776, the year marking the birth of the United States following the adoption of the Declaration of Independence, and the enduring afterlife of revolution. Rooted in America’s evolving place in the world, the season draws on long histories and global legacies to ask how freedom, democracy and belonging are imagined, contested and lived today.
Unfinished Revolutions spans music, dance, comedy, literature, history, theatre and film, directed by John Fulljames, it places experimentation and co-creation at its heart. The season will include performances by award-winning American artists and writers including Sarah Jones, who conjures a cast of voices from the last 250 years of American History in America, Who Hurt You?, and Suzan-Lori Parks, who confronts the contradictions of America’s founding myths in the reading of Sally & Tom.
Audiences can explore the breadth of jazz, blues, folk, and baroque music in musical storyteller, Cécile McLorin Salvant’s Book of Ayres, alongside the epic rock opera meditation on queerness Bark of Millions in Concert with Taylor Mac and Matt Ray and the film 24 Decade History of Popular Music. The premiere of Grammy Award-winning composer Anna Clyne’s major new composition Looking Glass, brings together a live string quartet and sinfonietta with real time digital sound design to create an augmented orchestral experience inspired by the author Lewis Carroll. In a collision of hip hop and Memphis Jookin, street dance pioneer Lil Buck with ZooNation and Body Politic youth companies reclaim 1776 through dance and the language of movement.
In spoken word, Afua Hirsch and Peter Frankopan will be in conversation to mark the 250th anniversary of the American Declaration of Independence, and Pulitzer Prize winner, Patrick Spero dives into the American Philosophical Society’s vault to discuss Thomas Jefferson’s final draft of the Declaration and Percival Everett, one of the most inventive voices in contemporary American fiction gives the 2026 Esmond Harmsworth Lecture in American Arts & Letters.
John Fulljames, Director of the Cultural Programme, Schwarzman Centre, University of Oxford, said: “Unfinished Revolutions invites us to reflect on America’s evolving place in the world. Across theatre, music, comedy and literature, the season asks how ideas of freedom, democracy and belonging are shaped, challenged and reimagined. From Cécile McLorin Salvant’s jazz to Sarah Jones’ comedy and Suzan-Lori Parks’ theatre, this is a season that brings together artists and scholars to engage with history and shine a light on the world today.”
Alexandra Vincent MBE, Managing Director of Schwarzman Centre, University of Oxford, said: “We are thrilled to welcome audiences into the Schwarzman Centre to experience the first of our thematic seasons, Unfinished Revolutions. The season presents a rich and varied programme of performances, across our incredible spaces, drawing inspiration from the work of our world-leading academics, to explore the evolution of America and its place in a complex and changing world.”
Funded by the largest ever single gift in modern times to the University of Oxford and designed by leading UK architectural practice Hopkins Architects, the Stephen A. Schwarzman Centre is a new world-class centre for the Arts and Humanities in Oxford. It includes the world’s first Passivhaus concert hall, theatre, gallery and a state-of-the art home for seven faculties of the University’s internationally recognised Humanities Division, the Institute for Ethics in AI, the Oxford Internet Institute and the new Bodleian Humanities Library.
Central to the programme are the Schwarzman Centre Cultural Fellows, a group of outstanding artists from around the world who are collaborating with Oxford’s leading academics to create pioneering new work. The initial cohort of Schwarzman Centre Cultural Fellows are: Refik Anadol; Lil Buck; Anna Clyne; Bryce Dessner; Rhiannon Giddens; Sarah Jones; Taylor Mac; Sir Wayne McGregor; Suzan-Lori Parks; Anoushka Shankar; Dan Smith; Kae Tempest; Nitin Sawhney; and Bloomberg-Oxford Fellows Es Devlin, Hans Ulrich Obrist and Marshmallow Laser Feast.
The Schwarzman Centre’s inaugural programme for 2026 spans visual arts, theatre, dance, music, literature and talks, with a range of free and ticketed events. In the Autumn, the second themed season Utopia Now! (October – November) invites audiences to be inspired by Utopian thinking and imagines bold futures with highlights including a new commission by Nitin Sawhney and a History of Utopia, led by Brian Eno and Kim Stanley Robinson.
Other keynote performances throughout the year include piano recitals by Alexandre Kantorow and Grammy Award-winner Víkingur Ólafsson; ROBOTA, a new staging of Karel Capek’s R.U.R. by Headlong Theatre; a day-long exploration of the psalms curated by Edmund de Waal, in collaboration with Oxford scholars, the Aurora Orchestra and the Colin Currie Group. Sigur Rós will collaborate with spatial sound specialists Loss><Gain to create and present a new immersive 360-degree spatial audio experience. Local collaborations include the Leys Festival, as well as dance company Body Politic, Oxford International Song Festival and early music specialists Instruments of Time and Truth. Oxford alumna Samira Ahmed, journalist and broadcaster, will chair a series of conversations exploring topics including AI and creativity, music, democracy and representation on stage and screen.
Photo: Lil Buck rehearsing in the Sohmen Concert Hall. (c) David Levene
