BECKET, Mass. — Jacob's Pillow announced the opening date of, and artists to perform in, the new Doris Duke Theatre, an international venue for dance and America's only purpose-built new dance theater to open in 2025. 

 

The multi-day opening celebration will begin on July 9, 2025, with programming continuing throughout the summer as part of the nation's longest-running dance festival, located on Jacob's Pillow's campus.

 

"We envisioned and built the new Doris Duke Theatre grounded in the Indigenous history of the land on which we dance. At the same time, it is a global hub for innovation," said Pamela Tatge, Jacob's Pillow executive and artistic director. "I am excited to see how artists and audiences join together and move beyond the limits of a traditional performance venue. In the new Duke, we will offer not just compelling and wide-ranging works that already exist today—but also some of tomorrow's most innovative mixed reality movement and dance experiences, which meld the virtual and the physical in deeply affecting ways."

 

Designed by Dutch architecture firm Mecanoo, the reimagined Doris Duke Theatre occupies the site of the former studio theater from 1990, destroyed by fire in November 2020.  The new theater aims to become one of the world's most technologically advanced dance venues, providing a makerspace for artists seeking to integrate artificial intelligence, extended reality, robotics, and immersive platforms into live performance. The Doris Duke Theatre will include such capacities as a spatial audio system, infrared camera tracking of performers for interactive video content, and live performance interactions with recorded/projected dance content, among many other capabilities.

 

"At the heart of the new Doris Duke Theatre lies a celebration of movement, space, and connection," Francine Houben, Mecanoo's creative director and founding partner said. "Inspired by Mecanoo's core values of 'people, place, purpose, and poetry,' the new theater captures the essence of dance, not only as an art form but as a deeply human experience intertwined with the landscape and community. Rooted in the rolling hills of the Berkshires, the theater honors the rich heritage of Jacob's Pillow while pushing the frontiers of the performing arts. The design draws on the rhythms of nature, mirroring the fluidity and grace of dancers."

 

The first group of dance and technology makers invited to present work at the Doris Duke Theatre are interactive-electronics dance and theater artist Andrew Schneider, with the world premiere of HERE; Shamel Pitts (2020 Pillow Lab resident) with Touch of RED; the return of Korean choreographer Eun-Me Ahn with her innovative ensemble work, Dragons; and the Pillow debut of Taiwanese dancer/choreographer and robotics inventor Huang Yi. The inaugural season will also host the U.S. debut of Indigenous Sámi choreographer Elle Sofe and her Elle Sofe Company from northern Norway, performing Vástádus eana – the answer is land. The season will also feature Faye Driscoll (2022 Pillow Lab resident) and her masterpiece Weathering. Additionally, Shamel Pitts and Andrew Schneider will each create a digital-first work, designed to be experienced virtually and available to audiences around the world. Grisha Coleman will lead the first Pillow Lab residency in fall 2025 to develop The Movement Undercommons, a new motion capture movement project creating kinetic haiku from movement data.

 

"There is one constant at Jacob's Pillow: pushing boundaries. The new Doris Duke Theatre exemplifies this tradition, making possible new forms of expression and new ways to move audiences," said Sam Gill, president and CEO of the Doris Duke Foundation. "It's not just a new theater—it's a new chapter for Jacob's Pillow and for American dance."