Co-presented with Harvard Medical School’s Master of Science in Media, Medicine, and Health and ArtsThursdays, a university-wide initiative supported by the Harvard University Committee on the Arts (HUCA). Free and open to the public
Choreographer, filmmaker, dancer, and recipient of a 2019 John Simon Guggenheim Fellowship, Pontus Lidberg has established himself as a visionary artist who blends dance and film. This academic year, Pontus is serving as an artist-in-residence with Harvard Medical School’s Media, Medicine, and Health program, based at ArtLab.
This event will include a discussion with Pontus after the screening of his short film, Labyrinth Within. Described as a haunting exploration of jealousy, this existential thriller features a couple and an elusive lover in a series of intense pas de deux inside a stark apartment that acts as a fourth character. Danced to a commissioned score by composer David Lang, with solo cello by Maya Beiser, the work features NYCB principal Wendy Whelan, Giovanni Bucchieri, and Pontus Lidberg himself. It won the 2012 Dance on Camera Festival Jury Prize for Best Picture: color, HD, 28.5 minutes.
More about this artist residency, Pontus originally trained in medicine and completed several years of medical school before turning fully to choreography. Across his stage and film work he develops movement-based narrative structures that carry emotional, psychological, and even clinical themes without relying on spoken language. He describes this as a “narrative logic” beyond literal story, built through embodied consequence rather than plot. This nonverbal storytelling is central to On the Nature of Rabbits, his La Biennale di Venezia commission, in which dreamlike scenes trace childhood mementos, sexuality, and the lingering impact of the AIDS era. During this residency, Pontus will be working at ArtLab with graduate students in the Harvard Medical School’s Media, Medicine, and Health, and teaching.
Parking: Please note that ArtLab does not have parking, and area street parking is limited. Rideshare and public transit are recommended.
Born in Stockholm, Pontus Lidberg is a prominent figure on the international choreographic scene. Trained at the Royal Swedish Ballet and the Conservatoire National Supérieur de Musique et de Danse in Paris, he furthered his education at the University of Gothenburg. He has created more than 40 works for institutions such as New York City Ballet; Paris Opera Ballet; Martha Graham Dance Company; Les Ballets de Monte-Carlo; Semperoper Ballet Dresden; Royal Swedish Ballet; Royal Danish Ballet; Le Ballet du Grand Théâtre de Genève; Beijing Dance Theatre; and the National Ballet of Cuba—as well as for his own experimental concert group, Pontus Lidberg Dance.
His work has been commissioned and presented by festivals and venues including La Biennale di Venezia, Montpellier Danse, Théâtre National de Chaillot, The Joyce Theater, the National Arts Centre of Canada, New York City Center’s Fall For Dance Festival, the Havana International Ballet Festival, and the Spoleto Festival.
Pontus Lidberg is also a filmmaker, offering an innovative approach that combines dance theatre, film, and visual arts. His projects often use camera, architecture, and layered time structures to extend choreography beyond the stage.
