Commedia dell'arte

Camille Henrot
New York Premiere

Sep 23-25 at 7:30pm; Sep 26 at 2pm

In English. Run time 80 min. No intermission.
Content Warning: Contains strong language and some sexual themes.

Camille Henrot brings her interdisciplinary practice to the stage for the first time with the New York premiere of Commedia dell’arte. Henrot’s performance incorporates the stock characters and comic ploys of the Italian Renaissance theatrical tradition within a modern-day New York City apartment building. The delivery of a package triggers a cascade of uncanny events among tenants, as the tragi-comedic play attempts to make sense out of the senseless.

The work draws on Henrot’s distinct visual language, shaped by her background as a cartoonist, as well as the slapstick and gestural comedy of Buster Keaton, Jim Carrey, and Tex Avery. Henrot engages and reconfigures the formal languages of film and television, media whose own structures are shaped by the conventions and performative structures of early theater. In a zany collision of mundanity and excess, Henrot constructs a portrait of contemporary life in which hustle and reflection, wealth and precarity, share a wall—bodies always in motion, in the constant performance of existence.

Commedia dell’arte is co-presented by Performa and L'Alliance New York’s Crossing The Line Festival.

Co-commissioned by Performa, Aspen Art Museum / Wheeler Opera House, and LYRA Art Foundation. Commedia dell'arte is curated by RoseLee Goldberg, founding Director and Chief Curator of Performa and Eliza Ryan, Curator at Large, Aspen Art Museum. World Premiere at the Wheeler Opera House in Aspen as part of the Aspen Art Museum’s 2026 AIR Festival July 30, 2026.
Commedia dell’arte is supported by the Performa Commissioning Council

Image credit © ADAGP Camille Henrot. Courtesy of the artist, Mennour and Hauser & Wirth

Ticket prices:

Sep 23-26 (Performance only)
Non-Member: $60
L'Alliance New York Member: $45
Ages 28 & Under: $45

Sep 23 (Performance + Opening Night Reception)
Non-Member: $95
L'Alliance New York Member: $65
Ages 28 & Under: $65

Members' only pre-sale from Aug 6-13.
Sales to the general public begin Aug 14.

Early bird ticket buyers save 10% when they purchase their tickets by Aug 28.

• All sales are final. No refunds. No exchanges.
• Tickets will be emailed to you. You can print your ticket with QR code and present it to the usher for scanning. You may also present your ticket from your phone. Please unblock images so that you can see the QR code before printing. 
• Minor children must be accompanied by a parent or legal guardian at all times.