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theatre · Tuesday 21 July 2026 · 7:00pm 
Colossus
At Black Box Theatre · Dyke Road, Galway City, Co. Galway
At Black Box Theatre · Dyke Road, Galway City, Co. Galway
Fifty dancers. One hour. No interval. Colossus is the kind of performance that earns the word monumental without needing to apologise for it. Australian choreographer Stephanie Lake brings her company to Galway for the Irish premiere of a work that has drawn staggering reviews since it launched. If you have any interest in what a large ensemble can do when choreography is pushed to its physical and conceptual limit, this is the show to book during GIAF 2026.
Out of darkness, a wall of bodies surges forward. Over the course of sixty minutes, fifty dancers drive, collide, scatter and reform - moving between pure chaos and astonishing, almost military precision. The piece asks a single question at very high volume: how does an individual shape a crowd, and how does a crowd shape the individual? Robin Fox’s score underpins it all, and the Black Box Theatre’s blank-canvas space - 25 metres wide, height to grid of 7.2 metres - gives the company the room to fill your entire field of vision.
Reviewers from the Australian season called it “utterly staggering in its scope and inventiveness” and Lake herself has been described as possessing “a monumental talent.” For Galway audiences this is a first look at a work that has already made a serious impression internationally.
There is a post-show discussion with the company on Wednesday 23 July - worth staying for if you want to hear how a piece at this scale is rehearsed.
The Black Box Theatre sits on Dyke Road, about a ten-minute walk from Eyre Square and the main bus and rail stations. Galway is well served by Bus Eireann express coaches from Dublin and Cork, and by Irish Rail on the Dublin Heuston line. If you are driving, there is paid parking directly outside the venue. Galway city centre fills up during festival weeks, so arriving early or using the park-and-ride at Parkmore is worth considering.
GIAF runs across the city for two weeks in July, so an evening at Colossus pairs easily with daytime festival events, a walk along the Long Walk, or a session in one of the city’s traditional music pubs on Quay Street. There is more to see in Galway and across Co. Galway.
Heading to Black Box Theatre in Galway? Galway has plenty more to see. Read the Galway area guide, find what else is on, and explore the towns and villages nearby.