Ruhrtrienniale Names New Artistic Director

Connecticut native Lydia Steier is to succeed Ivan Van Hove as artistic director of the Ruhrtriennale for the 2027-2029 seasons. Germany’s largest industrial region hosts an international arts festival every year, launched in 2002 by the late Gerard Mortier. Van Hove’s second season begins August 21.

Like the Ojai Festival and, recently, the Cincinnati May Festival in the U.S., Ruhrtriennale rotates its chief artistic personnel—in this case, every three years.

“This is precisely what distinguishes the Ruhrtriennale and makes it so diverse, innovative, and special,”  said Ruhr Culture Director Vera Battis-Reese, “that each director brings bold new festival designs and creates extraordinary and captivating art for our audiences."

Steier, 47, has collected major plaudits for her cutting-edge work at Frankfurt Opera, the Opéra national de Paris, the Cologne Opera, the Theater an der Wien, the Salzburg Festival, and the Staatsoper Unter den Linden. Her production of Karlheinz Stockhausen's Donnerstag aus Licht (Thursday of Light) at Theater Basel was named "Performance of the Year" by critics in the magazine Opernwelt in 2016. Eight years later, the same publication named her "Director of the Year.” Engagements have taken her to Geneva, New York, and Tokyo. From 2020 to 2023, she was opera director at the Theater Luzern. She recently made her directorial debut at the Vienna State Opera with a new staging of Tannhäuser.

"Lydia Steier is a perfect fit for the Ruhr region,” said German Minister of Culture Ina Brandes. “The youngest artistic director of the Ruhrtriennale to date was born in America and has a very good sense for transforming high culture into an exhilarating experience with show and spectacle. This mix will serve the Ruhrtriennale well and will certainly appeal to the audience.”

Steier defined the Ruhrtriennale as “Germany's most important international art festival [in] over a quarter of a century: 25 years full of artistic ventures, courageous voices, and radical beauty.” She said she would be “focusing on encounters. We want to dare to create community, open up spaces, enable participation, and deepen the connection between the festival and the urban, diverse realities of life in the Ruhr region."

The program for this year's season, from August 21 to September 21, 2025, includes 35 productions and projects, including 13 co-productions and commissioned works, five world premieres, one European, and nine German premieres.