Turning the Tide
Turner Prize-nominated artist Catherine Yass’s site-specific film installation, Turning the Tide (17th – 20th September) will be displayed on the iconic disused Blackfriars Railway Bridge columns. For four nights, this free public artwork, created in partnership with disabled-led theatre company Graeae, will celebrate disabled young actors. Through a captivating visual narrative, this projected installation will engage thousands of visitors, encouraging conversations around inclusion and urban resilience. Turning the Tide has recently been awarded the prestigious Art Explora - Académie des beaux-arts European Award, the leading European Award championing new dialogues between the arts and audiences.
Find out more about Turning the Tide
River Recital Presents SS Robin
River Recital Presents SS Robin (26th & 27th September) transforms the historic SS Robin at Trinity Buoy Wharf into an immersive environment of sound, moving image and live performance. Presented across the ship and pontoon, the programme features newly commissioned audiovisual installations by Clifford Sage (National Gallery and ICA) alongside site-responsive works from Camberwell College of Arts’ Computational Art Department, with additional interventions from Ninon Ardisson (Tate Modern; Victoria and Albert Museum) and Mathis Saunier (Philharmonia Orchestra; London Symphony Orchestra). On 26th September, the pontoon becomes a live music stage featuring performances from Tara Lily (Royal Albert Hall with RAYE; Glastonbury Festival), Chris Hyson (BBC Proms; Snowpoet), Carolina Cury, Thomas Stone (Tate Britain; Serpentine Gallery) and Narotam Horn (Serpentine Gallery; Wigmore Hall), whose work bridges contemporary classical composition, jazz improvisation and Bengali devotional music. Through ecology, technology and the Thames’ industrial histories, the dialogue is a part of the Thames Festival Trust’s Seed Funder programme as it invites audiences to experience the vessel as a living archive shaped by memory and transportation.
Art on Your Doorstep
As part of the Creative Mile, Brentford Art Trail weekend (4th-6th September 2026), Art on Your Doorstep – Creative Mile partners with the National Gallery to transform Brentford into an open-air exhibition space. Featuring life-size reproductions from the National Gallery’s collection, the project will place artworks throughout the town in striking and unexpected locations, with the Thames forming a backdrop to a number of installations. Responding to Brentford’s riverside identity, the exhibition invites audiences to encounter nationally significant artworks within everyday public spaces, creating new connections between the local environment and iconic paintings from the collection. Creative Mile will also work with schools and community groups using the National Gallery’s learning resources to inspire creative responses through photography, drawing and writing.
The Waterfront Journals
The Waterfront Journals (6th September) is a site-specific outdoor performance that will showcase a series of powerful monologues presented by production company ONE DAY THIS KID, written by artist and activist David Wojnarowicz at Thames Barrier Park. Performed by three actors, this promenade piece weaves together personal histories and queer narratives at the water’s edge, fostering dialogue on cruising, love, loss and resilience. Supported by Thames Festival Trust’s Seed Funder programme, the project will commission new responses from LGBTQIA+ Londoners, enriching the intergenerational conversation of queerness, fluidity and community along the Thames. The creative team includes co-direction from Alex Lawther (Black Mirror, Shut up and Dance, Netflix; The End of the Fucking World, Netflix), Ellie Kendrick (Game of Thrones; Misfits) and Hugh Wyld (DOG, Camden People’s Theatre).
Aftertide
Located on the banks of the River Thames, Hermitage Moorings will host a special live performance of Aftertide (5th September) by Seb Harcombe - a site-responsive audio walk designed to be experienced as an individual reflective journey along the river and across central London bridges. Drawn from testimonies of coma survivors at St Thomas’ and Guy’s Hospitals, the work was developed from lived experience - including the artist’s own recovery at the former, overlooking the Thames. Blending recorded voices from patients, loved ones and clinicians with atmospheric soundscapes and music from Handel’s Alceste - based on the myth of Alcestis, who journeys into the underworld and returns - the piece explores adventures in the subconscious realms between life and death. Alongside moments of fear and disorientation, many of the accounts are also humorous, imaginative, thought-provoking and life-affirming. Supported by Thames Festival Trust’s Seed Funder programme, Aftertide weaves together testimony, music and mythic imagination and connects deeply personal experiences to wider archetypal journeys of crossing, return and renewal.
Where the River Holds Us
At Two Temple Place, Helen Epega (Of Earth and Quill, Cockpit theatre) presents Where the River Holds Us (27th – 28th September), an immersive site-specific live performance combining operatic voice and West African tambin flute. A part of Thames Festival Trust’s Seed Funder programme, the piece is inspired by the River Thames as a living archive and explores water as a conduit for memory, ritual and belonging. As the founder of the creative collective The Venus Bushfires, Epega’s work reflects her interdisciplinary practice as a Black British neurodiverse artist, centring access, collective listening and embodied experience through opera, sound and performance.
Kick the Door Down
Kick the Door Down’s (25th September) alumni showcase will spotlight emerging theatre voices in a dynamic evening of new writing, supported by Thames Festival Trust’s Seed Funder programme onboard the Theatreship in Canary Wharf. Featuring five original works selected from an internal call-out to 2024 and 2025 programme participants, the showcase brings together actors, writers and directors to present bold, contemporary stories. Delivered in partnership with Riverside Studios, the evening will be shaped in collaboration with leading industry professionals from organisations including the Bush Theatre, Theatre 503 and the Pleasance Theatre. Selected artists will receive dedicated support, including an artist fee and tailored feedback from a panel of industry experts from development teams at Riverside Studios, the Bush Theatre, Theatre 503 and the Pleasance Theatre, creating a platform for development and visibility within London’s theatre community.
Find out more about our Seed Funders
Totally Thames 2026 promises to be an epic year with an amazing site-specific installation on the orphan columns of the old Blackfriars Rail Bridge, an awesome immersive sound and light experience in SS Robin, the oldest complete steam coaster in the world. Plus, exhibitions in the new riverside public spaces that the Tideway tunnel has created, river races and regattas, foreshore clean-ups and, of course, loads of mudlarking exhibitions.Adrian Evans CVO, Director, Thames Festival Trust
Increasing access, particularly for under-represented communities including disabled people, to the culture, heritage, and wellbeing benefits of the tidal Thames is a core priority for us at the Port of London Authority. We’re delighted to be supporting the Totally Thames festival this year - what an exciting range of opportunities for people to experience this iconic blue space!Siân Foster, Director of Corporate Affairs, Port of London Authority
Festival Supported by:
Thames Festival Trust gratefully acknowledges Port of London Authority’s sponsorship of the Totally Thames festival. Jenny Cooper-Low, PLA’s Thames Vision and Partnerships Lead comments: Totally Thames plays a vital role in bringing the river to life for Londoners and visitors alike; not just as a waterway, but as a space of history, culture, and opportunity. The PLA is proud to support the festival in making the Thames more accessible and inclusive, particularly for young people and underrepresented communities. Through creative programming and community engagement, Totally Thames is helping to raise awareness of foreshore safety, promote environmental sustainability, and inspire future careers in the maritime sector; all of which directly contribute to the goals of our vision for the tidal Thames and our broader commitment to social impact.
Thames Festival Trust is sponsored by Port of London Authority and gratefully acknowledges the support of Agilia Infrastructure Partners, Art Explora Académie des beaux-arts European Award, British Council France, City Corporation’s Community Investment Levy Neighbourhood Fund, City of London Culture Team, City River Partnership, Heathrow Community Trust, Illuminated River Foundation, LB Ealing, Lloyds Register Foundation, National Lottery Heritage Fund, National Lottery through Arts Council England, Platinum Jubilee Pageant Foundation, 20 Fenchurch Street (GP) Limited, Thames Water, Tideway, Trinity Buoy Wharf Trust, Vinehill Trust, and WaterAid.
Turning the Tide Creative Partners & Artists
- Catherine Yass
- Becky Bailey
- Hugo Glendinning
- Graeae: Turning the Tide by Catherine Yass, in partnership with Graeae & commissioned by Thames Festival Trust.
Turning the Tide Funded & Supported by:
- Arts Council England: Supported using public funding by the National Lottery through Arts Council England.
- Art Explora: This initiative is generously supported by the Art Explora – Académie des beaux-arts European Award.
- City of London Corporation: Turning the Tide is brought to you in partnership with the City of London Corporation’s Culture Team. It is supported by the City Corporation's Community Infrastructure Levy Neighbourhood Fund.
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Without the support of funders, partners and people like yourself, we wouldn’t be able to deliver our diverse programme of projects and events along the Thames and across the world.