Incubate artists, change the world

Combustible is a lab for intersecting art practices from dance and technology. Artists are given real, raw Space and Time, to collaborate on the creation of innovative live performance projects using state-of-the-art lighting, sound tools, and emerging technologies. Throughout a residency period artists share their research through designed public experiences and events. Combustible carves a place to be deeply inquisitive and experiment on the edge of what is known.

CounterPulse offers a rotation of supported artist residencies each year spanning different ways of making. Each residency concludes with a fully produced work on stage at CounterPulse.

Interest in participating in one of our residencies? Check out our current Open Calls >>

Cover Photo: TecTonic Shifts by dævron & Raissa Simpson’s PUSH Dance Company as part of Combustible Residency 2018; photo by Robby Sweeny


The Combustible Residency was launched with seed funding from the Doris Duke Charitable Foundation, as part of ARC which is made possible by support the Ken Hempel Fund for the Arts, Facebook, Kenneth Rainin Foundation, the Zellerbach Family Foundation, the National Endowment for the Arts, Emmet R. Quady Foundation, and CounterPulse members.  

Archived Events

Freeicecream.network

h0tclub
Saturday, May 7, 2022 at 7:30, 8, & 9 PM PT

CATENA: sound/image through a hybrid network

Dilate Ensemble & ThoughtWorks Arts
Thursday - Friday January 13 - 14, 2022 at 8pm PT

Human/ID and are:era

StratoFyzika and Pseuda
Wed-Sun, Apr 14-18. Video Installations at CounterPulse Wed-Sun, 12-8pm PDT. Livestream and Q&A on Fri, Apr 16, 5pm PDT

The Looking Glass Self and Metamorphosis: Phase 1

Mugwumpin and Mabel Valdiviezo with Travis Bennett
Thu-Sat, Sep 12-14 & 19-21, 7:30pm & 8:15pm

inCIVILITY: P.2 Outrage Machine and TecTonic Shifts

Deborah Slater Dance Theater & John Fesenko and dævron & Raissa Simpson’s PUSH Dance Company
Thu-Sat, Sept 13-22, 8pm-9pm

MÆ – Motion Aftereffect & MESH

Freya Olafson with Yagiz Mungan and Kinetech Arts
SEP 7-9, 14-16, 2017, THU-SAT 8PM

DANCEHACKDAY 2016

Hosted by Kinetech Arts and CounterPulse
DEC 10, 2016, Saturday 9AM-6PM