More than 20,000 people will be treated to a spectacular artistic extravaganza in the heart of Belfast’s docks as part of the city’s plans to mark the 2012 Olympics.
Some 500 cast and crew will take part in the Land Of Giants show next summer, with acrobatics, aerial dance, carnival, circus, music and pyrotechnics mixed into a one-off show to celebrate the London Games.
It is one in a programme of arts events taking place throughout Northern Ireland as the region contributes to the London 2012 festival.
Derry, Enniskillen and the Causeway coast will all play a role in the three-month Cultural Olympiad.
Today, London 2012 and the Arts Council of Northern Ireland unveiled details of many of the events which will run from June 21, through the Olympics and up to the last day of the Paralympic Games on September 9th.
As part of the festival, Turner Prize-winning artist and musician Martin Creed will invite the people of Northern Ireland to join in with All The Bells, a project which encourages people across the UK to ring bells as loudly and quickly as they can at 8am on July 27th, 2012 to welcome the 205 competing nations on the first day of the games.
Other notable events will include a staging of Benjamin Britten's Noye's Fludde by NI Opera, featuring a large cast of local schoolchildren in a novel setting for an opera - Belfast Zoo.
Internationally renowned German artist Hans Peter Kuhn is set to transform the Causeway coast with his project Flags. A series of flags, red on one side, yellow on the other, will stretch along the bay as it approaches the Giant's Causeway.
In Fermanagh, theatre director Robert Wilson's adaptation of Krapp's Last Tape by Samuel Beckett will be presented as part of the proposed Happy Days - Enniskillen International Festival Of Beckett.
Peace One Day’s countdown to Global Truce 2012 will open the festival with Massive Attack headlining a rock concert at Ebrington Barracks in Derry.
Culture minister Carál Ní Chuilín welcomed the line-up.
“Central to the successful London bid for the 2012 Games was a commitment to reconnect world-class performance in sport with excellence in the arts,” she said. “Our participation here in the north of Ireland with the festival gives us a strong connection with the Games and allows us to showcase some of the very best of our local talent as well as giving people here a chance to see works by internationally acclaimed artists and performers."
All confirmed programming for the festival is available on the London 2012 Festival website at london2012.com/festival