Late Shift Extra: In Parenthesis, National Portrait Gallery

As part of its four-year programme of events  marking the centenary of the First World War, the National Portrait Gallery hosts what promises to be an evocative, site-specific performance of ballet and contemporary dance inspired by David Jones’s 1937 poem, In Parenthesis.

For one night only dancers from English National Ballet will appear in different rooms of the gallery in new work created by English National Ballet Associate Artist, George Williamson, whose Firebird formed part of the company’s Lest We Forget at the Barbican Centre in April.

Jones’s poem, which was hailed as "a work of genius" by T. S. Eliot, uses as its basis the poet’s experience on the Western Front. It draws on Welsh literary heritage, the language of Shakespeare, and First World War slang. Visitors to the event will also have free access to the gallery’s  The Great War in Portraits exhibition.