music + dance + visual arts
Art Crush | Ensembl’arts is Québec and Canada’s first cultural organization with the mission of bringing together music, dance and visual arts on stage.
ART CRUSH | Ensembl’arts interprets a story or idea through the multifaceted lens of sound, image, and movement.
We produce performances, workshops, community projects, mentorship series and performing arts related video content.
Art Crush | Ensembl’arts is a dynamic cultural organization that merges music, dance, and visual arts into immersive performance experiences. Founded in Montreal in 2013, our multidisciplinary ensemble pioneers innovative productions through research, exploratory rehearsals and collaborative workshops. These processes encourage interconnections between artistic disciplines, resulting a vibrant exchange of movement, sound, emotion, and expression. Throughout our projects, each art form inspires and affects the others in a captivating cycle of creative interpretation.
We are committed to community engagement, arts education, and delivering exceptional performances across Quebec, Canada, and internationally. By reimagining concerts with a unique fusion of artistic expressions, we provide audiences with fresh perspectives and deeper appreciation for diverse repertoires.
In performance – ART CRUSH concert series
By crossing concert music with dance, movement and live visual arts, we create immersive concert experiences set in unexpected settings and spaces. Somewhere between an instrumental concert and an art or dance performance, our innovative stage / beyond-the-stage formats allow us to combine several arts forms into one.
We invite the public to experience a new multidisciplinary approach in the familiar concert context, while giving equal space to each art form. With each new creation we aim to explore deeper connections between these three disciplines as they create a new interpretation together in a unique setting.
Our ‘ART CRUSH’ concerts can be described as an on-stage visual transmission of movements, sound, emotions and expressions from one artistic discipline to another, forming a chain reaction or feedback loop of creative expressions.
NEWS
Our history and highlights
Ensembl’arts (Art Crush) blends instrumental music, live visual arts, and dance to create immersive, multidisciplinary performances. Its programming spans large-scale productions at renowned venues such as Salle Bourgie (Musée des beaux-arts) and the Ottawa Art Gallery, to grassroots initiatives in creative spaces like Bâtiment 7 (Montreal) and outdoor summer festivals.
Founded in 2013 in Montreal under the name Art Crush, the ensemble officially registered as a non-profit in 2019, and received charitable status in 2020. Its main concert series continues under the original name as a nod to its origins.
In June 2016, Ensembl’arts | Art Crush traveled to the Maritimes for performances and filming with Mécénat Musica Noncerto, collaborating with local musicians and artists from Fredericton and the wider region to interpret works by Canadian composers.
The group performed at Salle Bourgie in 2017 in collaboration with the innovative Baroque ensemble Ensemble Caprice.
During a month-long residency at the Banff Centre, members of Ensembl’arts deepened their exploration of the Art Crush format’s multidisciplinary potential. Visual artist and founder Avery Zhao created dozens of live-painted works timed to solo violin compositions, and developed a set of custom painting tools. This visual component, titled The Painter as Scribe, was further developed and exhibited at Banff during a Fall 2017 residency.
In 2021–2022, the ensemble workshopped and premiered a multidisciplinary interpretation of Trio Toccata, a new composition written for the group by Canadian composer Tim Brady.
Ensembl’arts was Artist in Residence at the 2021 Festival Été Musical de Barachois. From 2021–2023, it co-led a mentorship initiative with the Nova Scotia Talent Trust called Digital Paths. A concluding video series was released jointly by NSTT and Ensembl’arts in spring 2023.
Since the pandemic, the group has participated in Mini-Concerts Santé — an Opus Prize-winning summer series by Ensemble Caprice. These free outdoor performances bring music directly to the public in parks, streets, and public spaces, often pairing instrumentalists with singers, acrobats, and visual artists.
Launched in 2021, Corps Maison is a major community outreach initiative led by Ariana Pirela Sanchez and selected by the Ville de Montréal for its Médiation culturelle programming (2023–2025). Through a series of workshops using dance, music, and visual expression, the project explores themes of self-perception, resilience, and engagement. Facilitated by Sanchez in collaboration with Ensembl’arts, the workshops are offered to people from marginalized communities, including current and former unhoused individuals, people living with mental illness, and women in vulnerable situations. Partners include Centre du jour St-James and Pavilion Lise Watier.
In 2026, Ensembl’arts will begin a rural research and creation residency titled Arts at the Harvest, hosted by Les Concerts de Saint-Grégoire in the Montérégie region of Quebec. In collaboration with The Parcival Project and Ferme Cadet Roussel, this interdisciplinary residency will explore themes of ecology, sustainability, and community through music, dance, and visual arts. The project will feature original creations inspired by the farm environment, interactive workshops, and immersive performances with artists, farm teams, and chefs — fostering new dialogue between the arts and agriculture.
