Sydney Festival has named Canadian-born Kris Nelson as its next artistic director.

The first festival he will program will be in January 2026, which is also the 50th anniversary of the event.

Current Sydney Festival director Olivia Ansell is preparing to unveil her fourth and final festival, which will be staged from January 4 to 26 next year, before taking up the top job at Toronto’s Luminato Festival.

Most recently, Nelson, 43, has been artistic director of the London International Festival of Theatre (LIFT), a major biennial event staged in the UK capital since 1981.

Nelson said he was “over the moon” when he got the call to say he had been chosen for the gig over more than 100 hopefuls worldwide.

Before helming LIFT, Nelson directed the Dublin Fringe Festival, Ireland’s largest multidisciplinary arts festival.

“I’ve been a festival director and producer my whole career,” he said, speaking from the West Midlands in the UK. “Coming out of theatre school, it was the thing that landed with me.

“The thing that keeps me coming back into the festival world is that thing of different voices coming together, different stories coming together and bringing different challenges, provocations and gifts to an audience.”

Nelson said Sydney’s annual summer event was one of the “great” worldwide festivals.