Competition alert! Start 2012 with a surprise arts trip. On theartsdesk we love crossing the borders - "Surprise me," was the edict of the great impresario of theatre, music, art and dance, Serge Diaghilev, and it's one we hold to here, because we believe in the pleasure of surprises. So please enter our competition, and a pair of tickets to one of the splendid events listed below could be coming your way, but you will take pot luck with which one you win, and who knows? You could discover a new passion.
We will email winners on Sunday 1 January - New Year's Day - with details of how they claim their prize. We have two geographical centres, London and Leeds/Yorkshire, so please don't forget to put down on your competition entry which area you're claiming in. Some tickets are for specific dates, others have a degree of winner's choice. Good luck.
Click here to go to our competition entry form.
You need to submit your entry by the last stroke of 2011 - midnight Saturday 31 December.
- Dame Edna Everage in Dick Whittington, Wimbledon Theatre, London, Mon-Thur performances, ends 15 Jan
Bourne's Nutcracker!, New Adventures (pictured right), Sadler's Wells Theatre, London, date arranged with winner, ends 22 January- Slava's Snowshow, Royal Festival Hall, South Bank Centre, London, Sun 8 Jan, 6pm
- National Youth Orchestra, Barbican Hall, London, Fri 6 Jan
- London Symphony Orchestra/Antonio Pappano, Barbican Hall, London, Tues 10 Jan
- Mission Impossible - Ghost Protocol, the IMAX Experience (12A), BFI IMAX, Southwark, London, date to be arranged with winner, ends 19 Jan
Happy Feet 2 - An IMAX 3D Experience (U), BFI IMAX, Southwark, London, date arranged with winner, ends 15 Jan- Woody Allen's Manhattan (12A), BFI Southbank, Waterloo, London, date arranged with winner, ends 22 Jan
- Woody Allen's Midnight in Paris (12A), BFI Southbank, Waterloo, London, date arranged with winner, 27 Jan-8 Feb
Shakespeare's The Comedy of Errors (with Lenny Henry, pictured right), National Theatre, Olivier Theatre, London, date arranged with winner, ends 1 Apr - O'Casey's Juno and the Paycock (Abbey Theatre, Dublin co-production), National Theatre, Lyttelton Theatre, London, date arranged with winner, ends 26 Feb
- Dickens on Screen (winner's choice), BFI Southbank, London, date arranged with winner, ends 28 Feb
Pipilotti Rist and George Condo (pictured right), Hayward Gallery, South Bank, London, 4-8 Jan- Spaghetti Western Orchestra, Queen Elizabeth Hall, South Bank Centre, London, Tues 10 Jan
- Sacconi String Quartet, Kings Place, London, Sun 8 Jan
- New York City Ballet "live" screening of George Balanchine's The Nutcracker (U) (or voucher for future live dance Cinestage screening in more convenient UK cinema), Empire cinemas in Basildon, Birmingham, Newcastle, Poole, Sunderland, Swindon, Wigan, Mon 2 Jan
The York Family Robinson (pictured right), Theatre Royal, York, Mon, Tues, Wed evening performances, ends 4 Feb- Northern Broadsides, Shakespeare's Love's Labours Lost, Viaduct Theatre, Dean Clough, Halifax, 29 Feb-10 Mar
- Jack and the Beanstalk, West Yorkshire Playhouse, Leeds, Fri 6 Jan
- Double bill: Fred Zinnemann's High Noon (U) +live music by Home of the Brave, Howard Assembly Rooms, Leeds, Fri 13 Jan
- Opera North, Handel's Giulio Cesare, Grand Theatre, Leeds, Sat 14 Jan
