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Hijinx Academy (learning disabled actor trainees) work with leading companies eg Spymonkey, Punchdruk etc to create a key component for the festival. They are joined by leading disability-led work from across the world. There is also a participatory programme.

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Tramway’s Unlimited Festival showcases exceptional work by disabled artists. Like Southbank Centre’s Unlimited Festival, it programmes work funded by the Unlimited commissioning programme. Tramway’s Unlimited places a focus on programming Scottish disabled artists alongside international work.

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BewegGrund
June

Inclusive dance company BewegGrund has been hosting a biennial dance festival since its inception in 1998. BewegGrund stands for equal rights, for self-determination, equal opportunities and integration: its goal is the self-evident participation of disabled and non-disabled people in cultural projects.

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Skånes Dansteater works continuously with developing dance as an art form. Every year it presents a festival or conference programme on a relevant theme which opens up to varying perspectives relating to dance.

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L’Altre Festival is an International cultural event that takes place in Barcelona. It connects Performing Arts and Mental Health and seeks to involve, promote and exhibit Performing Arts among people with mental illness. Moreover, the Festival focuses on three specific objectives: performing arts and creation of companies as a rehabilitation tool for people with mental illnesses; the fight against the stigma associated with mental health; and contribution to the creation and enrichment of popular culture.

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Fuori Posto, FESTIVAL DI TEATRI AL LIMITE is a festival that chooses to offer its shows only in places out of place: markets, squares, metro, galleries, monuments, cultural centers. Out of place is a festival that approaches the public until it becomes part of the work. The Fuori Posto festival tells stories that make the “difference”, proposes shows that reflect on social issues: such as disability, homosexuality, environment. The festival is organised by integrated theatre company Fuori ConTesto.

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Since 1997, the festival “From near nobody is normal” animates the Milan summer evenings. The former psychiatric hospital, as an emblem of exclusion, has become a public square of sociality and culture, a strong sign that even in the suburbs it is possible to have a public life full of quality, accessible events.

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Culture From the Edge is an international festival for theater groups in which people with disabilities are artistically active.

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The non-profit association Integrative Kulturarbeit was founded in 2005 in Linz / Upper Austria with the aim of promoting the art of people with disabilities and making it accessible to the general public in as comprehensive a form as possible.

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By engaging with artists, connecting with communities and forming collaborations, Scottish Mental health Arts Film Festival celebrates the artistic achievements of people with experience of mental health issues, exploring the relationship between creativity and the mind, and promoting positive mental health and wellbeing.

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DaDaFest International is a critically acclaimed and award-winning biennial festival, which showcases high quality and exciting work in key arts venues across Liverpool city. It challenges stereotypes and celebrates disability and deaf cultures.

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Out of the Box Biennial of Inclusive Arts takes place in cultural venues across Geneva around with an inclusive arts programme i.e. artistic productions characterized by the inclusion of artists with disabilities. Unique in French-speaking Switzerland, this event aims to rethink the relationship between art and disability.

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WILDWUCHS Festival focusses on themes which otherwise would be neglected in the public discourse, such as physical and mental disabilities, old age, homelessness, migration – to name but a few. WILDWUCHS Festival strives for interesting and new encounters, allowing people to get to know each other and understand that if we listen to each other, we will find more commonalities than differences.

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IntegrART
May

IntegrART, a Migros Culture Percentage networking project, actively supports the inclusion of artists with a disability within art and society. Since 2007, the biennial initiative has been linking up local festivals, presenting national and international productions, and organising symposiums in cooperation with key partners.

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The Festival 10 Sentidos was created in 2011 with the intention of portraying works by artists with disabilities together with artists without apparent disability, and in the successive editions it has since been transformed into a festival with a strong social discourse as opposed to only supporting artists with disabilities. Every year the programming is structured according to a particular motto that strives to highlight problems that affect our society. The Festival is committed to generating new languages of communication via art in order to understand how people differ and how differences are accepted by others.

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Paladio Art festival aims to bring the world of performing arts and diversity to wider society, thus contributing to greater knowledge, awareness, acceptance and integration for disabled people as citizens. It continues to demonstrate that integrated art can be synonymous with artistic quality.

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Annual inclusive dance festival which features performances, workshops, talks and since 2017 a ‘choreography competition’ in which inclusive dance companies from around the world compete for cash prizes.

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Una Mirada Diferente is organised by the Centro Dramatico Nacional (National Drama Centre of Spain). It brings together international disabled artists and companies working across performance artforms including theatre, dance and music.

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Kyma Festival is organized by Kyma Project, a platform for inclusive dance created by Angeliki MItropoulou. It includes dance and theater workshops accessible for everyone and performances by international and national mixed-ability companies. The first edition of the festival was supported by START-create cultural change and took place in May 2018 at theater of Athens School of Fine Arts.

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The festival NO LIMITS is looking for strategies on how artists with disabilities can act politically on stage.

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Work selected will be across art-form genres, ranging across theatre, dance, visual arts, digital art, live art and children’s work. The programme will also include a series of talks and debates delivered by UK artists and arts consultants. International delegates are encouraged to attend and to consider work for inclusion in their programmes, and to forge relationships with the UK disability arts constituency to broker relationships with the UK disability arts sector.

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Sommerblut, the “Festival of Multipolar Culture”, sees itself as an inclusive cultural festival that unites different social, social and political viewpoints and identities. The concept of inclusion is here deliberately broad: it is about physical and cognitive features, ways of life, value systems, traditions, beliefs – all that determines the identity of each human being and the daily discourse in our society.

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Fest’Dif as a place of social and professional integration, an invitation to meet, share and be open to others; a time of festive conviviality on the themes of difference and diversity, including workshops and performances. Fest’Dif makes visible sports and artistic creations developed by people with disabilities or any other arts professional with an inclusive conduct promoting social diversity in their practice.

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There are two key aims: First, to develop the idea of a relaxed performance/screening further to create an entire festival that’s designed to be as autism-friendly as possible. Second, to be a celebration of autistic creativity, with a range of performances, films, installations and an exhibition of visual art by artists on the spectrum.

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An annual festival organised by Sala Tarambana, Madrid which aims to increase the visibility of disabled artists. Festival Visibles programmes inclusive theatre companies, predominantly from Spain. It also includes musical performances, film screenings and discussions.

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I wanna be with you everywhere is a gathering of, by, and for disabled artists and writers and anyone who wants to get with us for a series of crip meet-ups, performances, readings and other social spaces of surplus, abundance and joy. It refuses policies of individuation and inclusion in favor of (and in the flavor of) whatever disability aesthetics has in bodymind. We won’t know what this is ‘til it shows us, but we do know that disability communities don’t only make art about disability.

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Downtown Contemporary Arts Festival (D-CAF) is Egypt’s only international multi-disciplinary contemporary arts festival that takes place over three weeks between March and April each year, at multiple sites in Downtown Cairo. D-CAF includes local, regional and international music, theatre, dance, visual arts, literature and film by cutting-edge artists from Egypt, the Arab world, and beyond. In addition to featuring established Downtown cultural spaces and theatres, D-CAF breaks new ground by using non-traditional sites such as historical buildings, storefronts, alleyways, and rooftops for performances, events, and arts installations, with the aim of bringing both audiences and performers to engage with the city in a new way.

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InArt
February

InArt – Community Arts Festival aims to examine and explore new strategies of work and interaction of disabled people for citizenship by promoting contact with the various forms of artistic expression. InArt includes various cultural events – seminars, performances, video exhibitions, talks and workshops. It brings together artists, technicians, psychologists, journalists, teachers and students in reflection and sharing of processes and issues through dialogue and artistic display.

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Artistically led and committed to meeting the new challenges of producing and touring theatre made by learning disabled and non-disabled theatre makers, Crossing The Line will allow the three companies to bring their artists together to learn from and with each other; engage with creative and audience development processes; develop connections with a wider network of European theatre companies with a focus on learning disabled artists; and create 3 new productions – culminating in a showcase festival.

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ITFoK will mobilise ‘forms’ to stage this transitive contemporary. It will seek to reflect upon the state of democracy, call attention to alternative voices, and propose different futures or ways to remember. In this spirit, all kinds of performative works are welcome – proscenium plays, performance-readings, live art, promenade theatre, follow-art, site-specific theatre, game-narratives, endurance-art, documentary-theatre, intimate-plays, lecture performances, flash-drama, theatre-on-the-internet, or any other work that experiments with participation, interaction, and the political urgency of live art forms. The intention is to employ the theatric to form a community of interest, to imagine new geographies of space, of body, and of the mind. ITFOK will imagine our theatre as a deep, horizontal comradeship.

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Cross-art, cross-impairment festival which takes place every November-December in East London. It brings together locally based, national and international Disabled artists and offers exhibitions, performances, screenings, events and other activities that are free and open to everyone. Includes a disability film festival.

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Simbiòtic Festival is a multidisciplinary festival of performing arts that offers contemporary and accessible programming, both for audiences with sensory diversity and for performing arts enthusiasts.

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Inclús, Barcelona International Disability Film Festival promotes audiovisual works whose theme is the functional diversity, with the aim of raising awareness of the reality of people with disabilities from a different point of view. The centerpiece of the festival is an audiovisual contest where short films, fiction films, documentaries and audiovisual productions of entities can be found. Inclús focuses on audiovisual productions, but also has other artistic and commercial activities and disciplines in order to give visibility to this sector. It is an initiative of Associació Inclús and organized by the audiovisual production broadcaster Fish Muvi.

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Art et Décirure
November

Since 1988, the Art et Décirure festival has been supporting and spreading artistic expression in all its forms to people with mental illnesses.

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The Accessible Arts and Culture association was founded in Tampere, Finland in 2011, The principle of Accessible Arts and Culture activities is to provide events, cultural services providers, organisations, theatres and companies with concrete assistance related to improving accessibility and reaching new audiences and participants. The goal of the association is to improve accessibility in the Finnish culture and events field and to promote equal participation in cultural events for all people. 

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IMAGO festival
October

This festival takes all its meaning and its interest to be accompanied by a real field work, intended to facilitate access to the culture of disabled people and to promote social diversity in theaters, cinemas and libraries. It showcases high quality contemporary ‘art and disability’ work.

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Dublin Fringe Festival is a platform for the best new, emerging Irish arts companies and a showcase for the finest international contemporary performing arts. For artists, Fringe facilitates opportunities to innovate, to cross boundaries and strengthen the conditions in which they work. For audiences, Fringe is the place to discover meaningful, exciting and unforgettable cultural experiences.

Website: www.fringefest.com/

 

Festival Reviews and Reports:

2019

Dublin Fringe Festival 2019: Women In Flux

 

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A music festival run by and for people with a range of learning difficulties. Open to the public it has become a much-anticipated event each September.

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Bounce
September

BOUNCE is the annual arts festival produced by the University of Atypical. Since 2012 Bounce has presented new work by deaf and disabled writers, actors, dancers, musicians, directors and poets, as well as hosting participatory workshops and masterclasses across a range of art forms.

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Southbank Centre’s Unlimited Festival is one of the world’s largest disability arts festivals, celebrating the artistic excellence of disabled artists across artforms. The festival programmes work produced as part of the Unlimited commissioning programme (delivered by Shape and Artsadmin) alongside other work by leading disabled artists. It features performances, exhibitions and talks. The festival predominantly showcases UK artists and companies, with some international representation.

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International festival committed to making diversity visible. ÍDEM brings together spectators and artists in an effort to develop empathy for our surroundings and contribute to our understanding of today’s world, in order to help to transform the way we look at things and to “resist the false appearances of illusory evidence”.

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Oriente Occidente
September

Oriente Occidente was founded in 1981 to actively strengthen the role of contemporary dance in Italy. As one of the leading European dance festivals, Oriente Occidente hosts artist residencies, seminars, lectures, workshops and performances, which encourage exchange between cultures, genres and languages of contemporary dance. Oriente Occidente hosts leading artists’ and companies’ premieres from all over the world, at the cutting edge of the form. The programme is of the highest quality to promote development, availability and diversity of dance for audiences and mass media.

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Grenzenlos Kultur
September

“Grenzenlos Kultur” is not only Germany’s oldest theatre festival with disabled and non-disabled artists. But also a very lively platform well known beyond the borders of Mainz, which shows unusual, often experimental, mostly socio-politically motivated forms of art and theatre.

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DanceAble
August

Under the umbrella term DanceAble, Holland Dance Festival aims to put inclusive dance in the Netherlands firmly on the map, reduce barriers and remove prejudices. The festival features workshops, performances and a symposium, featuring both local and international integrated dance companies and experts.

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Started in 2007 by disability parent organization Barlicka the festival aims at artists with disability in Eastern Slovakia, often coming from state institutions. Very often this is their only chance to perform.

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Since 2003, the Clin d’Oeil Festival has been organized every two years by the association CinéSourds, whose mission is to introduce the Sign Language in all the diversity of its culture and artistic forms.

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Festivals

  • Hijinx Theatre Unity Festival

    Hijinx Theatre Unity Festival

    June , Wales, United Kingdom

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  • Unlimited Festival Tramway

    Unlimited Festival Tramway

    June , Glasgow, Scotland

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  • BewegGrund

    BewegGrund

    June , Berne, Switzerland

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  • Skånes Dansteater

    Skånes Dansteater

    June , Malmö, Sweden

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  • L’Altre Festival

    L’Altre Festival

    June , Barcelona, Spain

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  • Fuori Posto

    Fuori Posto

    June , Rome, Italy

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  • Da Vicino Nessuno è normale

    Da Vicino Nessuno è normale

    June , Milan, Italy

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  • Kultur vom Rande (Culture From the Edge)

    Kultur vom Rande (Culture From the Edge)

    June , Reutlingen, Germany

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  • Sicht: Wechsel

    Sicht: Wechsel

    June , Linz, Austria

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  • Scottish Mental Health Arts Film Festival

    Scottish Mental Health Arts Film Festival

    May , Scotland

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  • DaDaFest International

    DaDaFest International

    May , Liverpool, England

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  • Out of the BOX Festival

    Out of the BOX Festival

    May , Geneva, Switzerland

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  • WILDWUCHS Festival

    WILDWUCHS Festival

    May , Basel, Switzerland

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  • IntegrART

    IntegrART

    May , Zürich, Switzerland

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  • 10 Sentidos

    10 Sentidos

    May , València, Spain

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  • Paladio Art

    Paladio Art

    May , Segovia, Spain

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  • Escena Móvile

    Escena Móvile

    May , Seville, Spain

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  • Una Mirada Diferente

    Una Mirada Diferente

    May , Madrid, Spain

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  • Kyma Festival

    Kyma Festival

    May , Mainz, Germany

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  • No Limits Festival

    No Limits Festival

    May , Berlin, Germany

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  • Unlimited Festival of Disability Arts

    Unlimited Festival of Disability Arts

    May , Southbank Centre, London, England

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  • Sommerblut Festival

    Sommerblut Festival

    May , Cologne, Germany

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  • FEST’DIF

    FEST’DIF

    May , Villeurbanne, France

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  • Autism Arts Festival

    Autism Arts Festival

    April , Canterbury, United Kingdom

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  • Festival Visibles

    Festival Visibles

    April , Madrid, Spain

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  • I wanna be with you everywhere

    I wanna be with you everywhere

    April , New York, United States

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  • DCAF – Downtown Contemporary Arts Festival

    DCAF – Downtown Contemporary Arts Festival

    March , Cairo, Egypt

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  • InArt

    InArt

    February , Lisbon, Portugal

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  • Crossing the Line Festival

    Crossing the Line Festival

    January , Roubaix, France

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  • International Theatre Festival of Kerala

    International Theatre Festival of Kerala

    January , Kerala, India

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  • Together! Disability History Month Festival

    Together! Disability History Month Festival

    November , London, United Kingdom

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  • Simbiòtic Festival

    Simbiòtic Festival

    November , Barcelona, Spain

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  • Inclús, International Film and Disability Festival of Barcelona

    Inclús, International Film and Disability Festival of Barcelona

    November , Barcelona, Spain

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  • Art et Décirure

    Art et Décirure

    November , Rouen, Normandy, France

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  • ACCAC (Accessible Arts and Culture)

    ACCAC (Accessible Arts and Culture)

    November , Tampere, Finland

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  • IMAGO festival

    IMAGO festival

    October , Île-de-France, France

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  • Dublin Fringe Festival

    Dublin Fringe Festival

    September , Dublin, Ireland

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  • Rockin Roadrunner Festival

    Rockin Roadrunner Festival

    September , Northampton, United Kingdom

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  • Bounce

    Bounce

    September , Belfast, United Kingdom

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  • Southbank Centre’s Unlimited Festival

    Southbank Centre’s Unlimited Festival

    September , London, United Kingdom

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  • ÍDEM (International Festival of the Scenic Arts)

    ÍDEM (International Festival of the Scenic Arts)

    September , Madrid, Spain

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  • Oriente Occidente

    Oriente Occidente

    September , Rovereto, Province of Trento, Italy

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  • Grenzenlos Kultur

    Grenzenlos Kultur

    September , Mainz, Germany

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  • DanceAble

    DanceAble

    August , The Hague, Netherlands

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  • Margaretafest

    Margaretafest

    July , Prešov, Slovakia

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  • Clin d’Oliel

    Clin d’Oliel

    July , Reims, France

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