Hosted by The Spoleto Festival of Two Worlds, the La MaMa Spoleto Open is curated by La MaMa Umbria International, artistic residence, study and production center founded in 1990 by Ellen Stewart, founder and former artistic director of La MaMa Theatre in New York. This event aims at give support and visibility to emerging artists from all over the world. The 2019 Program includes several shows, mostly interdisciplinary, with the participation of artists of different nationalities.

Every summer we invite the most exciting downtown companies to present their latest projects in an environment of generosity, dialogue, and inspiration. Ice Factory is a place where artists can take risks, try out new ideas, and bring their projects to a new level.

Plays introduced in Ice Factory have gone on to garner Drama Desk nominations, Obie Awards, Audience First Awards in Edinburgh, Off-Broadway productions, commercial runs, and national and international tours.

ANT Fest is our annual, month-long festival of All New Talent showcasing new work from New York’s most adventurous emerging artists. Every June, Ars Nova throws open our doors to the next wave of pioneering theater, comedy, music and hybrid theater-makers who fill our stage with their most dynamic ideas.

Hangö teaterträff is an annual festival where performing arts are presented, experienced, discussed and developed. The festival is one of the main events within the Swedish-language theatre of Finland, connecting the local, international, traditional and experimental. A gathering of performing arts in the small town of Hanko in the unique archipelago of the southernmost point of mainland Finland.

URB is an annual urban art and culture festival that presents the influence of ever-changing urban and youth culture on different forms of contemporary art. The festival is produced by Kiasma Theatre.

URB makes space for incompleteness, enables experiment and connects communities, artists and actors. The festival events spread out from the museum and the black box to various urban spaces, asking to whom and on what terms urban art can exist.

The PuSh Festival expands the horizons of Vancouver artists and audiences with work that is visionary, genre-bending, multi-disciplined, startling and original. The Festival showcases acclaimed international, Canadian and local artists and mixes them together with an alchemy that inspires audiences, rejuvenates artists, stimulates the industry and forges productive relationships around the globe.

Nová dráma/New Drama is different every year. To program it anew forces the organizers to listen carefully, to follow European trends and to harmonize them with Slovak particularities. The aim is to model a festival that will always surprise and, perhaps most of all, confirm the meaningfulness of presenting and promoting new Slovak drama.

The Taipei Arts Festival continues to be in this city, bringing together the creativity of outstanding artists from home and abroad, inviting citizens to participate together, presenting themselves with art, embracing differences with dialogue, presenting Taipei’s characteristics and vitality, connecting the world. The cultural landscape of the city.

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.

Since its creation in 1992, the Puppet Theater in Paris has the challenge of defending and promoting contemporary forms of puppet theater. The festival is dedicated to contemporary puppetry in all its forms will allow to express even more strongly the richness, the diversity and the inventiveness of this art.

The Festival presents the most interesting international avant-garde and independent works including theatre shows, concerts, and exhibitions. It also engages its audiences in workshops and panel discussions.

In a nutshell, SPAC aims to present a joyous and inspiring the festival that remains deeply rooted in its home region of Shizuoka while also connecting to the wider world through theatre.

With the development of other dramatic performances such as environmental theater, consultative theater, practical and performative interwoven arts, Mariwan International Festival as a most specialized outdoor Theater Festival is to be receptive not only for street theater but also for all other dramatic performances. 

In line with its slogan of “Fujinokuni (The Mt. Fuji region) and the world are connected through the performing arts,” SPAC will introduce a wide range of cutting-edge theatre programs from Japan and abroad at venues in Shizuoka City and the surrounding, wonderfully scenic area. In a nutshell, SPAC aims to present a joyous and inspiring festival that remains deeply rooted in its home region of Shizuoka while also connecting to the wider world through theatre.

The Festival reflects our contemporary, cosmopolitan city with its many communities. It challenges artists and audiences to be bold and take a risk. Through the work of artists of Aotearoa and across the world, we aim to unify, enlighten and inspire the people of Auckland/Tāmaki Makaurau and our many visitors.

Lagos Theatre Festival (LTF) is the largest performing arts festival in Nigeria and West Africa.

It was created to promote the presentation of theatre in unconventional spaces. Through the festival, theatre makers and producers are supported to expand their practice beyond traditional theatre spaces by creating work that responds to any given space.

Over 4 weeks, young and underrepresented voices will occupy all corners of Battersea Arts Centre.

Theatre, music, live games, virtual experiences, rap, poetry and installations collide as old certainties are overturned and new possibilities imagined. As the UK faces an uncertain future, Homegrown Festival: Occupy shines a light on new perspectives.

Founded in 2004 and organised by Abu Dhabi Music & Arts Foundation, the annual multidisciplinary Festival is the largest cultural celebration in the entire region and reaches across the world through co-commissions and the international presentation of innovative Arab creativity. In essence, Abu Dhabi Festival strives to deepen global cross-cultural dialogue whilst inspiring a deeper interest in the cultures of the Arab world.

Produced by Ottawa Fringe, our winter festival showcases the best original, contemporary theatre created by local, national and international artists.

Festival founders, The Great Canadian Theatre Company, originally hosted from 2011–2014. Now, undercurrents takes place in Ottawa’s downtown core at Arts Court. Since 2011, undercurrents has has hosted 16 world premieres and presented 6 productions as part of their under development program.

More than any other cultural event, Sydney Festival defines Sydney’s personality. For over four decades we have presented international artists who guarantee headlines, and whose presence in Sydney adds to the Festival’s buzz and prestige

Over the last 14 years, The Public’s UNDER THE RADAR FESTIVAL has presented over 229 companies from 42 countries. It has grown into a landmark of the New York City theater season and is a vital part of The Public’s mission, providing a high-visibility platform to support artists from diverse backgrounds who are redefining the act of making theater. Widely recognized as a premier launching pad for new and cutting-edge performance from the U.S. and abroad, Under the Radar Festival has presented works by such respected artists as Elevator Repair Service, Nature Theater of Oklahoma, Gob Squad, Belarus Free Theatre, Guillermo Calderón, and Young Jean Lee. These artists provide a snapshot of contemporary theater: richly distinct in terms of perspectives, aesthetics, and social practice, and pointing to the future of the art form.

Website: https://publictheater.org/Programs–Events/Under-the-Radar-Festival/Under-the-Radar/?SiteTheme=UnderTheRadar

Festival Reviews and Reports:

2020

Static Electricity: Beckett At Under The Radar

2018

“The Pursuit Of Happiness” At Under The Radar Festival

2017

“Two Shakespeare Adaptations in Iran” – 2017

Performance Space 122’s Coil Festival explores the vitality of live performance in New York City through contemporary artists from diverse genres, cultures, and perspectives. Full of inquisitive and dynamic work created locally, across the US, and around the world.

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.

Our annual celebration of theatre. First held in 1983, the Prithvi Theatre Festival has become an annual event in the Mumbai calendar. There is no one theme – the Festival simply seeks to explore and celebrate theatre in its diversity – local, national, international; old traditions, new forms, cross-currents – and to share theatre with our audiences.

FESTLIP is an artistic, face-to-face, interactive and virtual manifestation. Bound integrally and naked of any type of barriers, the societies that speak Portuguese show their face. 

SPIELART has been exploring and researching new trends and movements in the world of international theater since 1995, in order to present them to audiences in Munich every two years. The antennas are aimed at unusual forms of expression and aesthetics, current topics, strong personalities, and impressive productions. SPIELART, however, also always concentrates on posing questions about theater itself as an art form, and on consistently re-exploring or re-establishing theater with approaches from the fringes. Important accents of the festival’s platform are also its entrenchment in the city’s cultural life and the dialogue between the city’s artistic and institutional energies.

23rd edition of Konfrontacje Teatralne is another “turning point” for the Festival. We begin to build programme for the next years – experts in Polish theatre, Wojciech Majcherek and Łukasz Drewniak, are responsible for the selection. The new curators chose a quote from Stanisław Wyspiański’s Study on Hamlet – What is there to think? – as a motto of this edition. They created a very diverse theatre programme revolving around Polish way of thinking, which is a kind of reflection on the troubled times. This is the “old spirit” of the new festival. We always wanted to share such thoughts with our audience. We invited recognized creators including Maja Kleczewska, Ivan Vyrypaev, Anna Smolar, Theatre of the Eighth Day and the Czech director, Jan Mikulášek. For the first time students of directing from Cracow and the Warsaw theatre academies will present their works.

The New York International Fringe Festival (FringeNYC) presents 200 companies from all over the world performing for 16 days in 16 venues. Each year the festival presented programming by nearly 200 of the world’s best emerging theatre troupes and dance companies; as well as Special Events, including FringeJR (shows for kids), FringeAL FRESCO (free outdoor performances), FringeHIGH(shows that resonate with High School kids), FringeCLUB (celebrations), FringeART (a visual art celebration) and more!

Fresh Meat is a playground for Ottawa’s theatre makers; giving local individuals and collectives of all levels of experience a unique opportunity to test new ideas in front of an audience. We present world premieres exclusively, and seek out projects that are original and innovative, and that test the traditional boundaries of live performance. Past Fresh Meat participants have used the festival as a launch pad for theatrical works intersecting with a variety of genres, including dance, poetry, burlesque, clown, pantomime, performance art, standup, sketch comedy, storytelling, and many more.

BAM’s Next Wave Festival has permanently changed the artistic landscape, featuring breakout performances and landmark productions. Using a name that plays on the New Wave in French cinema, BAM President and Executive Producer Harvey Lichtenstein launched a series entitled “The Next Wave/New Masters” in November 1981 with four productions: three dance works, plus Philip Glass’ new opera Satyagraha. A more ambitious program followed in 1982, including a two-evening performance work by Laurie Anderson entitled United States: Parts I-IV.

Welcome to the biennial New Vision Arts Festival! Our line-up showcases the Festival’s role as a creative platform, where artistic genres and cultural insights converge and energize innovation, bringing a new viewing experience to the audience.

Since its first edition in 2007, FITA has presented a panorama of the most significant production regarding the Brazilian and world animation theater.

Dance Umbrella is London’s international dance festival, celebrating contemporary choreography across the capital. Our mission is to celebrate contemporary choreography. We do so enthusiastically and collaboratively through an annual, international London festival, through year-round creative learning opportunities for all ages, and by developing choreographic talent. Our aim is to entice audiences, nurture artists, innovate practice, and stimulate interest in the power of the body in motion.

The International Theater Festival MESS has been innovative from its very beginnings, prepared in all the previous leadership through its history, even in unbelievable circumstances, in Sarajevo creating a cultural refuge for all generations, risking and investing in the bravest and most interesting art projects. That is exactly why the International Theater Festival MESS is one of the leading festivals of this part of Europe.

TBILISI INTERNATIONAL is founded by Tbilisi Municipality, by initiative of Tbilisi Mayor Gigi Ugulava in 2009. Charm of one of the oldest cities in the world – Tbilisi – its atmosphere and diversity , its culture and life, its vitality is something, that could create unforgettable experience and inspiration for all participants.The Festival runs every year and is one of the major events in International life of Georgia. But not only – it is becoming one of the main performing arts events in Caucasia, attracting attention of the most well-known, creative, provocative and innovative theater productions from the world, a meeting point of Europe and Asia, of many countries and places in one of the most beautiful, warm, unique theatrical and cultural TBILISI, the capital of Georgia.

Founded in 1967, through the initiative of Mira Trailović and Jovan Ćirilov, BITEF (Belgrade International Theatre Festival) has continually followed and supported the latest theatre trends, becoming thus one of the biggest and the most important European festivals.

FringeArts is Philadelphia’s home for contemporary performance, presenting progressive, world-class art that stretches the imagination and boldly defies expectation. As the city’s lead experimenter in the arts, FringeArts exposes audiences to unpredictable dance, theater and music performances by accomplished and emerging innovators who are pushing the boundaries of art-making and redefining the artistic landscape worldwide. Each September, the organization presents the annual Fringe Festival, a 17-day celebration that fills the city’s neighborhoods with more than 1,000 curated and independently produced contemporary performances.

Crossing the Line is an international arts festival for New York City produced by the French Institute Alliance Française (FIAF) in partnership with leading cultural institutions. France has a long history of supporting national and international cultural practices, welcoming and nurturing new ideas and influential perspectives from around the world. FIAF, as the leading French cultural institution in the US, critically maintains that practice through the Crossing the Line Festival, presenting leading-edge artists from France and the US alongside their peers from around the world. 

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

A festival organized by the Egyptian Ministry of Culture, which is non-competitive and aims to create a state of communication and dialogue between different peoples and groups from the theater and to perform, in addition to introducing the public in Egypt and the Arab region to the latest trends in the theater scene, and to provide a window from which the playwrights around the world on the latest developments in the theater scene in Egypt and the Arab countries.

The Festival has always been produced from the collective to the collective, seeking to value the professionals of the performing arts, joining pleasure, reflection and provocation, and bringing the public closer to the artists. The strong vocation of the city for group theater and artistic experimentation was reflected in the constitution of the FIT in a multiplicity of scenic poetics that recognize the richness of difference and help in the realization of an urgent desire to relate to the other.

The CHANGE was born with the intention of spreading through theaters, squares, streets, creating a greater approximation of the public with its urban spaces, and thus, a greater dialogue between the Theater and the City.

“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.

ANTI began life in 2002. Held annually in Kuopio, Finland, the city hosts the festival, projects by artists from around the world inhabit the spaces of public life – homes, shops, city squares, business, forests, lakes – and directly engage communities and audiences in the making and showing of their work. The festival is free to attend.

The International Festival Divadelna Nitra is the largest theatre festival in Slovakia. It is also one of the most important international activities in the cultural area in Slovakia. Divadelna Nitra is a recognised activity in the European context. It is organised every year towards the end of September since 1992. It is a selective, but non-competitive parade of the top European production focused on mainly the drama/play, susceptible to dance, music, puppet theatre and also the visual theatre. It selects the non-traditional, innovative and inspirational scenic theatre, it informs about the new tendencies and about the new names of the artists. It consists of the rich accompanying and working programme, it offers space to other types of art and to the representation of regional cultural activities.

Act Alone is dedicated to soloists and solo art in every field. 

nternational Theatre Festival Retroperspektywy is the only festival in Poland that rejects the division of genres and currents and does not grade the artists as professionals and amateurs, presenting at the same time the most interesting theatre phenomena which define cultural identity of a modern man. In the events offered such identity is determined by the modern language of art that follows its own ways and search for the references to tradition. Here every year there meet prominent musicians, dancers and masters of word.

Kyoto Experiment: Kyoto International Performing Arts Festival is a theater and dance event held every autumn since 2010 at theaters in Kyoto. It features a wide-ranging lineup of radical artists from Japan and around the world, presenting theater and dance as well as visual art, music, design, and architecture.

We believe that THEALTER, which has received the EFFE Label of the European Festivals Association for the second time, continues to be a festival which can cherish its traditions and achievements as well as succeed in renewing itself so that it can always offer more to its audience and the theatre community. During these 9 days, we offer about 60 events at 11 venues, including 5 premieres, 7 Hungarian premieres, open-air performances, a show for children, and Q and A’s with artists, so hopefully everyone will find something to their liking. We are certain that our programme series will again be full of surprises and unforgettable moments.

The international Gdańsk Shakespeare Festival is one of the key events in European theatre, bringing together performances, workshops and meetings with artists from every corner of the world. The Gdańsk Shakespeare Festival showcases today’s most interesting theatrical trends inspired by the works of Shakespeare. Since 1997, it has been taking place annually with the Gdańsk Shakespeare Theatre (from 2008) and the Theatrum Gedanense Foundation as the main organisers of the event.

CLAW – Contemporary Latin American Writers – Festival is a week-long initiative designed to confront London’s audiences with the vibrant talent driving the new creative scene from Latin America.

CATF’s commitment to new work is an annual festival of new plays by American playwrights, most often premieres or second or third productions. CATF focuses on plays that deal with contemporary issues that boldly challenge and entertain audiences.

The multidisciplinary Galway International Arts Festival takes place each July in Galway, Ireland and covers a range of art forms. In 2018, The Guardian named the festival as one of the Top 5 Summer Festivals in Europe.

In July each year, Porto Velho will become the capital of street theater!

The precursor to Finnish city festivals, Jyväskylän Kesä has strived throughout its history to stay ahead of its time and try new things. At the core of our multidisciplinary art programme are classy and interesting performances best experienced on the spot.

The International Alternative Theatre Festival – PUF is one of the most popular alternative theater festivals in this part of Europe. During the 20 years of its existence some 200 hundred plays have been performed, as well as over 100 accompanying programs (exhibitions, performances, concerts). This festival attracts participants from all over the world.

The performances take place at different locations around the city and are all free. Part of the program takes place at the Rojc Community Center.

The quadrennial exhibitions, festivals, and educational programs act as a global catalyst of creative progress by encouraging experimentation, networking, innovation, and future collaborations. PQ aims to honor, empower and celebrate the work of designers, artists and architects while inspiring and educating audiences, who are the most essential element of any live performance.

We choose: Unconventional theatre, Intersections of artistic and social practices, hybrids of forms, genres, techniques

We prefer: process over result, experiment over production, documenting new experiences over illusions, partnership over genius, noname over star power.

Website: http://meyerhold.ru/festival-noname-2019/

For three wild weeks in January, One Yellow Rabbit’s High Performance Rodeo, Calgary’s International Festival of the Arts, is where the action is. It’s a chance to watch touring performances from across Canada, acclaimed international shows, and new and experimental work from artists here in Calgary. The programming is bold, cutting-edge, funny, frank, and full of heart. There’s theatre, dance, music, film, free lunchtime concerts, late-night cabarets, and so much more.