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Ten days that will transform a small medieval town into the stage for one of the world’s most important performing arts events, this year’s Santarcangelo Festival is entitled enough not enough. The 53rd edition of the event, it will take place July 7–16 in the town of Santarcangelo di Romagna. Curated for the second time by Polish playwright and critic Tomasz Kireńczuk, the ten-day festival will see 40 performers, groups, and companies present over 100 performances.
"Santarcangelo Festival has a distinct uniqueness that makes the entire town function according to a logic of action completely different from that of daily life. Santarcangelo does not only host the event, but it also becomes a festival-city, a dialogue-city, a meeting-city, a party-city. It fascinates me how the places that Santarcangelo's community offers to artists as art spaces become an essential part of the narratives created in other social and cultural contexts, even very different ones. Above all, we want the 53rd edition of Santarcangelo Festival to be an authentic and profound experience: individual, collective and open to new ways of thinking and being together."
Tomasz Kirenczuk, director of Santarcangelo Festival 2023
The event will also pose a string of questions, challenging us to explore the way we think and the way we “occupy” the world with our bodies: What are we no longer willing to accept? What are we missing? How is it possible to share this world of spiraling inequality, injustice, and exploitation with others?
These are issues that are rarely discussed in the information-driven Western world because they’re potential triggers of dissent and condemnation. It’s therefore the job of the performing arts, theater, and dance to stimulate new visions and bring about change. In these performances, the body is seen as both object and subject – a source of discrimination but one that can also be a medium for liberation. The first building block of our identity is our body – this observation giving us hope for a more equitable and inclusive future in which we can all coexist.
Underscoring the fluidity of genres – including in the performing arts, which are no longer bound by predefined labels or limitations – Santarcangelo Festival 2023 will be more diverse than ever. Theater, dance, music, visual art, and combinations thereof will mix different cultures and aesthetics, bringing to the stage the most innovative trends emerging globally with numerous international artists making their Italian debut.
One of the most important new developments in 2023 is the first edition of DanzER, a project to promote Emilia-Romagna’s contemporary dance scene around the world. It’s organized by the Tavolo Regionale della Danza with the support of the Regional Department of Culture and Natural Heritage, ATER Fondazione, Fondazione Nazionale della Danza/Aterballetto, ERT Fondazione, and the Emilia-Romagna Antibodies Network.
From the opening days of the festival, panel discussions and meetings open to the public will be presenting the results of the Let’s Revolution! / Teatro Patalò and Teatro delle Able Non-School workshops. Both involved months of work with junior high and high school children from Santarcangelo.
Some of the most notable Italian artists at the event include performer and author Chiara Bersani, and dancer, performer, and choreographer Cristina Kristal Rizzo. Rizzo also directs a duo formed by performer, actress, and author Silvia Calderoni, and performer, activist, and researcher Ilenia Caleo. Their latest works will be presented by performer, director, and visual artist Eva Geatti, ColettivO CineticO, Francesca Pennini, the Dewey Dell collective, and the performers/choreographers Giorgia Ohanesian Nardin and Sara Sguotti. More highlights include the participation of actress, performer, and director Emilia Verginelli with sound artist and musician Agnese Banti, who’ll be presenting their new project dedicated to supporting young creatives, backed by the Santarcangelo Festival with twelve national partners, and the results of work carried out last year with the support of FONDO.
Notable international participants include Rébecca Chaillon from France (originally from Martinique) in her Italian debut; Berlin-based author and performer Ligia Lewis; Brazilian researcher, choreographer, and performer Ana Pi; Canadian artist and performer Dana Michel; French artist Nach; Canadian multidisciplinary artist Clara Furey; and German performer, musician, and visual artist Julian Hetzel, who’ll be joining forces with South African performer Ntando Cele. Also appearing are Lithuanian Anna-Marija Adomaityte; South African Tiran Willemse; Belarusian artist and activist Jana Shostak; and Palestinian artist Basel Zaraa – all young artists who’ll be performing in Italy for the first time. Polish-Dutch performer Wojciech Grudzinski will also be participating thanks to support from the European Festivals Fund for Emerging Artists.
As part of BE PART – Art BEyond PARTicipation, Piazza Ganganelli will be the setting for the Guxxi Fabrika project by Chilean visual artist and performer Cote Jana Zuniga. Alex Baczynski-Jenkins, a Polish-British performer, and Catol Teixeira, a performer from Brazil, are returning to the 2023 Festival after last year’s success with two new performances. New Zealander Kate McIntosh is the guest artist of “boxed” performance project Samara Editions, which will be completing its program with Swiss performer Mélissa Guex and Jamaican-Norwegian artist Harald Beharie.
Put together by Chris Angiolini and featuring Trust the Mask and Tout Bleu, the musical program is also a highlight. The venue is Imbosco, a circus tent set up at the intersection of Via Costa and Via Morigi, where, at the end of the day’s performances, Italian and international DJs will take turns at the controls.
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