The Malta Council for Culture and the Arts (MCCA) has unveiled its programme for the ninth edition of the Malta Arts Festival 2014, Malta’s largest arts festival. The features include a video opera where film and reality mirror each other, a circus which brings together poetry and humour and a film festival under the stars.
Running from July 14 July to August 2 , the festival will include artists from Croatia, the UK, Spain, the Netherlands, Czech Republic, South Africa and Russia along with Maltese.
Most of these events will be held in the Mediterranean Conference Centre, Pjazza Teatru Rjal and the newly-restored Fort St Elmo.
Following the previous artistic director’s departure last December, the programme was put together by an artistic committee composed of British-Malaysian dancer and choreographer Mavin Khoo, composer Ruben Zahra, theatre director and actor Toni Attard and Malta Philharmonic Orchestra chair Sigmund Mifsud. The team worked under the direction of MCCA chairman Albert Marshall.
The festival will open on a high note with 2Cellos, where two young Croatian cellists take cello playing to a new level in a live performance. The next day, Kelma Kelma will team up with the Big Band Brothers for a night of music and literature at Pjazza Teatru Rjal.
Fort St Elmo will set the scene for Hide and Seek, the new dance production by Ivan Perez which will take audiences into an atmospheric trip where desires, frustrations, madness and tenderness are slowly revealed. The other main dance event of the programme, a Triple Bill of duets featuring works by emerging Maltese practitioners and established international artists, will be held at Pjazza Teatru Rjal.
Two events are expected to be a hit with families: Fecha de Caducidad a circus from Spain which will bring together moments of poetic beauty, of heart-stopping risk and of tragically funny circus combined with elements of physical theatre and dance to create a visually stunning and emotionally charged show. Ir-Ritorn, a production based on Homer’s Odyssey by Teatru Anon, originally a Żigużajg Commission, promises to be a quirky good old-fashioned swashbuckling adventure. Both performances are free for children 12 years and under.
Music-lovers will enjoy Ruben Zahra & Windstreken Ensemble, a concert which portrays a unique folk-fusion profile, as well as Up-close, an innovative work by Dutch composer Michel van der Aa where film and live performance reflect each one another. Up-Close is a cello concerto duplicated and magnified until it reaches the boundary of video opera, featuring soloist Konstanze van Gutzeit under the direction of Pavel Snajdr with the string orchestra of the Malta Philharmonic Orchestra.
Also bridging genres is Il-Kappillan ta’ Malta, a stage adaptation of Monsarrat’s famous novel by Immanuel Mifsud. Presented by Fundazzjoni Avventura, the theatre company behind Vassalli and Jiena Nћobb Inti Tћobb, the performance will be held at Piazza d’Armi in Fort St Elmo. And the emerging artists series – featuring musicians Nadine Galea and Luke Baldacchino – will also present an interdisciplinary showcase of music, literature and painting.
The visual arts will also make a strong appearance through VIVA, the Valletta International Visual Arts Festival, a first pioneering festival for the visual arts in Malta. Organised by St James Cavalier Centre for Creativity, Valletta 2018 Foundation and Agenzija Żgћażagћ, with the support of the Malta Council for Culture and the Arts, the festival will run a few weeks after the Malta Arts Festival and will include events such as a summer curatorial school, exhibitions in Valletta and the third edition of a collective exhibition for young emerging artists.
Also running as part of the festival is a series of films which will be held under the stars at Pjazza Teatru Rjal, curated by Simshar director Rebecca Cremona with a guest appearance by distinguished professor Dr Yevgeny Yevtushenko.
Globe will be back with King Lear, with Pjazza Teatru Rjal providing the backdrop to the high tragedy of what is arguably Shakespeare’s most moving play.
The trademark Closing Concert will be held at the Mediterranean Conference Centre, with the Malta Philharmonic Orchestra playing under the baton of Mro Brian Schembri with Russian cellist Alexander Kniazev.
More at www.maltaartsfestival.org