The programme for the 17th Budapest Autumn Festival is very diverse, said Deputy Mayor Csaba Horváth at a pre-launch press conference. Hungary's most important contemporary arts festival includes an extraordinary series of film screenings, a giant showcase of contemporary Norwegian jazz, street theatre, art exhibitions and dance productions.
József Nagy, Ákos Szelevényi: Entracte
BŐF artistic director Balázs Kovalik said one of the festival's aims is to add new and exciting venues to Hungary's cultural scene. As part of this endeavour, this year's festival will include a programme called PLACCC 2008, with events scheduled in venues as diverse as the Dürer Garden and the Mammut2 shopping centre. Performers from the UK, the Netherlands and Poland will be on the PLACCC programme.
The Gödör Club, in the centre of the capital, will host Blast Theory, an impossible to classify performance based on cyclists' stories strung together with the help of mobile phones equipped with earbuds.
The Dutch company Wunderbaum will explore the boundaries of personal space and the characteristics of consumer society in a performance entitled MagnaPlaza at Mammut2.
One of Poland's cutting-edge alternative theatres, Teatr Strefa Ciszy, will teach spectators "how to fly" at the former Workers Party College.
The improv street theatre Kamchátka will make appearances in several of Budapest's most popular public spaces, including Blaha Lujza Square and Nyugati Square.
Iaki Mata, one of Spain's best actors, will demonstrate the prejudice disable people face with solo performances with a wheelchair.
The ironic street theatre piece Barreras focuses on equal opportunity and serves as a guide to living with physical and social restrictions.
Sanne van Rijn
The Flemish artist Sanne van Rijn will present a one-man show about getting attention, and Jerk will explore the mind of a serial killer through a monologue.
HOPPart, which won an award at the Budapest Fringe Festival, will perform Heinrich von Kleist's Hermann's Battle, to which Hungarian theatre owes much.
Among the highlights of the festival's musical programme are a composer's evening with Barnabás Dukay and a concert by the Hungarian Radio Symphonic Orchestra. The latter will feature works by four contemporary Hungarian composers: Zsigmond Szathmáry, Gyula Csapó, Gyula Bánkövi and László Tihanyi. BŐF will also celebrate the 11th anniversary of one of Hungary's most important horn trios, Trio Lignum.
New Jazz Update 2008 will offer a broad look at contemporary Norwegian Jazz, with performances by Beady Belle and the gifted singer Beate S. Lech.
Humcrush & Sidsel Endresen (fotó: adhocmusic.de)
Humcrush will bring its special blend of futuristic electro-jazz to the programme, together with the singer Sidsel Endresen.
The young and talented pianist Bugge Wesseltoft will play a solo concert as well as a set with DJ collective Mungolian Jet Set.
On BŐF's dance programme are József Nagy, who will represent the best of Hungarian dance with a production based on China's book of change, the Ji King, and a solo performance - involving electrodes - by the Flemish dancer Cindy van Acker.
Bugge Wesseltoft (fotó: buggesroom.com)
A festival of films by the German director Rainer Werner Fassbinder will take place at three cinemas in Budapest and one in Pécs. The festival, which pays tribute to the recently deceased Hungarian artist El Kazovszkij, includes the epic 16-hour Berlin, Alexanderplatz, which will be screened in two parts during the festival. The film is one of 14 of Fassbinder's works on the programme.
The festival will also host an exhibition of works by the controversial artist Hermann Nitsch, who will attend the opening.
Visit the festival website to see the complete programme.
