Timisoara 2023 - snapshots - European Cultural Capital

Images from Timisoara, the old center, the tourist streets, the park, the Opera Square, the Orthodox Cathedral, Timisoara restaurants and bars.

4k video -Timisoara, 2023

In 2023, with a delay due to the Covid pandemic, Timisoara is the European cultural capital.

The season started in February 2023

A selection of important events still available for participants includes events and frameworks such as:

May-December. Step by step in the neighborhoods,

includes: Timișoara celebrates International Trade Day; tastings of local products; food waste awareness event; the right to a food awareness event.

January-August. Danube women

Site-specific theatrical performance regarding the multiculturalism of the Danube area, in collaboration with Donauschwäbisches Zentralmuseum (Ulm, Germany) Productions and related events under the European Directors programme.

April-December 2023 Culture and community

This project includes a series of debates, conferences, artistic events on topics such as street art and urban regeneration, design thinking, etc. Events will take place in non-conventional spaces, including events pop-up in rural areas, beneficial for regional cultural tourism.

June-September. Theater of the oppressed

Forum theater preceded by workshops with young locals. Training young artists with regarding cultural animation in Roma communities.

July 2023 Impuls Festival

A large-scale performing arts festival, for amateurs and for professionals alike, who will guide locals and tourists in an artistic journey of the unseen face of Timisoara. Concerts, contemporary dance, circus performances and theatre, workshops and street food will occupy Traian Square to bring a tribute to its cultural and historical richness and to draw attention to energy and effervescent potential of its inhabitants.

July-September. Temporary tactics

A nomadic, mobile stage for transmedia projects using tech as challenging tool for capturing an audience that consumes too little or not even contemporary art and culture, directed to the outskirts of the city to experience new ways of social and cultural interaction.

September-December. Eurothalia European Theater Festival #9

Theatres, collectives and guest performers from all over Europe. Productions and events related within the European Directors program. Producing a show of theater on the theme of migration, based on a text written by the author Anja Hilling, Germany, and the author Elise Wilk, Romania, in collaboration with the Altenburg Theatre (Gera, Germany).

September. Step by Step/Walking Festival:

artisanal gastronomy festival

September. The Light Across Borders program will culminate with a festival of two weeks in September at various locations along the Bega River. this will includes multilingual theatrical productions, film screenings, concerts of various genres music and art installations. The festival will enliven and allow exploration of the various forgotten urban spaces along the Bega Canal

September. SABOTAGE Festival – Music Arena – 2 music stages (Dub Arena – dub & reggae, Electronic Arena – techno, electro, experimental and live); Technology Arena – new media art, exhibitions, documentary film, video mapping, installations by art and lights; Knowledge Arena – discussions, conferences, workshops and presentations.

September-November. Performing 89

Exhibition and research discussing in historical context the public involvement of the artist in the early 1990s. He initiates a reconstruction that discusses about the efforts of Romanian artists from the beginning of the 1990s, of collectives artistic or solitary initiatives as solutions for starting an action on a field unexplored.

September-November. Festival IN: VZBL 

will take place between September and November at the Theater Basca, as well as in various public spaces in the Fabric district. The festival includes community cultural events and activities that actively engage the public in the area Traian/Fabric: concerts, creative workshops for children and the elderly, residencies for artists (international and local), guest theater performances, performance by forum theater, debates about political theater, documentary screening. Festival IN : VZBL caters to both the general public and people from underprivileged groups from the Traian/Fabric area, a diverse range of activities and cultural events that promotes culture and education through culture, dialogue, understanding, diversity, multiculturalism, respect and solidarity

September-November. Art Encounters

 This international event has been taking place in Timisoara since 2015. 

In 2023, the Art Encounters Biennale will continue to contribute to the creation of new cultural routes that include the outskirts of Timisoara, as well as public spaces, where the interventions are intended to draw attention to the need to rehabilitate those spaces or return them to the community. Biennale Art Encounters 2023 will have a strong national and international impact, watching expanding its mediation program and its presence in the public space. This one edition of the biennial will focus on collective knowledge, of the structures of support and building communities as part of its concept for the 5th edition, which will also be an opportunity to rethink the model the biennial. The Encounters program will be marked by two other important moments at Art Museum. The Brâncusi exhibition, curated by Doïna Lemny, Romanian sources and universal perspectives will present essential themes that the artist has developed over decades, in sculpture, but also in photography and drawing. A part of his most emblematic creations from the Center Pompidou collections, The Tate Art Museum and other important international and national collections will be exhibited for the first time in his country of origin. Victor Brauner Retrospective  (1903–1966) will be the most important retrospective dedicated to the surrealist de Romanian origin in his native country as well as in this part of Europe. construction which have never been presented in Romania, from the Center's collections Pompidou, as well as from other French private collections, will be reunited with paintings and drawings owned by Romanian museums and private collectors. Autumn season of the program will be marked by a program of three sculpture exhibitions at the Museum of Banat, organized by the Triade Foundation.

October. Sit+Read Festival – publication fair, exhibition, workshops, conferences, closing event

October. Intrada Festival

In October, the Intrada Festival will once again include masterclasses and concerts with young participants who will perform alongside the Romanian Chamber The orchestra led by conductor Cristian Măcelaru.

October November. Classical Music Summit

In late October – early November 2023, it will be hosted by "Banatul" Philharmonic, the second edition of the Classical Music Summit. In the within this edition, the number of participants will increase to over 150 musicians and classical music professionals. Again, the 4 day meeting will be a opportunity for cultural exchanges and will encourage the exchange of knowledge between participants from different countries. This conference and exhibition will place Timisoara on map of cities relevant to professionals in the sector.

Throughout the year

In 2023, all the Light Centers in the neighborhood will be activated through a program of events, workshops, concerts, theater performances (Teatrul Auăleu, Company 9), screenings of films created within the program, educational sessions and projects selected by the community. A dedicated conference will be organized local communities in different neighborhoods in Europe as vectors of transformation and urban regeneration. A series of interventions in the public space will be co-created together with the local community, which will also host art workshops and creative education (Bajko Attila, Tajo). Under the title Timisoara, the secret map. People and places, a series of documentary films will be made in 24 episodes, with lesser-known stories of the city (common transversal program for stations Dare! and Reflections).

Voices of the city. Identity workshop.

Because the identity of Timișoara consists in diversity, in 2023, the Workshop of identity will be defined as the Diversity Workshop. It consists of 12 events (theatre, dance, shows, concerts, etc.) that will take place in Civic Park/Hall 2 or other locations. Once a month, the Diversity Workshop will use these events to bring to the fore a different aspect of diversity: ethnicity, communities, ages, genders, architectural styles, music, history and stories of the city

Contemporary Dance Community Sessions: Contemporary Dance School Frames & Shapes ; Well-being workshops through dance; Dance Meets Sports: The Passage from athletic training to creative movement and dance; dance workshops between generations; dance workshop for people with disabilities, led by Catrinel Catana (DANS.ABIL); outdoor workshops for children from vulnerable families or foster homes, in partnership with the Timișoara Circus School. Performances: 3-4 local Unfold Motion productions, 2 national co-productions, 4 international guest performances

Edutainment : educational tours, guided tours of landmarks, supported by historians, architects, museographers, either in person or via virtual reality, combining learning and entertainment for visitors

The ROD digital caravan (mobile studio for audio-video production, streaming, podcast, print, etc.) dedicated to marginalized groups and communities, for generating original, local cultural content for projections and interventions in 2023

Other European Capitals of Culture

From January and throughout the year there are presentations about the productions and results of the past CEACs. The interviews and community works will be carried out by LOCOP - Local Operators Platform in collaboration with local artists.

source: Travel images