Israel Festival 2023Fri | Sep 1 | 5:00PM

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The Israel Festival is a unique intersection between the international and Israeli fields of all performing arts. It brings together artists and creators from Israel and abroad. The festival is a famed and celebrated multidisciplinary event, presenting high-quality productions in the disciplines of dance, music, theater, and performance from around the world, as well as original productions from Israel. It is a celebration for all, and includes outdoor performances open to the public. Atop of all the performances, the festival also includes professional conferences, master classes, and workshops with guest creators from abroad participating and leading the learning and sharing process.

The festival is one of the most known cultural events in Jerusalem in Israel and around the world. A significant part of the festival is the artistic collaboration taking place on historical sites and institutions in Jerusalem, such as the Jerusalem Theater, Tower of David, Sultan’s Pool, Gerard Becher, Beit Mazia Theater, YMCA, Beit Shmuel, Hansen House, the First Station Complex, Ein Kerem and the Israel Museum.

The festival works in collaboration with Jerusalem Municipality, Jerusalem’s Culture and Sports Office, Jerusalem Fund, Mifal HaPais, numerous embassies, academic institutions, and cultural centers both inside and outside Jerusalem to promote cultural landscapes in Jerusalem and Israel and to encourage an international and artistic discourse.

Selected Israel Festival 2022 Performances

Sun and Sea – An opera performance for a sinking world

Get inspired by the work of Rugilė Barzdžiukaitė, Vaiva Grainytė, and Lina Lapelytė, presenting us with a one-off performance from Lithuania. We know the beach as a mosaic of towels, swimwear, sunscreen smell, children playing, popsicles, toys, and, of course, lots of sand. In this installation you are above the sea, wandering between the mundane, the sinister, and the surreal.

This world that you look down upon is the world of the Sun & Sea Performance– a performative opera that tackles the issue of the climate crisis. The whole work is done elegantly, smartly, and moved by the desire to make a difference. Sun & Sea offers a new way to tap into the debate over the crisis and manages to be fun, spectacular, and effective at the same time.

Sun & Sea was the big winner of the 2019 Venice Biennale, and ever since it was presented at the biggest and most important festivals around the world.

The performance will be held in Israel for the first time and for five days only. Tickets are limited. The show is observed from four-meter-high balconies.

When? 15.9, 19:00 – 22:00 | 16.9, 11:30 – 14:30 | 17.9, 20:30 – 23:00 | 18.9, 19:00 – 22:00 | 19.9, 18:00 – 21:00 | Entrance every half hour
Where? Jerusalem Theater

Night Train to Izmir – A Turkish-Israeli Musical Celebration (Turkey-Israel)

There is ongoing informal dialogue between Ankara and Jerusalem, between Izmir and Tel Aviv and between Istanbul and Sderot. The music coming from Turkey touches us and inspire the best of the local musicians. Between Israel and Turkey, the music has become one of the hallmarks of the Middle East. For one festive and exciting evening, the best musicians from here and there will unite to perform this music on stage in a spectacular concert that is all a show of love and boundless party.

The show will feature Berry Sakharof, Dudu Tassa , Balkan Beat Box, Red Axes, Kalben (Turkey), JANSET (Turkey), Murat Ertel – the legendary soloist of the “Baba Zula” (Turkey), Harel Shachal & the Ottomans, among others.

Musical  Producer – Shlomi Alon (Hadag Nachash)

The show is a collaboration with the Jerusalem Municipality and the Jerusalem Foundation

When? 22.9.2022, 20:00
Where? Independence Garden, Jerusalem
Ticket price: 199 NIS

VHS from the Past-A stage interpretation of the Family Archive

Featuring: Tal Friedman, Shirili Deshe, Roni Kuban, Renana Raz, Doron Nesher, Corrine Kitzis, Yossi Zabari, and Ofri Cnaani.

Let’s talk about forgotten VHS tapes: stored far away in some warehouse, like kind of time capsules. Snippets of lives – family events, trips, lost memories, weird hairstyles, first words. Now it’s time to move those tapes and memories from the living room shelves to the dusty shelves of oblivion.

Renana Raz and Nitzan Cohen invite filmmakers to seek out a meaningful moment in their tapes, and meet them on stage with us. The new format creates a visual and heads-on encounter with who we were and with the time that has passed.

When? 21.9.2022, 21:15 | 22.9.2022, 20:00
Where? Jerusalem Theater
Ticket price: 135 NIS

Temple of the Eye-Exhibition – A restored ritual-exhibition-show by Gon Ben Ari and Oren Fischer

In 1974, Shmuel Fischer established the Temple of the Eye in southern Israel. The Temple is actually a house of worship to the missing eye of Moshe Dayan, and has become a place of worship for the dimension of the “none”. The temple quickly became a Bohemian sensation.
But in 2021 the temple was discovered fully on the Dayan family’s estate, and a new question arose – could it be that Dayan bought the temple not to get rid of it but to perform a psychoactive mystical work?

Gon Ben Ari (a scion of the Dayan dynasty) and Oren Fischer (a scion of the Fisher Dynasty) come to the Israel Festival to present previously undiscovered materials from the Temple of the Eye. Fisher will present an exhibition of large-scale canvases inspired by his grandfather and Ben Ari will make a performance of a band and a choir, filled with singers and musicians, inspired by songs from the temple.

Dov Elbaum, Lior Dayan, Oren Fischer, Gon Ben Ari, Yael Abecassis, Lawyer Barak Cohen and Zulat Choir will participate in the performance.

When? 21.9.2022, 21:00 | 22.9.2022, 21:30
Where? Jerusalem Theater
Ticket price: 135 NIS

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