June 2006: Alkantara Festival

Four years after the last Danças na Cidade Festival, Lisbon once again becomes the stage of a large scale performing arts festival. «Al Kantara» means «the bridge» in Arabic and underlines our wish to create bridges: between people, cultures, and artistic languages.

Alkantara Festival has presented 34 different performances of artists and companies from Belgium, Brazil, France, Lebanon, Great-Britain, Mozambique, Thailand, Italy, Turkey, Egypt, Germany, Czech Republic, Spain, Japan and Portugal. The festival brings together creators that are considered references in contemporary creation with artists that are less known – often only for working in so-called ‘peripheral’ regions. Supporting and presenting Portuguese artists remains a central objective, realised through a series of co-productions, commissions and the ambitious project Encontros 2005-2006.

Alkantara Festival is present all over the city. The most festive moment is, without a doubt, Close Encounters, a trajectory along 16 projects selected by a jury to be presented in parks, palaces, cloisters, galleries, museums, sports clubs, churches and warehouses.In June, Alkantara builds its bridges in Lisbon and invite the public to join them in crossing them …