A celebration and a fight

Once again, we gather in Avignon for a celebration that is also a fight for the performing arts and for its audience. These 44 shows will bring us together — symbols of the extraordinary talent of artists from all around the world, and sensitive observers of human vulnerability. Whether it be intimate or collective, this vulnerability is a fertile soil where artistic seeds can grow and different ways of looking at and communicating with the world can flourish.

We also gather around hundreds of other artistic gestures: visual arts exhibitions, readings, film screenings, and radio creations. We'll meet at the Café des idées, a space of conviviality and thought, the beating heart of each day of the Festival. And at the Mahabharata, our artists' bar, open to all from this year onwards and the beating heart of the Festival's every night. For 21 days and 21 nights, we'll come together to celebrate thought, to celebrate doubt, to smile even when we disagree with one another, to perform the dance of citizenship, to sing the song of risk, and to applaud artistic freedom.

We gather around words, languages, and the joyful confusion of translation. The English language is invited to this edition of the Festival d'Avignon to build bridges where some would like to build walls. We do not accept a world divided by borders, because we believe the world should be organised according to the freedom of languages, with the complex richness of their past and their present.

We come together in the fight for a planet where future generations can live on, by changing our practices and offering experiences that renew our relationship with living things. Our celebration is also a fight for the future we desire, and that's why we're bringing together thousands of young people as they discover the Festival through our Première fois (First time) programme.

This 77th edition of the Festival d'Avignon is a celebration of memory and the future, of vulnerability and power, organised by an extraordinary team, supported by partners who share our struggle, and designed for a passionate and exciting audience who is able to turn this struggle into a celebration.

Tiago Rodrigues
Director of the Festival d'Avignon
1st June 2023