On 1 – 4 July 2023, in cooperation with partner organisations from Norway, Liechtenstein, and Iceland, Pôtoň Theatre is preparing a unique art project entitled Into the Miracles, which will take place on a seventy-kilometre route between Dudince and Bátovce, with the participation of more than sixty artists from six countries.
The upcoming artistic project Into the Miracles is aimed at developing audiences, supporting the creation and presentation of contemporary art, and building partnerships on a local, national, and international level. Through the project, the organiser and partners aim at promoting values such as creativity, artistic freedom, and regional, international, and intercultural cooperation. At the same time, the project also aims at drawing attention to contemporary pressing social or environmental issues through art.
More than thirty-five works by Slovak, Czech, French, Norwegian, Liechtenstein and Icelandic artists will be placed and displayed along the route. Visitors to the event will be able to see works of contemporary performance, music, and visual art, as well as sound design and literature along the seventy-kilometre pilgrimage. All works are created particularly for the festival and will be performed or displayed for the first time during the festival. Into the Miracles will be a unique event whose concept has no equivalent in Europe.
“Into the Miracles is a journey to the sources of inner strength. In the tumultuous times we live in, our stopping, slowing down and breathing are important. We can walk and take time to think. To have time to perceive the beauty in the silence. Works of art delicately complement nature. The physical and the spiritual harmonize. The impulses for thinking are created by the pilgrim themselves through their openness and receptivity; the artists, through their works, accompany the pilgrims´ thinking. The proximity of other people, also wandering, is another source of balance and harmony,” says Iveta Ditte Jurčová, the festival’s programme director.
The festival route leads from Dudince, through Terany, Hontianske Tesare, Šipice, Sebechleby, Stará Hora, Baďan, Beluj, Jabloňovce, Pečenice and ends in Bátovce. The organizers make use of existing tourist routes of local importance, which they, however, interconnect by temporary marking. Walkers will pass through small villages, meadows, and forests on the border of the Tekov and Hont regions. In addition to artists, the project involves local operators, activists, producers of gastronomic products, as well as representatives of local governments.
“The event is a continuation of our smaller projects that we implemented under the brand “Miracles” in 2017-2018 in Bátovce and in France. In these, the audience travelled roughly four kilometres and mostly performance art and contemporary dance were presented.”, adds the festival dramaturg Michal Ditte to the origins and history of the upcoming festival. “Preparations for the current project have been underway since 2019. Our original intention was for the audience to exchange the comfortable seating in cultural institutions for nature, to wander in search of contemporary art, to be alone with themselves and in silence. In the meantime, however, came the pandemic and then the war in Ukraine. These events give the four-day journey through the landscape completely new contexts and scope, which we are analysing and evaluating in the project team.”
The project partners are Company B. Valiente (Norway), Kultur-Traverse (Liechtenstein) and Tjarnarbíó (Iceland), whose artists have already completed their artist residencies in their selected locations and worked on their new works during the last year. The project also involves students from universities with an artistic focus (Technical University Košice, Academy of Arts Banská Bystrica and Academy of Fine Arts Bratislava) and their teachers. In total, more than sixty artists from six countries will participate in the project.
The project Resurrection of a Miracle: Developing a New Model for an Arts Festival in the Slovak Countryside has received a grant from Iceland, Liechtenstein and Norway in the amount of EUR 170 000 through EEA Grants. The project was co-financed by EUR 30 000 from the state budget of the Slovak Republic. The aim of the project is to develop audiences, support the creation and presentation of contemporary art and build partnerships at local, national and international level.
International festival Into the Miracles is funded via public funding by Slovak Arts Council.
Information about the upcoming project:
https://www.intothemiracles.com/into-the-miracles/
Michal Ditte, ditte(at)poton.sk, 0908 359 788
V Bátovciach, 17.2.2023
