24th Istanbul Theatre Festival Has Ended

Organised by the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts (İKSV) with the sponsorship of Koç Holding Energy Group Companies Aygaz, Opet and Tüpraş between 14 November and 1 December with an online programme extending until 28 December, the 24th Istanbul Theatre Festival came to an end.

14 physical and 11 online productions were staged at the festival, which met with audiences both on stage and on the festival's online platform online.iksv.org with a hybrid programme.

More than 13.000 people streamed the shows on online.iksv.org, while close to 2500 people attended the physical performances of the festival.

The opening ceremony of the 24th Istanbul Theater Festival took place online due to the pandemic. The ceremony, which was published on the festival's website and social media accounts on Saturday, 14 November, started with the opening speech of İKSV Chairman Bülent Eczacıbaşı. Following the speeches of Yağız Eyüboğlu, Chairman of Koç Holding Energy Group and Leman Yılmaz, Director of the Istanbul Theatre Festival, this year's festival award recipients were introduced. Honorary Awards were presented to dancer and choreographer Geyvan McMillen, director Işıl Kasapoğlu, and director Ivo van Hove.

The 24th Istanbul Theater Festival started with the opening show Diagonale Ascendante, which took place at Yapı Kredi bomontiada on Saturday, 14 November. In the project realised by the French ensemble Retouramont with the choreography of Fabrice Guillot, dancers Nathalie Tedesco and Fanny Gombert's public performance on the exterior of YapıKredi bomontiada was held free of charge thanks to the kind contribution of Institut Français, and repeated on 15 November with two other iterations.

This year, the festival opened up a wider platform to local companies that were adversely affected by the pandemic. Festival's Local Productions Performance Sponsor ENKA Foundation supported 20 local productions staged in physical venues and online platform. Another local performance of the festival, Dumrul and the Grim Reaper, met with the audience with Tekfen Holding's Special Performance Sponsorship.

Physical performances of the festival took place under Covid-19 measures in various venues in Istanbul such as DasDas, Fişekhane, Moda Stage, Zorlu PSM, Yapı Kredi bomontiada, Caddebostan Kültür Merkezi and Surp Vortvos Vorodman Church. The online performances were available for streaming on online.iksv.org for audiences to enjoy on their screens.

5.000 people streamed the panels, workshops, conversations and readers' theatres held within the scope of the festival's Learning and Training Programme on YouTube, free-of-charge. Click to watch the online talk "The Future of Dance Educatıon in Universities", held in English.

The leading job site in Turkey, Kariyer.net made a donation to İKSV to support theatre companies that are under financial pressures due to the pandemic. The donation to compensate the significantly decreased ticket revenues will be split equally among the 13 companies that had their premieres physically in limited-capacity halls at the 24th Istanbul Theatre Festival.

The 24th Istanbul Theater Festival was held with the co-sponsorship of the Koç Holding Energy Group Companies Aygaz, Opet and Tüpraş. Performance Sponsor for all local productions was ENKA Foundation, while Tekfen Holding was the Special Performance Sponsor.

The Founding Sponsor of the Istanbul Foundation for Culture and Arts is Eczacıbaşı Group, İKSV Official Hotel Sponsor is The Marmara Group, the Insurance Sponsor is Zurich Sigorta. Digital Content Security Service Sponsor was Digiguardians and Recycling Supporter was Coca-Cola. Zorlu Performing Arts Centre was the Venue Sponsor with the Highest Contribution. Other Service Sponsors were Plaza OSG, Navitas, GFK, AGC, Loodos Teknoloji and OMD.

The festival acknowledges the kind collaboration of Dutch Performing Arts, a programme of the Performing Arts Fund NL, US Embassy Ankara, Institut Français and Italian Cultural Institute. The festival was also supported by the Istanbul Metropolitan Municipality, and Beşiktaş, Beyoğlu and Kadıköy Municipalities.

The festival poster was designed by Mehmet Ali Türkmen. Festival's Design Advisory Board members are Uğurcan Ataoğlu, Pemra Ataç and Kenan Ünsal. The promotional video was prepared by alldstudio.