ITTA Director Artur Gukasia, Chairman of Armenia High Fest International Art Festival
《Art has no boundaries》
I am Atul Gukasia, the initiator and chairman of the Armenian High Fest International Performing Arts Festival. The High Fest Art Festival is held in the Armenian capital of Yerevan in early October every year. Yerevan has a population of about 1 million. Of course, this population in China is only the same as the population of a village and town. It is very small. Although the place is small, High Fest Art Festival has become an international performing arts festival, carrying a variety of cultures and arts. Before introducing this festival, I would like to share with you the topic of our common concern and the theme of our coming here - "Drama Town".
What does "drama town" mean? What does it mean? What constitutes the culture of "drama town" and the cultural attraction of this region?
It is undoubtedly culture and education that can bring people closer to each other. For example, when we talk about the Drama Festival, we talk about the Edinburgh Drama Festival. It is the world's leading art festival in the world, and I have been there about 14 times. It must be said that I have been to Edinburgh five times without a theatre festival. It's really a very cold city. The colors of the buildings are grey and black, which makes you think they won't accept foreigners. But once the festival begins, it becomes the friendliest city in the world. Everyone comes here crazy, wants to participate, wants to play, and everyone enjoys the festival. The Festival changes people's viewpoints and attitudes, changes people, and even changes the population composition of a region. Another example is the Avignon Theatre Festival in France, or the Ancient Greek Theatre Festival in Barcelona, Spain, where crowds of people pour in and residents rent their houses to them and then leave for a while to spend their holidays elsewhere. During the festival, more than 200,000 outsiders flocked to the town, staying for ten days or half a month, and the town seemed to be another planet.
Either Edinburgh Drama Festival or our own art festival, the key is that if there is no culture, everything will not exist! I can't imagine that a tourist area is very attractive, but it has no culture! There must be a corresponding culture in order to attract tourists to a certain place. For example, Sibiu, we know that this Romanian town was originally based on an Irish writer's English novel Dracula, which is set in this city. But now Sibiu is not just a vampire city, it's a city with drama festivals! People will feel it is cultured because of its drama festival. For example, why are we discussing drama towns in China now? Is it because China has a large population and a prosperous economy? Not only that, but also because of Chinese tradition, Chinese culture and values, and the support of the International Theatre Town Alliance for this cause - you want to be at the forefront of the world, and you know the importance of culture for development.
Speaking of our own Haigh Fest Art Festival, it has a history of 15 years and is very young. Like many festival planning concepts, we want to turn rural areas into areas with high-end artistic atmosphere, and launch festival activities around visual arts, movies, museums and some art buildings, so as to attract attention, attract people and bring economic benefits. Like all art festivals, we should let everyone have a full understanding and understanding of it, so as to get relevant support, whether it is team, creativity, or some special institutions, donors or government, etc., all of us work together to provide assistance for the art construction of small towns. Nowadays, High Fest has become the most important Performing Arts Festival in the former Soviet Union countries except Russia. We are also members of IFEA, IETA, ASSITEJ and ITI. We cover almost all forms of performing arts, and we also hold corresponding activities, including seminars, workshops and so on, totaling 7 days.
In addition, we have a High Street Art Festival. This is an art festival that we have organized as an outsourcing team. In Russia and other places, we have done this project. We have 12% of our budget coming from the local government, which has helped us a lot. In Edinburgh Art Festival, we did a "High Street Theme Day" activity, which played a good role in publicity. We are striving to bring High Street Art Festival to Kazakhstan and other places in 2019.
It's a great honor to be a member of the International Theatre Town Alliance. The members come from different countries and organizations with different views and methods. You can work together, and we are well prepared to help achieve each other's goals. Art Festival has infinite possibilities, because although the region is limited, the culture is infinite! Integrating infinite creativity and culture, art will be infinite.
Address by Artur Gucasya at the ITTA Forum
(These contents are from the tape recordings of the speaker.）