Cultural affairs

Cultural affairs

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    Israel is a small country with a rich history and active cultural life. Our cultural department presents mainly contemporary Israeli culture and the works of all genres. Provides information on cultural life in Israel, collaborates and co-organizes music and film festivals and exhibitions.

    The work of the cultural department of the Embassy of the State of Israel is based on the Agreement on Cooperation between the Government of the Slovak Republic and the Government of the State of Israel in culture, education and science for 2013 - 2016.

    Contact:

    E-mail: culture@bratislava.mfa.gov.il

     
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  • Culture events taken place in 2014

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    YOSSI ARNHIEM and VAAG PAPIAN
    Dates: January 29, 2014
    Concert Hall of the Slovak radio – concert of Israeli musicians – Yossi Arnhiem /fluet/ and Vaag Papian /conductor/. First concert of the Chamber Guitar Festival.
    The concert took place in the big concert hall of the Slovak radio with capacity over 500 seats. Concert and invitation of two Israeli artists was prepared in cooperation with Slovak national radio and Israeli embassy in Bratislava. Artists performed together with Symphony orchestra of Slovak radio. The concert was broadcasted live on Radio Devín / Slovak radio.

     

    HAGAI SHAHAM
    Date: February  20 – 21, 2014
    Famous Israeli violin solist, teacher and a professor at the Buchmann-Mehta School of Music in Faculty of Arts at Tel Aviv University was invited to Bratislava by representatives of The Slovak Philharmonics. Hagai Shaham played two concerts with The Slovak Philharmonic Orchestra in big concert hall ( 700 seats capacity ). His performance had great success in Slovak audience. Local media including Slovak national television informed about concerts.

     

    VISEGRAD FILM FORUM and Boaz Debby
    Dates: March 11 – 15, 2014
    Movie director Boaz Debby visited festival Visegrad Film Forum organized by Film and Television Faculty Academy of Performing Arts Bratislava, which cooperate with Sam Spiegel Film and Television School Jerusalem. The festival screened his movie HIVES. After the screening Boaz Debby discussed about the movie with the audience.
    Visegrad Film Forum is networking and educational platform for emerging film professionals, students with major in film, media or audiovisual studies and film enthusiasts.
     
     
    HUMAN FAMILY
    Date: May  22, 2014 – July 15, 2014
    The exhibition was situated in the center of the town on the main historical street, in historical park. In the year 2012 the exhibition was presented in Bratislava. Showing around 50 pictures of Israel and one documentary movie. The aim of "Human Family" is to capture the lives of people in countries that were recently in a conflict. In contrast to the dramatic media image it wants to present Israel as the place where are meeting three major monotheistic religions and show how to live together. The project is not focused on the political situation does not even have the ambition to address political and economic interests. Represents the country where people know to live together and show a different face of the country, such as the media presented. Introducing the common people with their troubles and joy.

     

    CIRKUL´ART
    Date: May 23 – 25, 2014
    Festival of Contemporary Circus – Cirkul’art takes place in the historical garden in downtown of Bratislava. Is hosting artists from countries of the whole world. This year invited artistic duo from Israel – Karin and Gili Keren – Duo Comic Casa. Each year the festival Cirkul´art is hosting Israeli artists who are very popular with in Slovak audience. Nouveau cirque, or contemporary circus, belongs to the newest genres of the performing arts. Contemporary circus is characterised by narrative form of storytelling; it expresses metaphors, themes, theatrical images and stories by using traditional circus skills. The presentation of its artists’ virtuosity, dangerousness and equilibristics of particular circus skills is secondary. Nouveau cirque is a modern phenomenon reflecting on contemporary forms of expression. Emotions, absurdity, poetics, yearnings, dreams, humour, self-irony provocation and dreamy romance of fairy tales are all dotted around the spectrum of aesthetic values of contemporary circus.

     

    INTERNATIONAL CHAMBER GUITAR FESTIVAL
    Date: June 8, 2014
    Israeli guitar soloist Alexei Belousov performing on the festival. In Trenčín played together with Russian soloist Jekaterina Maťušenková / flute / as Duo SoloNeo.
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    CITY BEATS
    Date: June 20 - 21, 2014
    Music festival
    Tamir Grinberg in Bratislava. Possessing an old soul and outstandingly distinctive raspy voice, Tamir was naturally drawn to the R&B, funk, and Blues to find his musical inspiration, marrying his youthful energy with an authentic, vintage sound, the result of which is music that appeals to a diverse audience of any age or generation, with songs such as "I Was Made To Love Her" and "Something" showcasing his passionate vocal delivery on stage while also exploring his unique songwriting ability that can be described simply as “timeless”. 

     

    MAZAL TOV!
    Date: July 4  – 6, 2014
    Festival of Jewish Culture -  TheAngelcy music group from Tel Aviv

     

    POHODA FESTIVAL
    Date: July 10 – 12, 2014
    Biggest outdoor Music festival in Slovakia – Internationally recognized (among top 10 festivals in Europe, nominated for the Best middle size festival in Europe in 2012) hosted three music groups from Israel.
    Israeli music groups Bemet, Lolamarsh, Helfer.
    Israeli tend at Pohoda Krav maga, cooking, literature, discussions.
     

     

    KREMNICKÉ GAGY
    Date: August 29 – 31, 2014
    ASPHAL THEATRE. A unique performance of a klezmer street band! Israeli actors, musicians, clowns, jugglers and acrobats, all in one! What these multi-talented musical comedians perform while playing on instruments defies any clear-headed logic. Unbelievable acrobatic pieces, circus-like tension, clown humour and surprising moments only have one aim: to make the audience leave the show with a glimmer of fascination in their eyes. The show combines live music, circus, acrobatics and interaction with public in a very special way. It has its own, original style and anti-logical language! Three men, one woman and their pleasure from playing and performing!

     

    IN SILENCE / Mrs. Schindler´s Diary
    Date: August 28, 2014
    Documentary movie.
    The 1930s and 1940s left a devastating trace on the world which affected every social class, regardless of their education, beliefs, gender or race. Fascist Germany and its ideology began its work of destruction in 1933. Many artists fell into disfavour, they were barred from working in their profession and were persecuted. Fascist laws disqualified so-called “non-Aryan” artists in Germany and these norms were subsequently applied in all the European countries occupied by Germany."In Silence" depicts the fates of five Jewish musicians and performers whose suffering in concentration camps or even their fear of inevitable death were alleviated by the piano and music. Karol Elbert, Alica Flachová – Pastorová, Edith Kraus, Arthur Chitz and Jozef Weiss – these are names fated to remain forgotten and whose talent was to be erased forever from the cultural awareness. The film reveals the happy and carefree lives of the protagonists in a stylised manner, with precise film aesthetics and a strong musical component, in contrast with the humiliating, painful and most difficult part of their lives.

     

    ARON GRÜNHUT
    Date: September 2014
    Exhibition about Bratislava citizen, who saved hundreds of Jews during the World War II. Prepared in cooperation with Slovak national museum and Slovak national archive.
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    BRATISLAVA MUSIC FESTIVAL / The Slovak Philharmonic
    Date: September 26 – October 12, 2014
    Opening concert by Israel Philharmonic Orchestra and conductor Zubin Mehta.
    The prominent Israel Philharmonic Orchestra performing for the first time in Slovakia opened the BMF in its festive 50th year led by the conductor of world fame Zubin Mehta, whose baton has the ability to unite people in the name of great music and understanding.
    The evening will start with a popular overture Egmont, written by Ludwig van Beethoven for Goethe’s drama. Similarly to Beethoven’s Egmont also Mozart’s Symphony in G minor has become a musical icon. Behind the Mozartean purity of texture there is an ambitiously elaborated harmony used even by Arnold Schoenberg while presenting his atonality. The last one from the collection of Richard Strauss’s symphonic poems – A Hero’s Life – brings virtuoso orchestrated episodes from the life of a hero. His fate is presented by Strauss as a fate of every musician active in the chaotic period at the end of the 19th century.
    Closing concert Slovak Philharmonic Orchestra, conductor  Pinchas Steinberg.
    At the end of the jubilee year of the 50th BMF Symphonie Fantastique by Hector Berlioz – it is a famous, magical, still provoking and inspiring work. Episodes from the life of an artist disturbed by passion from unaccomplished love are simply a perpetual theme.

     

    BRATISLAVA IN MOVEMENT
    Date: October 9 – 26, 2014
    Israeli dance duo Niv Sheinfeld and Oren Laor with their performance Two Room Apartment.   

    Niv Sheinfeld and Oren Laor are stage artists that have been creating together since 2004. In their work they combine elements of contemporary dance with elements of performance-art and physical theatre, and received both national and international acclaim. Sheinfeld and Laor’s body of work includes the productions Two Room Apartment (2012), Ship of Fools (2011), Big Mouth (2009), Covariance (2004) and others. Two Room Apartment brings Sheinfeld & Laor to the stage for a duet that reflects on their relationship as partners in life and as creators. Both personal and political, the work examines boundaries in various contexts: physical borders such as between territories or between two rooms, but also non-physical borders, such as the one between life and performance, and the boundaries that the individual sets for himself. The work uses a simple dance language and a minimalist aesthetic, and explores the notion of life as a framework in which a precise, almost compulsive repetition of customs and behaviors takes place. The work suggests a new and contemporary reading to the original performance created by Liat Dror and Nir Ben Gal that premiered in 1987 in Tel-Aviv. It is considered a milestone in the development of independent Israeli choreography, and it also received impressive international acclaim: the work had won several awards at the time, among them the Bagnolet Competition for Choreography. 
    The work was chosen as Best Performance of the Year by the Israeli Dance Critics' Circle for 2013.

     

    WAVES
    Date: October 3 – 5 2014
    Club and showcase festival 
    This Slovakia-unique event connects under one roof  the concept of showcase music festival and conference aimed to supporting the best from  local and foreign music. Its aim is to offer it to broader public, music professionals, labels and media.Waves Bratislava 2014 is the second year of Waves festival, which after two successful years in Vienna is expanding to Slovak capital with series of music gigs.The motto for the festival is East meets West. It is oriented towards musical area of Central and Eastern Europe. The aim of the festival is to offer annual overview over the most actual music life in Central and Eastern Europe. Waves Bratislava intends to be the ambassador of local music scenes and  event to fulfill the white spots on the map of important events focused on music and creative industry in the region.
    Garden City Movement. An Israeli trio making nostalgic and moody music you can call chillwave. Delicate sounds of acoustic guitar, crunchy mid-tempo beats and analog synths. If this music needs to be described in colour, it would be a pastel one.

     

    INTERNATIONAL FILM  FESTIVAL BRATISLAVA 2014
    Date: November 7 – 14, 2014

    Jury for the Competition of First and Second Fiction Films

    Avinoam Harpak 
    Avinoam Harpak was among co-founders of the Jerusalem Film Festival. After serving as head programmer of the Tel Aviv Cinematheque from 1978 to 1982 he moved to Jerusalem to become the programme director of the Jerusalem Cinematheque.           
    Together with Lia van Leer, the legendary founder and director of the Cinematheque, Avinoam in 1984 initiated and established the Jerusalem Film Festival (JFF), which soon became the most prestigious cinematic event in Israel. From the very outset, one of its main focuses was social and human rights issues. Over the past three decades the JFF became the home port for the new Israeli  
    cinema and the main platform where the Israeli public encountered international cinema. Having spent more than 30 years in the capacity of its program director, Avinoam left the Jerusalem Cinematheque and the JFF in the beginning of 2014. He is on a sabbatical year and will consider taking a new position in 2015.

     

    RETURN TO THE BURNING HOUSE
    Date: November 18, 2014
    Documentary movie about the hero of Slovak National Uprising Haviva Reick. Cooperation with Museum of Slovak National Uprising in Banská Bystrica.
    Haviva Reick (1914–1944), agent of the British intelligence, activist, passionate Zionist longing to help the country of her childhood when it fought the Slovak National Uprising in the Autumn of 1944. Reick was among the Palestinian Jewish paratroopers dispatched to military missions in the Nazi-occupied Europe. What do contemporary Havivas – female soldiers in Slovakia and Israel – think about their service to the country? What does Haviva Reick’s story tell us today?
    Documentary film Return to the Burning House introduces the life of a remarkable woman Haviva Reick. It presents a wealth of hitherto unknown archival material, memories of contemporaries and follows Haviva’s traces in Slovakia and Israel. Above all it is a story of an attractive person who is an inspiration until today.
     
    The movie will come to Slovak cinemas during January 2015.

     

    ​ONE WORLD

    International Festival of Documentary Movies
    Date: November 20 – 25, 2014
    The One World Film Festival is the only cultural and educational event in Slovakia, which comprehensively addresses the human rights and global issues. Every year we present around 60 documentaries, more than a dozen debates on current topics, photographic exhibitions and concerts.
    The movie Web Junkie. China is one of the first countries in the world to call Internet addiction a clinical disorder. The authorities therefore set up 400 centers to help young people overcome this addiction. In the withdrawal camps, teenagers are under the permanent supervision of psychologists and physicians and their daily routine is reminiscent of a military drill. Will the methods of the Chinese therapists succeed? The film explores the lives of Chinese teenagers, mostly only children from dysfunctional families, who due to their inability to resist the attractions of cyberspace turn their backs on their loved ones and friends.