GRAPE: The Athens Epidaurus Festival Platform for the Promotion of Greek Performing Arts on the Global Stage

GRAPE – Greek Agora of Performance is an innovative platform launched by the Athens Epidaurus Festival to elevate Greek Performing Arts on the global stage.

This annual event takes place annually as part of the Athens Epidaurus Festival and provides Greek theatre and dance artists the opportunity to present their work to representatives and artistic directors of international festivals and cultural institutions abroad, as well as to the general public of the Festival. “Exporting” Greek works and fostering connections that can lead to future collaborations and tours abroad has been one of the Festival’s main objectives.

Launched in 2023, GRAPE focuses on innovative dramaturgy and contemporary issues, allowing new productions to be flexible and adaptable for international audiences. The initiative not only showcases the rich tapestry of Greek creativity but also aims to facilitate meaningful dialogues and exchanges within the global arts community, ultimately promoting a deeper understanding of Greek culture and its contemporary artistic expressions.

In 2024 GRAPE returned for a second year as part of the Athens Epidaurus Festival on 21 – 25 July 2024 with 8 powerful theatre and dance performances.

Greek stage Director Katerina Evangelatos, Artistic Director of the Athens and Epidaurus Festival, spoke to Greek News Agenda on the GRAPE initiative

How do you judge the operation of the GRAPE platform after its second year?

“We are particularly happy about the progress of GRAPE, an Athens Epidaurus Festival initiative that started last year, although the initial idea for the systematic “export” of Greek works was already announced in 2020. Due to the pandemic period the program was finally implemented in 2023.

This year, the performances of GRAPE 2024 were presented to more than 60 international guests and to the public of the Festival, in a condensed five days Greek creation program. Among the 14 performances presented at GRAPE 2023, 7 are already traveling to stages abroad, proving the necessity and the success of our venture.

We hope that this initiative, which is already bearing fruit, will continue and expand, so that it will soon become an institution for the promotion of Greek culture abroad”.

How is the language barrier overcome? Is the database created accessible to professionals, experts and to the public?

“All the performances included in the GRAPE are presented with English subtitles so that the representatives of the cultural organizations visiting the Festival can watch them. This invitation is addressed to artistic directors, curators and programmers from important stages abroad, who come to watch the performances, but also to get to know the Greek artists through meetings and networking events held during the GRAPE. The performances can of course be watched by the public.

The archival videos are not posted for copyright reasons, but the audio-visual material is available to the professionals who attended the performances, creating bridges of cooperation for the future as well”.

The selected productions for GRAPE 2024 investigated the question of identity –national, racial, and sexual– and that of citizenship, justice, and equality; they delved into women’s relationship with their bodies and motherhood, migration, and the impact of modern technology on the shaping of human relationships, and also explored the search for hope and stability, as well as the joy of togetherness in a world marked by a universal sentiment of uncertainty, alarm, and seclusion. Each piece posed the question: Can we shift our perspective on the world? By engaging with political, social, and existential issues through a poetic lens—often drawing on myth and folk tradition—these performances illuminated our current reality and challenged the stereotypes that permeate our daily lives.

From left to right: MARIO BANUSHI, Taverna Miresia – Mario, Bella, Anastasia; ANESTIS AZAS, Ta skylia / The dogs (1^st GRAPE Audience Award); EFTHIMIS FILIPPOU – ANGELIKI PAPOULIA, Etymologies; ZOE CHATZIANTONIOU, Amalia melancholia, Queen of the Palm Trees

The GRAPE 2024 was complemented by networking events, panel discussions, and other activities, fostering dialogue and collaboration within the global arts community and enhancing the visibility of Greek creativity on the international stage.

Among the guests who attended the GRAPE 2024 program were representatives of leading artistic organizations, such as: Festival d’Avignon (France), Rising Melbourne (Australia), FIBA - Festival Internacional de Buenos Aires (Argentina), NYU Skirball (USA), Centro de Experimentación Teatro Colón (Argentina), TransAmériques (Canada), Théâtre de Liège (Belgium), KVS Royal Flemish Theater (Belgium), La Bâtie-Festival de Genève (Switzerland), Comédie de Genève (Switzerland), Residenztheater (Germany), Istanbul Theater Festival (Turkey), Factory International (UK), Théâtre National de Bretagne (France), Ivan Vazov National Theatre, Sofia (Bulgaria), Sadler’s Wells (UK), Festival euro-scene Leipzig (Germany), Center Nationale de la Danse (France) and more others.

From left to right: ARGYRO CHIOTI, Point of Refreshment; KATERINA ANDREOU, Bless This Mess; CHARA KOTSALI, Borborygmi (dance performance – 3^rd GRAPE Audience Award); YOLANDA MARKOPOULOU – STATION ATHENS GROUP, Connection Error (2^nd GRAPE Audience Award)

Several media platforms from around the world praised the GRAPE initiative:

“A platform that is increasingly penetrating Europe’s most important scenes”, “”A Week of sensational Images” (nachtkritik.de)

“Although the platform is only in its second year, its impact is already being felt” (The Stage)

“GRAPE is bearing fruit as seven of the 2023 productions are touring to other countries” (THEATER DER ZEIT).

At an event organized by the Athens Epidaurus Festival at the Goethe Institute in Athens on September 24, the 3 GRAPE Audience Awards were presented: 1^st prize for the theater performance by Anestis Azas “The Dogs”, 2^nd prize for “Connection Error” by Yolanda Markopoulou and the group Station Athens and 3^rd prize for the dance performance “Borborygmi” by Hara Kotsali.