Stefano Ricci and Gianni Forte (ricci/forte) are now on their third year as artistic directors, and announced the theme of the 51st International Theatre Festival (15 June > 1 July): Emerald. “Armando Punzo’s magic wand – ricci/forte declared – finds traces of splendour in the darkness of prisons. FC Bergman’s flying brooms soar over the galleries of the Royal Museum of Fine Arts Antwerp, photographing the absurdity of our existences. Tiago Rodrigues’s herbarium dissects suggestions of individual freedom versus its uniform equivalent. Federica Rosellini’s sonorous witchcraft merges with Giacomo Garaffoni’s soothsaying, and they face off against the oceanic versions created by Fabiana Iacozzilli, as she steers Tolja Djoković’s dematerialisations to establish some unbreakable vow. The charms of deep sleep are then torn to shreds by Boris Nikitin’s moral enchantments, while Romeo Castellucci’s metamorphic hippogriffs fly over Bashar Murkus’s necromantic Milky Way, and Gaetano Palermo’s immortal elf is lost among Morana Novosel’s levitating objects. Elsewhere, the shape-shifting maps through which Mattias Andersson’s questions pass unveil numbers for the arithmancy practised by El Conde de Torrefiel; and Valerio Leoni’s Parseltongue provides comfort on Noémie Goudal and Maëlle Poésy’s journey through the dark forest, as they search for the philosopher’s stone.

The 2023 edition is one of spells, engaging with growth, and with the GREEN that becomes a metaphor for a luxuriance not only planetary but above all moral”.

The President of La Biennale di Venezia Roberto Cicutto has commented: “The Festival wants to take the reins, seeking to show us there is always a purpose to what we see. Of course, artistic talent will always find thousands of ways to tell stories and evoke feelings. Yet the times we are living through are plain to see, and it is hard to avoid the urgency they demand and the questions they pose. We have always maintained that La Biennale’s performing arts festivals are more than a simple review of what the Artistic Directors deem the best work in their respective fields. On the contrary, they are ongoing projects that unfold over a four-year term, furthering knowledge and experimentation”.

THE 2023 LION AWARDS FOR THEATREGOLDEN LION FOR LIFETIME ACHIEVEMENT: Armando PunzoAwards ceremony: Saturday 17 June at 12 noon, Ca’ Giustinian. “The search for the meaning of theatre begins when we venture into human territory driven by the need for a personal, original cultural identity. Where the stage is nurtured by real life. In the attempt to communicate through isolation, both artistic and geographical; prison and its barriers. (...) Our limits, fears, need for social assertion, blindness when it comes to others; to make the intangible, the unconscious, visible: a cultural utopia of which Armando Punzo and the Compagnia della Fortezza are the shining embodiment” (Stefano Ricci and Gianni Forte).

Armando Punzo will present in Venice the production Naturae (15 June at 8 pm / 16 giugno at 6 pm - Teatro alle Tese).

SILVER LION: FC BergmanAwards ceremony: Saturday 17 June at 12 noon, Ca’ Giustinian. “With their creations the Flemish artists of FC Bergman, drawing inspiration from cinema, literature and art history, and blending a painterly aesthetic and the use of highly advanced technology with the great allegorical-Medieval-biblical stories, shape an original language of site-specific theatre-dance, poetic yet at the same time irreverent” (Stefano Ricci and Gianni Forte). FC Bergman will present in Venice the production Het Land Nod (17 and 18 June at 8 pm - Sala Marghera).

Valerio Leoni, the winner of the call Biennale College Teatro – Regia Under 35 (2022-2023), presents the world premiere of Cuspidi (16 June, 8 pm / 17 June, 6 pm - Tese dei Soppalchi). Federica Rosellini (director) and Giacomo Garaffoni, the winner of the call Biennale College Teatro – Drammaturgia Under 40 (2021-2022), present the world premiere of Veronica (20 June, 8 pm / 21 June, 6 pm - Teatro Piccolo Arsenale). Fabiana Iacozzilli (director) and Tolia Djoković, the second winner of the above call, present the world premiere of EN ABYME (29 June, 8 pm / 30 June, 6 pm - Tese dei Soppalchi).

The two winners of the call for a Site-specific Performance are Morana Novosel and Gaetano Palermo: their performances, Fluid Horizons and Swan respectively, will go live at Campo Sant’Agnese and Via Garibaldi every day from 24 June to 1 July at 6 pm. Stefano Fortin, the winner of the call Biennale College Teatro – Drammaturgia Under 40 (2022-2023), presents the world premiere of Cenere as a mise en lecture (28 June, 4 pm / 29 June, 8:30 pm - Sala d'Armi E). The second winner of this call is Carolina Balucani who presents Addormentate, also a world premiere as a mise en lecture (28 June, 8:30 pm / 29 June, 4 pm - Sala d'Armi E).