The Festival D’Avignon – A Shared Cultural Experience as a Way Forward
The Festival D’Avignon – A Shared Cultural Experience as a Way Forward

Summary/Abstract: This article is a reflection on the 76th edition of the Festival d’Avignon. It provides a brief introduction to the issue of festivalisation in France and presents the research conducted in this field in relation to theatre audiences in the past three years. It also includes shorter reflections on productions by international theatre makers that the author had the opportunity to see at the festival. It analyses the context in which these productions are presented to the public in the festival programme, in dramaturgical and thematic lines (for example, the themes of power, manipulation, sacrifice, defiance of fate, emotions that bind people together or make them go insane), and it also highlights the return of the theatre makers to the basic means of theatre expression instead of complex effects and technologies. There is an imbalance stemming from this: often, productions have an epic and storytelling non-dramatic basis, but their stage form goes back to a theatre of simple and effective images that are based on symbolic theatre signs and acting action. The Festival d’Avignon adheres to the concept of storytelling with initiatory potential and thus can engage theatrically in a better real world. In 2022, it was a post-pandemic challenge for both the theatre and society.

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