Negev artists to take part in Israel Festival, with performances in Jerusalem and south

The continuing Hamas war and hostage crisis haven’t erased the Israel Festival from the cultural calendar, but those life-altering disasters have shifted the shape and tone of the annual event.

This year’s festival, taking place September 10-28, will be held in Jerusalem and in the Western Negev, the epicenter of the October 7 Hamas massacre, when terrorists killed some 1,200 people and took 251 hostages to Gaza.

Artists, producers, creatives and residents of southern communities in the Gaza Envelope worked throughout recent months with festival artistic directors Itay Mautner and Michal Vaknin to create a program that draws from what took place there on October 7.

“We struggled with the dissonance between the very essence of the word ‘festival’ and the harsh reality we are living,” said Israel Festival director Eyal Sher. “We produced the festival out of a deep belief in the role and the unique ability of art to contribute to the healing and recovery processes, and to imagine a space of dreams and hope for a shared future.”

It’s a more intimate festival this year, said Sher, dealing with wounds and traumas and providing a direct look at the reality in which Israelis have been operating for the past 10 months.

Performances will be held in the south — the towns of Sderot and Ofakim, Kibbutz Dorot and the Eshkol regional council — as well as in Jerusalem, the regular home of the Israel Festival.

Musician Eviatar Banai will perform as part of the Israel Festival, September 10-28, 2024 (Courtesy Tamar Hanan)

While the festival usually includes artists from around the world who provide a look at contemporary and avant garde fare from abroad, this year it’s all local performances and events examining reactions to the tragedies.

Opening night will be in Sderot on September 10, with a three-stage program that includes an exhibition and sound installation. The evening will include “7 Boom,” a dance piece by Liat Dror, a work that examines the instability in the southern city where rocket booms have become the soundtrack of life.

That event will also feature “HaYelala,” a musical performance with a group of creatives from Israel’s north, who will perform and sing about their various states of consciousness, and “Windless,” a sound installation by Yaniv Shenzer, who has been collecting remnants of rockets fired at Israel and turning them into wind chimes.

Hayelala, a musical performance with a group of creatives from Israel’s north will perform at the Israel Festival, September 10-28, 2024 (Courtesy Ronen Goldman)

One 24-hour event titled One Day will bring together musicians, actors, dancers and speakers, including Shlomi Shaban, Great Gehenna Choir, Dana Ivgy, Eviatar Banai, Dana Modan and others, on the main stage of the Jerusalem Theater, where they will discuss, create and sing, with audience participation.

Another musical event is Music People, a social project for professional performers working with emerging musicians from the south and the north, in areas mostly evacuated of their residents since October 7, amid the ongoing war in Gaza and clashes with Hezbollah in Lebanon.

The event is named for a comment made by Bono of U2 during a show on October 8, 2023, when he dedicated a song to those who were killed at the Supernova desert rave, saying, “We sing for them, the music people.”

During Music People, singers Alma Gov, Marina Maximilian, Berry Sakharof, Alon Eder and Karolina will perform original material created by four young musicians — Yaara Cohen, Omri Shrif, Agam Jeremy and Talia Dancyg, the granddaughter of hostage Alex Dancyg who was killed in Hamas captivity — along with classics and familiar hits by the professional performers.

There will be two performances of Music People, one in Jerusalem and one in Kibbutz Dorot, near Sderot.

The Kan podcast “One Song,” which tells the stories behind popular musical works, will meet once in Ofakim and once in Jerusalem, transforming into a stage show with eight musicians, live performances, archival clips and stories all woven together into an event titled “More Than One Song.”

The stage adaptation will feature three songs that have become anthems to the difficulties of life in Israel, including its wars, protests, days of sadness and moments of hope.

Choreographer Yasmeen Godder and singer Dikla will meet in Jerusalem to perform “Love Music (Now!),” harking back to Dikla’s album from 2000, accompanied by a new dance work by Godder featuring eight female dancers and a band of nine musicians.

German artist Volker Gerling, who documents people he meets on his long walks, came to Israel after October 7 to record and photograph people he met on his strolls. This time, Gerling brings his compassionate gaze, sensitivity and humor to “Portraits in Motion,” a stage performance that tells a story though his photographs.

At the Eshkol Regional Council and in Jerusalem, a group of actors including survivors and evacuees from Otef Hanegev Theater will perform a multidisciplinary work, “A Place to Live,” exploring the journeys of residents of the Gaza Envelope.

In “Living with What We Have,” writer and playwright Rabbi Delphine Horvilleur, teacher and activist Chaya Gilboa, and musician Sivan Talmor will speak about loss, augmented with performances of original songs and familiar songs.

Playwright Roee Joseph’s latest work, “Shura,” which he created with Tmuna Theater, will be performed at the festival. In “Shura,” Joseph tries to make sense of the 60 days he spent on reserve duty in the Shura military base identifying victims of the October 7 atrocities in order to be able to bury them.

A view of the Shura military base, the subject of a play being performed at the Israel Festival, September 10-28, 2024 (Courtesy Roee Yosef)

For dates, times and locations of the Israel Festival events and performances, go to the Israel Festival website.

Tickets for the Israel Festival range from NIS 95 to NIS 145, with discounts for seniors, students, soldiers, Yerushalmi card holders and other clubs. All entries to events in the south are subsidized and will cost NIS 10.