From 7 to 14 March 2026, Catanzaro returns to the national capital of the performing arts with the second edition of the Performing Festival, promoted by the Academy of Fine Arts of Catanzaro and hosted this year in the “Cav. G. Colosimo” exhibition center, in the seaside district of the capital, transformed for the occasion into a real village dedicated to performance.
The choice of the exhibition spaces marks an important step forward in the festival’s path: not just a place that hosts events, but a liveable cultural ecosystem, where talks, workshops, live shows, performances, music, cinema and digital arts coexist every day in a single large environment. The Performing village was created to encourage meeting, crossing and permanence, offering the public the opportunity to experience the festival as a daily and shared experience. All events are free.
A village open to the city, the neighborhoods and the university
Bringing the festival to the seaside district also means moving the center of gravity of cultural production towards the more peripheral areas of the city. The “Cav. G. Colosimo” exhibition center thus becomes a functional urban container to bring performance art closer to residents of the city’s most populous neighborhoods, to the university community and to those arriving from outside the city, thanks to more accessible logistics and large, inclusive spaces.
This approach strengthens the social vocation of the festival: breaking down the distances between the center and the periphery, between institutional places of culture and the daily fabric, promoting participation, proximity and intergenerational involvement. Performing Festival thus presents itself as a tool for symbolic and relational regeneration, in which performing art becomes a shared language and an opportunity for active citizenship.
Performing Research: the results of artistic research at San Giovanni
One of the most significant outputs of the Performing project will be the presentation of the results of research in the artistic field, scheduled for March 7th at 10.30 am at the San Giovanni monumental complex in Catanzaro. Curated by Simona Caramia, the opening meeting of the exhibition will feature interventions by Elena Bellantoni, Simone Bergantini, Matilde De Feo, Luana Perilli and Fabio Sandri, who will illustrate the projects developed in these months of research. The exhibition will remain visible until May 15th at the San Giovanni Monumental Complex.
Virgilio Piccari, Simona Caramia and Luca Panaro will speak, together with the artists. This moment represents the scientific heart of the festival, demonstrating how Performing is not only a spectacular event but a laboratory for the production of knowledge, with concrete implications for advanced training, artistic innovation and dialogue between academic research and contemporary performance practices.
National partners and program highlights: from Brian Eno to Alfredo Jaar’s lectio
The second edition confirms and expands the national network of partners of the Performing project, who will reach Catanzaro from all over Italy, making the village a research and experimentation hub open to contamination between visual arts, music, theatre, dance, new technologies and digital studies.
Among the key events:
- March 7, 9.00 pm: Electronic music concert: Electro PRMG Act with Godblesscomputers;
- March 8, 7.30 pm: screening of the film “Eno” by Gary Hustwit, dedicated to the pioneer of sound and generative art Brian Eno. Presented by Sonia Golemme and Dobrila Denegri, with talks on Never the Same Stream and the aesthetics of perpetual change — an unmissable encounter to explore the intersection of experimental music, digital art and philosophical thought.
- 14 March, 10.30 am: lectio magistralis by Alfredo Jaar, introduced by Simona Gavioli and Dobrila Denegri.
- Intensive workshops on AI, live coding, dance theater (Giovanna Zanchetta, dancer, actress and performer), BrainSound, software art conservation; performance of new generations (New Gen); concerts (Ballad of the Sea, Naples Conservatory); participatory masterclasses and international talks (Global South, Mediterranean condominium).
At the Performing Village there will also be space for various prestigious national and international training institutions, with the contribution of artists, students and doctoral students such as the Escuela de Arte y Superior de Diseño de Alicante (Easda, Spain), the Université de Constantine 3 (Algeria), the University of the Arts of Tirana, the New Academy of Fine Arts (NABA, Rome) and the Brera Academy (Milan).
Performing OFF anticipates and amplifies the festival
Thursday 6 March, 6.00 pm, the Ex Stac will host Performing OFF: exhibition of the works of the projects’ PhD students Performing Arts and Cultural Heritage (ABA Catanzaro) e Innovations, Technologies and New Materials for Arts (ABA Naples), edited by Dacia Palmerino and Andrea Grosso Ciponte. Ehab Halabi Abo Kher, Samuel Hernandez, Paola Loprete, Antonio Perticara, Giada Pugliese exhibit. Open from 6 to 14 March (16.00-19.00), this preview introduces the dialogue between academic research and artistic experimentation that animates the entire edition.
From 9 to 11 March, the “Ernesto Pucci” Student House, starting from 9 pm, will be transformed into a laboratory on the regeneration of urban places. The students of the Academy Elia Valeo and Eva Fruci, with the coordination of prof. Giacomo Costa, will give life to three evenings of discussion and debate for all citizens in which there will be space for reflection on urban evolution, memory and the future.
Art, community and responsibility: merchandising proceeds to Emergency
On the occasion of the Performing Festival, a merchandising area dedicated to the sale of gadgets and books from the Academy of Fine Arts of Catanzaro will be set up at the exhibition center. The entire proceeds will be donated to Emergency, an organization that plays a fundamental role in informing and raising public awareness, promoting a culture of peace and supporting humanitarian activities through fundraising.
This choice confirms the desire of the Academy and the festival to link artistic practice to a broad idea of civil responsibility and solidarity, in which training and aesthetic research dialogue with the themes of equality, rights and care of communities, near and far.
A permanent performing arts laboratory
With the second edition, Performing Festival consolidates its role as a permanent laboratory on the performing arts, capable of connecting artistic production and advanced training, new technologies and bodily practices, memory of places and contemporary imaginaries, local dimension and national network of partners. In the village there will be four stations in which to immerse yourself in the Metaverse created by teachers Sonia Golemme (Aba Catanzaro) and Pietro Pirino (Aba “Sironi” from Sassari).
The Performing village at the “Cav. G. Colosimo” exhibition center thus becomes the symbol of a Catanzaro that looks beyond the traditional boundaries of places of culture, opening art to the city as a whole and making the seaside neighborhood a space for experimentation, meeting and dialogue.
The statements
«The second edition of the Performing Festival closes a circle that has spanned two years of work – explained Virgilio Piccari, director of the Academy of Fine Arts of Catanzaro -. A work that is the result of the great commitment made by all members of the Academy, whom I thank from the bottom of my heart. Our institution oversaw the coordination of a project that involved 11 other important institutions in the Afam and Italian university sectors, demonstrating enormous capabilities. The path taken could only lead us to create, in a place that was also associated with the difficulties of the Covid 19 pandemic, a performing arts village that embodies all the commitment and attention put into the Performing project. We strongly wanted to build a place open to all in which to give shape and substance to the idea that art, in all its forms, is a social glue and an engine of personal, cultural and economic development for the territory”.
«It has been an interesting and complex journey so far, during which we have rediscovered ourselves as communities – added Simona Caramiascientific coordinator of the Performing project -. The idea of the Performing Village was born precisely from the idea of a community meeting: the project allowed us to compare ourselves with other communities, with other places and this exchange finds synthesis and is realized in the village that is taking shape today and which will open its doors on March 7th. Here we decline the language of performance art in a transdisciplinary key thanks to the many facets that each institution will be able to bring to the village.”
«We are truly happy, as the municipal administration, to have accompanied events like this from the beginning – said Donatella Monteverdi, Councilor for Culture of the Municipality of Catanzaro -. The Performing Village is the culmination of a significant project that allows a space like that of the Exhibition Center to open up to the world of art, finding a new declination that is precious to us. The interaction between this space and the activities in the historic center planned by the festival further strengthens the vision of a city that has its strength in its being polycentric.”