Kalamata Street Festival

Kalamata Street Festival was initiated by K.A.NE., Social Youth Development non profit company, as Youth Fest in 2008. In 2009 it was renamed to Kalamata Street Festival.

The aim of the Festival is to promote youth creativity and participation through street arts, cultural activities and sport events and therefore to contribute to the social coherent and the cultural development of Messinia Region.

In order to achieve that, Kalamata Street Festival seeks broaden partnerships and invites all civil society organisations to participate to its actions. The 10th Kalamata Street Festival was organised by K.A.NE. in collaboration with the Peloponnese Regional Government and 25 local associations, NGOs and youth groups.

Kalamata Street Festival is a combination of cultural, social and sport activities with objectives:

- To create the proper space for expression, creativity and activation of young people and offer the audience both learning opportunities and entertainment. - To promote civic participation, active socialization and prevention of the negative aspect of modern life - To promote the cultural and artistic use of public spaces by the citizens and contribute to the cultural development and free artistic expression

- To give opportunities to the "marginalised" arts to be presented to the public

The Kalamata Street Festival last for 4 days, it is being organised annually at the last weekend ofJuly and hosts more than 20 parallel events each day. It is an international festival with free entrance, based on volunteers and the society itself. The last year it was organised by a team of 50 volunteers, 20 local civil society organisations and groups and it hosted more than 200 artists and 12000 people as audience.

During the festival the audience has the opportunity to attend or actively participate in concerts, street theatre performances, circus performances, street dance performances, sport activities, exhibitions, art installations, educational program for children and adults, video art and documentary movies projection, painting, graffiti and environmental activities. Based on the aims of the festival, it is giving opportunities to young artists to present their job as well as art, music and dance workshops for artists or the broaden audience. Every year it hosts individual or groups of artists from abroad to present their work and facilitates the on-the-spot creation of partnerships and common artistic works.

During the 10 years of its existence, the Kalamata Street Festival achieved to become an agent of volunteerism, solidarity and artistic creation. It involves, if not all, the most creative associations of the city of Kalamata and hosts artists from all over the world. Important to mention is that the daily program is curated in this way that allows the free expression, promotes creativity and support the less experienced helping them in parallel to develop competences, knowledge and motivation.

Activities the last festival offered; Concerts (main stage- 15 bands -4 days), 2 photo exhibitions, 1 painting exhibition, 1 stencil exhibition and workshop, video art projections, documentary projections, handmade art bazaar, photo art installation (refugee tent), graffiti on the spot, circus performances, street theater performances, dance workshops (modern, salsa, hip hop, breakdance), capoeira class, martial arts workshops, street basketball championship, skates and bicycles area, music lessons (guitar and percussion), climbing wall, handcrafts workshops, children corner, bicycle shredding project and informational desks (local organisations, social and environmental campaigns, youth information).

1. presenting a coherent and curated artistic programme;

The main programme of the Festival is coherent and curated. However the festival allows the open space for artistic experimentation, on-the-spot performances and facilitates partnerships.

2. supporting on-going artistic development (some examples of this are: offering residencies to artists, contributing to new creations, and supporting artistic research);

Every year we are hosting a group of young artists for one month. During this month they have the opportunity to create artistic content both individual and common. When the budget allows we are hosting professional artists in residencies (f.e. Street Opera project, The step art installation etc). During the festival graffiti artists are being supported to create new creations, theater and dance groups are co-creating common performances for the festival and art workshops leading to creations are being facilitated.

3. providing opportunities for upcoming or innovative artists to create or to be presented in your programme;

Both creation and performing of new innovative arts if included in the program. Special focus is being given to young artists and art installations combining artistic content and new technologies (f.e. Puppet Myth photo and video art Installation).

4. being rooted in its’ local community fostering local connections in the programme and among the performers/ performances. The festival involves local artists as well as local audiences in its projects;

This is one of the aims of the festival. The whole production is being based on the broaden co-organisation of the activities by civil society organisations, public bodies and informal groups. At the last festival The Regional Government of Peloponnese was co-organiser as well as more than 20 civil society organisations and youth groups as well as individual artists. The collaboration in common creations is being facilitated before the festival between the local partners and on-the-spot for the hosted artists. Audiences are often actively involved in the performances and activities (especially in street theater, circus, graffiti, art installations and sports).

5. helping to increase access to culture and attract diverse audiences. (some examples include different socio-economic backgrounds, age groups, genders, and cultures);

The variety of performances and activities offered and the way the festival is being set-up (geography of the activities) and curated is facilitating the co-existence of different age groups, cultures and socio-economic backgrounds. It is very common for example that the audience coming for the concerts (mainly hard rock, reggae and hip hop) to visit the painting and photo exhibitions before or between the performances, or young graffiti artists to cooperate with older painting artists etc. The audience of the festival beside the general population of all ages, includes immigrants and refugees, small part of the Roma community and disabled. There are activities, performances and educational workshops available for children, for youth and for older people. Additionaly the last years we organise the "children's corner" with creative occupational activities for children so the parent have the opportunity to visit workshops or exhibitions.

6. taking measures to be more sustainable. This can refer to environment, economics, business models, and social impacts;

Environment: All around the festival, there are recycling bins for aluminium and plastic as well as a compost box. We also instal a shredder bicycle which shreds plastic to small pieces. This is part of an independent project of our organisations which uses the plastic flakes from water bottles shredded with the bicycle to build optimist sailing boats for children (Bottles to Boats project). Next year we will instal an environmental exhibition based on this project including environmental awareness activities and workshops.

Social impact: Festival promotes inclusion through sub themes. Every year the festival has one main inclusion sub-theme and artists are being invited to take it under consideration. For example last year we had a photography exhibition installation inside a tend in which refugees are used to stay at the refugees' camps.

Economic sustainability: Being a festival with free entrance being organised during the severe financial crisis of Greece, we had to experiment in different models for its financial sustainability. It is based on the circular economy model as well as on social entrepreneurship model. However the festival is mainly sustainable due to the huge effort of its volunteers.

7. helping to shape, encourage and promote intercultural experiences for your audiences and artists;

Each year we are organising a youth exchange which is hosting young artists from at leat 6 different countries who are co-creating common performances. Artists and volunteers from all over the world are included in the program and cooperation between them is facilitated. In parallel we host internships from Canada, France and Italy; mainly cultural management schools' students who take the responsibility to facilitate interactions, partnerships and common creations.

8. embracing inclusivity as a core principle and practice;

All activities and spaces are being set up taking under consideration the accessibility for wheelchairs and assistance is being provided by volunteers (in parts of the park which are more rough). Also we take under consideration inclusion issues; there is sign language translation in some workshops, assistance for blind people. Also toilets for disabled are installed.

9. investing in innovation and capacity building;

The festival assists the local organisations to built capacity in functional and creation aspects. We offer mentoring prior the festival and we facilitate local and international partnerships before, during and after the festival. We also train local organisations to use EU progr