Rio’s Tempo Festival for Performing Arts Begins October 9th

By Chesney Hearst, Senior Contributing Reporter

RIO DE JANEIRO, BRAZIL – Celebrating the best of theater, dance, music, and live performances, the Tempo Festival returns to Rio de Janiero for its sixth edition on October 9th. Continuing through October 18th, the festival will take place in several venues located throughout the city and feature more than twenty shows by national and international performers as well as installations and lectures by artists from Brazil, the Netherlands, France, South Africa and Spain.

The festival was created by Bia Junqueira, Cesar Augusto and Márcia Dias in 2009, and since the beginning the three curators have worked to offer Rio audiences diverse and innovative performance that showcase the best of contemporary performance art.

“Thinking is a necessary dialogue and it’s a foundation of the theater. Nowadays, we are almost always just reacting,” said curator Bia Junqueira in a released statement. Cesar Augusto added; “In times of moral, civic and religious setbacks, we are proposing a move to look forward, to look toward the coming times and the social, political and cultural clashes.”

This year the festival will open with Felipe Hirsch’s presentation of “Puzzle (d)” at Teatro Municipal Carlos Gomes in Centro at 9PM on Friday, October, 9th. Originally created for the 2013 Frankfurt Book Fair, the critically-acclaimed piece examines the international repercussions of Germany’s crash. Following the opening, the piece will be performed again in the same location on October 10th at both 5PM and 9PM.

On October 10th and 11th, the Netherlands collective Wunderbaum will present “Looking For Paul” at Oi Futuro Flamengo. The piece examines the controversial life and work of American artist Paul McCarthy.

Other notable performances that will take place during this edition of the festival include Christiane Jatahy’s “A Floresta que Anda” (The Forest That Walks), a work inspired by William Shakespeare’s “Macbeth,” and Dance Rochinha, an event held on Dia das Crianças (Children’s Day, Monday, October 12th) which will take place at the Quadra da Acadêmicos da Rocinha in São Conrado with live DJs, dancers and toys including hula hoops.

In addition to the Quadra da Acadêmicos da Rocinha, Teatro Municipal Carlos Gomes and Oi Futuro Flamengo, events during the festival will be held at IAB in Flamengo; Sesi in Centro; Reduto in Botafogo; ECM Sérgio Porto in Humaitá; Centro Cultural do Poder Judiciário in Centro; Museu de Arte do Rio in Centro; and the Lona Cultural Municipal Herbert Vianna in Maré. Ticket prices range from free to R$30 depending on the program.

For more information, venue address, performance times and the complete schedule of events, see the official Tempo Festival website.