“Sidewalks of an Alley”… seventh session after a break

From a theatrical performance that was held this summer at the Zoukak Theatre.

In 2013, the first edition of the “Alley Sidewalks Festival” was launched in Beirut, in an attempt by the organizers to create a multi-art event. From theater and choreographic performances to music and street performances. but the festival It was forced to stop for three consecutive sessions since 2019, due to the political and economic conditions that Lebanon is going through, and due to the Corona pandemic and the damage it caused to cultural events.

Alley fans return to meet Again with its makers and guests this year, as it launched the day before yesterday events The seventh session of it, which will continue until the fourth of next December in the “Zoukak Theatre”, which was restored following the damage caused by the Beirut Port explosion, in addition to various cultural spaces in Beirut, which are: “City Theater” and “Station Beirut”. Beirut Center for Contemporary Arts, Warehouse, Concrete 199, Mansion, and Sunflower Theatre.

According to the organizers’ statement, the return of the artists to the stage today will be a kind of “commissioning of new works, and other classic ones that are still preferred by many”, while ensuring that different generations are represented within the program.

The festival opened with a discussion between novelist Elias Khoury and playwright Roger Assaf regarding the play that Assaf signed in 1994 and titled “Ayoub’s Memoirs”. It deals with the subject of the disappeared as a result of the Lebanese civil war. In the same context, the festival will present two sessions: “The Age of Forgiveness” by Tony Shukr, and “On the Insomnia of Memory and Forgiveness” by Wudad Halawani, Silvana Lakkis and Mariana Vodolian.

Among the theatrical shows scheduled for the coming days: “Why am I not lucky?” Abdel Rahim Al-Awaji, “Nawal” by Lina Abyad, “The Black Hole” by Hashem Adnan, “The Smell of Amber” by Issam Bou Khaled, “I Am Not in a Place” by Mada Harb, “A Cocktail of Shoufs Without Meaning” by Jana Bou Matar, and “Tomorrow is the best day of my life” by Yara Abu Nassar, and “Harub” by Katy Younes and Karim Shebly.

In the live performances, a group of performances will be presented: “The Drifters” by Nada Kanoo, “The Deer Sleep” by Ali Shahrour, and “Things You Cannot See” by Stephanie Kayal and Abdel Kobeissi. Crystal Khodr is also re-presenting her interactive installation “Who Killed Youssef Beidas”, which she showed a few months ago at the Beirut Center for Contemporary Arts.

It is worth noting that this session allocates special support to new artists in the Lebanese cultural scene under the name of the “Zoukak Co-Production Program”, in order to present new works to them.