Alkantara Festival

The Alkantara Festival is an international performing arts festival in the city of Lisbon. It takes place every year in November, in partnership with some of the city's most emblematic performing arts venues: Centro Cultural de Belém, Culturgest, São Luiz Teatro Municipal, Teatro do Bairro Alto, and Teatro Nacional D. Maria II.

The Alkantara Festival presents dance, theatre, and performance, as well as experimental formats at the crossroads of different practices in the arts and knowledge production. The programme features artists from different places, who often engage with urgent questions in contemporary society.

Alkantara Festival (2006-)
2006, 2008 - directed by Mark Deputter
2010, 2012, 2014, 2016, 2018 - directed by Thomas Walgrave
2020, 2021, 2022, 2023, 2024 - directed by Carla Nobre Sousa e David Cabecinha

Espaço Alkantara

Espaço Alkantara is a place for arts residencies (attributed by open call or by invitation), showings, meetings, workshops, and occasional performances. It is also home to PISTA, a professional development programme for producers and self-producing artists, co-organised with Polo Cultural Gaivotas | Boavista/Loja Lisboa Cultura.

The Alkantara offices are located on the first floor at Espaço Alkantara. If you are an independent producer or artist who needs a place to do desk work, apply for a spot in our open office.

Seven Years Seven Pieces

Seven Years Seven Pieces is a long-term project (2016-2022) developed by choreographer Cláudia Dias and produced by Alkantara.

The basis of the Seven Years Seven Pieces project is the production of a new work each year by Cláudia Dias, in collaboration with an invited artist. Coproducers include Teatro Municipal do Porto, Maria Matos Teatro Municipal, São Luiz Teatro Municipal, and Teatro Nacional D. Maria II, among others. These pieces have been presented in Portugal and abroad.

• Monday: Watch out for the Right! (2016) with Pablo Fidalgo Lareo
• Tuesday: All That is Solid Melts into Air (2017) with Luca Bellezze
• Wednesday: The time of the cherries (2018) with Igor Gandra
• Thursday: Abracadara (2019) with Idoia Zabaleta
• Friday: The end of the world… Or maybe not (2020) with Vasco Vaz and Miguel Pedro

Each piece is the starting point for a year-long project with young people in Almada and Porto, called Seven Years Seven Schools. This project is currently supported by the Municipality of Almada, the PARTIS programme of the Calouste Gulenkian Foundation, and BPI/La Caixa Foundation.

Each piece also becomes a book, illustrated and designed by António Jorge Gonçalves, with the original stage text and a postface by Jorge Louraço Figueira. The Seven Years Seven Books series is published by Teatro Nacional D. Maria II.

Past projects

Danças na Cidade Festival (1993-2002)
1993 - coordinated and programmed by Mónica Lapa and Albino Moura
1994, 1995 - directed by Mónica Lapa
1996, 1997, 1999 - directed by Mónica Lapa and Mark Deputter
2002 - directed by Mark Deputter

Encontros Al Kantara (2004)
Directed by Mark Deputter

Sete Anos Sete Peças(2016-2022)
Developed by choreographer Cláudia Dias

International Projects
Dançar o que é nosso (1998-2003)
CoLABoratório (2006-2007)
Será o que fizermos (2007)
Nu Kre Bai Na Bu Onda (2007-2010)
Lugares Imaginários/Sites of Imagination (2007)
NXTSTP (2007-2017)
Départs (2009-2014)
Point(e) to Point (2009)
Global City/Local City (2012-2015)
Artista na Cidade (2012-2018)
2012 - Anne Teresa De Keersmaeker
2014 - Tim Etchells
2016 - Faustin Linyekula
2018 - Christiane Jatahy
Departures and Arrivals (2014-2018)
Urban Heat (2015-2017)
1Space (2015-2017)