What to do this weekend

At a loose end? BR brings you the best of Bucharest’s cultural highlights for the weekend ahead.

OUTDOOR

Bookfest

Until June 2

Romexpo

Important personalities of culture and art life, media, politicians, experts will attend the Bookfest 2013 International Book Fair, while Neagu Djuvara, Lucian Boia, Horia Roman Patapievici and Gabriel Liiceanu will each present a new publishing project.

The agenda of this year edition consists of 300 interactive events, book launches, reading and autograph sessions, meetings with culture and art personalities and politicians, concerts, films theater performances for kids, photography, creative writing and live drawing workshops, professional debates. More about this event, here.

B-FIT International Street Theatre Festival (in picture)

Constitutiei Square, Universitatii Square, George Enescu Square, CismigiuPark and OldCityCenter

May 30 – June 2

More than 200 artists from several international theatre companies will participate at the fifth edition of the B-FIT IN THE STREET International Street Theatre Festival that will take place between May 30 – June 2. This fifth edition of the festival invites spectators to a colorful universe where artists will offer emotions and reflections as well as a different kind of interaction with the public through space, rhythm and reception.

B-FIT in the Street will be opened with the most important Romanian band – Xtreme Project, with guitarist Mirel Cumpănaş – who will offer an impressive show of acrobatics on the façade of BCR building, situated in the University Square and will be accompanied by Silvestri Orchestra, conducted by Tiberiu Soare. More about the event, here.

LIVE MUSIC

Green Hours International Jazz Fest

Green Hours

May 30-June 2

Ready to welcome audiences who know that jazz is not mere tune selection, but an idea created first in the mind, inspired by the performer’s passion, and then made into music, the fifth Green Hours International Jazz Fest brings together the Sebastian Spanache Trio (Timisoara), Adam Baldych Imaginary Quartet (Poland), Jazzybirds (Cluj-Napoca), Marius Popp (Germany), the Gilad Abro Trio (Israel), Adrian Gaspar Trio (Austria) and Mircea Tiberian (in picture), Chris Dahlgren and Christian Lillinger (Romania/ USA/Germany). More about this event, here.

International Week of New Music

Sala Radio

May 31, 19.00

The founder of the International Week of New Music, composer Ştefan Niculescu, has conceived this festival based on two fundamental benchmarks: a better understanding of Romanian music of the past five-six decades in an international context and an improved awareness of the great values and latest directions of evolution of European and global music, of the audience and Romanian musicians. These targets were realized in an entire series of musical manifestations, festival thus gaining, along with the tradition built by the succeeding years, the national and international prestige brought by such an important event. More about this event, here.

FILM

Transylvania International Film Festival

Cluj Napoca

May 31-June 9

The 12th run of the Transylvania International Film Festival sees 12 young directors competing for the grand trophy. This year, the competition is focused on first-time directors – 10 of the competition titles come from helmers making their feature-length directorial debuts. The competitive section is traditionally focused on first- and second-time directors, and the 12 films come from Saudi Arabia, Uruguay, Poland, Sweden, the USA, Germany, Denmark, the Netherlands, India, Slovakia and Japan.

The boldest debut in the competition is Wadjda (Haifaa Al-Mansour), the first feature film entirely shot in Saudi Arabia. The director had to wait for years and subject herself to numerous restrictions to shoot the picture. It tells the story of a young girl who takes part in a Quran memorization contest in order to buy herself a bicycle – a perfect showcase for the director’s intricate and touching portrait of women’s status in the Muslim world, based on her own adolescence. In 2012, the film received three awards in Venice and the Dubai International Film Festival trophy. More about the event, here.

EXHIBITION

Q.E.D. by Mircea Cantor

The NationalMuseum of Contemporary Art

Until April 2014

More than 1,200 people have attended the opening of the first local solo exhibition of one of the most important young artists to emerge on the international scene over the last decade: Mircea Cantor, winner of the Prix Marcel Duchamp Award 2011. The QED exhibition, the largest survey of the artist’s works to date, comprises 30 pieces. More details here.

The Human Body

AntipaMuseum

Until June 30

One of the most realistic exhibitions in the world, The Human Body, will stop for the first time in Bucharest, at AntipaMuseum, from March 22 to June 30. The exhibition includes more than 200 pieces – human bodies which through dissection of organs and tissue offer a three dimensional perspective of the miracle of the human body. More about this exhibition, here.

“Live tropical butterflies”

Antipa Museum

Until July 31

Starting on May 1, the Antipa Museum will host the “Live tropical butterflies”, a temporary exhibition organized in collaboration with the “House of Butterflies” and the Vulticulus Geography Society. Visitors will have the possibility of seeing over 30 species of exotic butterflies flying freely in the special greenhouse set up within the “Antipa” Museum’s garden, but they can also witness the “birth” of butterflies. The exhibition can be visited from May 1 to July 31. Tickets cost RON 10 per child/student and RON 12 per adult/pensioner.

Treasures of China

The National Museum of History

Until July 30

Local culture enthusiasts are now able to enjoy a traveling exhibition of China’s Terracotta Warriors: thousands of life-size terracotta figures from an army prepared for battle. Found by coincidence in 1974, they are now considered one of the greatest archeological discoveries of modern times. The exhibition features 101 rare objects – including the Terracotta Warriors – from one of the largest burial sites ever built, the Terracotta Army of the first Emperor of China, Qin Shi Huang. Four is the maximum number of these figures permitted outside China in a single exhibition. More details about the exhibition, here.

Oana Vasiliu

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