THE ANNUAL Confrontations festival in Nitra has two main aims. Firstly, to give young people a chance to participate in the cultural life of the region. Secondly, for the artists to have their work scrutinized by arts professionals.
Confrontations consists of two streams - an art exhibition with a "returning time" theme and related musical performances every Friday throughout April.
The festival is being held, in its second year, at the renovated synagogue in Nitra.
The event opened on Friday April 1 with an exhibition of digital prints and 3D art objects. The concerts are intended to enable various levels of "confrontation" with the artworks on display.
The four young artists whose work is featured are all from the department of Fine Arts at Nitra's Constantine the Philosopher University. They have each tried to depict their "memories and returns to the past in confrontation with present".
The festival's musical stream comprises five chamber concerts by young as well as established local and foreign musicians.
Their repertoire focuses on classical music periods, featuring "confrontations" between the work of baroque composer Johann Sebastian Bach and neo-traditional composer Bela Bartók with composers of other styles and genres.
On Friday, April 15, homage will be paid to the renowned Slovak composer and pedagogue, Ivan Parík, who died at the beginning of March this year. In the 1960s Parík helped found a similar festival. Flautist Monika Štreitová and pianist Andrea Mudroňová will perform works by him as well as compositions by Erik Satie, Olivier Messiaen, André Jolivet, Francis Poulenc and others, starting at 18:30.
Self-proclaimed "small town" chamber orchestra Požoň sentimental will insert its playfulness into the closing Požoň vernakulár evening of the Confrontations festival, on April 29 at 18:30. Also performing will be violinist Ľubomír Burgr, accordionist Boris Lenko, pianist Peter Zagar and flautist Marek Piaček, who will play works by Zagar, Burgr and Bartók, Stravinsky, Schonberg and Lennon and McCartney.
Tickets (Sk40) are on sale at Nitra's Synagogue on Ulica pri Synagóge.
Prepared by Zuzana Habšudová
