AżTak Festival 2023 took place from July 6 to 8, 2023, under the theme HOME. Just a few months earlier, a villa in Warsaw’s Stara Ochota district became both the home of contemporary music in the city and a permanent base for the Hashtag Ensemble. That’s why the festival concerts were held there – on the summer stage, in the tomato garden, in the villa’s nooks and hallways, and on the Hashtag Lab stage.
The concept of “home” was explored musically as a space with multiple meanings: a space of safety, but also a reversed home – a dark home where we confront our deepest fears – and finally, a home as a place for our closest and most intimate relationships.
This year, AżTak Festival will take audiences into completely new realms and – diverting attention, if only for a moment, from fake news, the climate crisis, and armed conflicts – will invite them into a private, intimate space, familiar only to themselves.
During the festival, Hashtag Ensemble will offer deep reflection on our surrounding reality, healthy activism in collaboration with local communities, and a chance to reconnect with the body and emotions.
The theme of this year’s festival is HOME.
Just a few months ago, we launched a grassroots cultural institution – the Hashtag Lab Contemporary Music Space. The villa in Stara Ochota has become our first permanent musical home and a home for contemporary music in Warsaw. That’s where we invite you to join us for evening concerts. We will perform on the summer stage and inside the modernist building at Barska 29. We will also appear in urban spaces, explore new ways of listening, and make time to reconnect with bodies tired from a long winter.
Festival Highlights
On the first day, we invite you to the opening of a photography exhibition featuring works created with pinhole cameras under the guidance of Kacper Bartczak, interpreting the home as a space of multiple meanings. Selected photographs will serve as graphic scores for Hashtag Ensemble’s evening concert.
On the second day, we will explore the “home in reverse” – a dark home filled with our deepest fears. The performative concert titled “Shiver” will feature works by Nina Fukuoka, part of the composer’s Horror Project, a study of fear. Nearly every corner of Hashtag Lab will be filled with tension and sound. After the concert, we invite you to a film screening and discussion.
The final day features a concert titled “Touch”, focusing on the home as a space for our closest relationships. The program includes love-themed compositions by Julia Wolfe, Kevin Juillerat, Jacob Ter Veldhuis, and Jakub Krzewiński. After the concert, join us for a garden afterparty.
Program
July 6, 2023 (Thursday)
Hashtag Lab Contemporary Music Space
- 19:00 – Opening of the photography exhibition “Home” – Free admission
- 20:00 – Concert “Home” – Free admission
July 7, 2023 (Friday)
Hashtag Lab Contemporary Music Space
- 20:00 – Concert “Shiver” – Tickets: 10 PLN
- 21:00 – Film screening – Free admission
July 8, 2023 (Saturday)
Hashtag Lab Contemporary Music Space
- 18:00 – Walk (to be announced) – Free admission
- 20:00 – Concert “Touch” – Tickets: 10 PLN
AżTak Festival is organized by the Sfera Harmonii Foundation, which runs the community-based cultural institution Hashtag Lab Contemporary Music Space and the Hashtag Ensemble.
The Hashtag Lab Contemporary Music Space is co-financed by the City of Warsaw.
Partners:
- ZAIKS Authors’ Association
- Glissando
- Meakultura