NE:BITEF 2026_Tomi Janežič

This year was meant to mark the 60th anniversary of Bitef, a festival that has, for the local and international theatre scene alike, represented a space for artistic experimentation, critical thought, international dialogue, and freedom of expression. Instead, for the past two years, alongside numerous other actors on the cultural scene, Bitef has been subjected to various forms of financial, programming, and administrative repression. In the process, Bitef has become a prime example of a public cultural good being effectively held hostage by a government with a mind of its own.

Yet last year demonstrated that what makes Bitef relevant—both locally and internationally—is not its administrative structures, but the artistic community that has built it, and that Bitef itself has helped build over the course of six decades. Last year, prompted by the ongoing crisis surrounding Bitef, as well as the overt censorship of last year’s festival selection by the Board, numerous cultural workers chose to speak out and say “no” to such practices. Their response resulted in a self-organised, guerrilla edition of the festival, named ne:Bitef. The initiative resonated both across the region and internationally.

This year, solidarity from the international artistic community has resulted in six out of seven productions withdrawing from the originally announced official Bitef selection. The seventh show remained in the programme despite its director’s opposition to it. The acts of solidarity witnessed last year and this year demonstrate that those in power may be able to seize an institution, but they cannot seize the people that need it and for whom that institution holds meaning.

This is why ne:Bitef continues this year: as a collective, rebellious and liberatory act of civil disobedience and creativity—as the historically independent Užice Republic in the midst of the otherwise occupied culture. This year’s edition will take the form of a collectively organised, horizontally structured festival of micro-stages, welcoming audiences across the city on 20 September, from 12:00 to 18:00. Admission to all sixty locations will be free.

Each micro-stage will be curated by one local cultural worker, nominated by the broader artistic community, who will present an artist, collective, or work that has marked Bitef’s 60-year history. Specially conceived performances, exhibitions, workshops, conversations about theatre productions, and encounters with artists and cultural workers will take place at numerous addresses outside the institutional theatre system—in independent social and cultural centres, bookshops, cafés, pastry shops, private apartments, and other spaces of freedom.

Following the map and schedule of events, that will be published on the festival’s website, audiences will be able to create their own “Bitef” journey through Belgrade: choosing which micro-stages to visit, how long to stay at each, and at what pace to move between them.

From 19:00 onwards, all participants and audiences will gather at the Centre for Cultural Decontamination, where the final part of the programme will transform into a shared space for encounter, dialogue, and artistic action. Through performance and conversation, with the participation of local and international artists and other actors connected to Bitef throughout its history, the evening will be an open space to reflect on Bitef’s legacy, as well as on the possible ways going forward. The evening will be dedicated to resistance and solidarity—the values that remain at the heart of a living, open, and free theatre.

It is worth noting that the first ne:Bitef was created in response to last year’s censorship and the historic absence of the institutional festival. It took place in December 2025 as an act of self-organisation by a large part of the cultural sector and the wider public, with immense support from students. Against virtually impossible odds, this guerrilla undertaking was successfully realised, continuing the avant-garde tradition for which Bitef has become known around the world.

Tomi Janezic

Curated by: Radivoje Dinulović, Zoran Dmitrović and Zoja Erdeljan Stepanović (SCEN Center and Kolektiv Gallery)
Micro-scene: Galerija Kolektiv
Address: Drinčićeva 20, Belgrade
When: September 20 from 12 (noon) to 6 p.m

Short description: The event is dedicated to Tomi Janežič, with a focus on the play “The Seagull”, by A.P. Chekhov, which he directed at SNP in 2012, and which was performed at the 47th Bitef in 2013. Although we will talk about the overall work and Janežič’s authorial approach, this play was chosen, among other things, because of its specific and highly developed relationship to the spaces of the play. The event is conceived as a hybrid, and includes the presence of Tomi Janežič and communication with him via video link during the entire duration of the event, the projection of exclusive video material from the film about the play (which is currently in the editing stage), an audio recording of the original music of Isidore Žebeljan and a workshop format in which various documents (predominantly texts and photos) will be used for reading, viewing, study, dialogue and interventions. Internet radio station radioAPARAT will also be included in the work.