Festivals

Halaqat collaborates with festivals that offer public platforms for artistic presentation, dialogue, and visibility. These festivals engage with questions of care and gender, creating space for emerging voices and socially engaged art to meet diverse audiences.

Beirut Choreography Encounters – BCE (Lebanon)

Festival's Logo on a purple background © BCE

Beirut Choreography Encounters (BCE) is a regional contemporary dance festival dedicated to fostering artistic mobility and dialogue between Arab-speaking countries and internationally. Co-organized by Beirut Physical Lab, Les Premières Chorégraphiques, and Les Rencontres Chorégraphiques de Casablanca, BCE aims to decentralize the contemporary dance scene, amplify local voices, and support emerging artists through residencies, mentorship, masterclasses, and professional exchange, while challenging Western-centric approaches to choreography.

D-CAF | Downtown Contemporary Arts Festival (Egypt)

Festival's Logo on a black background © D-CAF

Founded in 2012, the Downtown Contemporary Arts Festival (D-CAF) is Egypt’s leading international multidisciplinary festival for contemporary arts. Taking place in the heart of Downtown Cairo, D-CAF presents performing arts, visual art, music, film, and new media, reclaiming public and historical spaces for artistic experimentation and dialogue. As an independent initiative, the festival supports bold local, regional, and international voices while expanding access to contemporary art for diverse audiences, particularly youth, artists, and emerging cultural practitioners. Public engagement and inclusivity remain central to D-CAF’s mission through initiatives that reach underrepresented communities.

Harvest Festival Marrakech (Morocco)

Festival's Logo on an orange background © Harvest

Harvest Festival Marrakech draws on the tradition of seasonal harvest celebrations as a metaphor for collective growth, care, and creation. Organized by the Global Diversity Foundation, the festival creates connections between High Atlas communities, Marrakech-based audiences, and translocal networks. Through multidisciplinary programming—including film screenings, workshops, exhibitions, food markets, and community exchanges—the festival explores environmental and social justice, ancestral knowledge, and cultural heritage, positioning art and culture as tools for reflection, exchange, and collective care.

L’Boulevard (Morocco)

Festival's Logo on a black background © L’Boulevard

Founded in 1999 in Casablanca, L’Boulevard is Morocco’s first urban music festival and one of the largest in Africa. Entirely free and open to the public, the festival offers a platform for emerging Moroccan artists in hip hop, rock, metal, electronic, and fusion
music, while celebrating urban cultures such as graffiti, breakdance, and street art. Rooted in Casablanca’s vibrant youth and subcultural scenes, L’Boulevard plays a key role in nurturing artistic ecosystems, fostering community connection, and supporting cultural participation through music and creativity.

Oakenfest (Lebanon)

Oakenfest is an independent, eco-conscious music and camping festival held annually in the oak forests of Lehfed, northern Lebanon. Founded in 2013, the festival brings together emerging and established Arab artists alongside workshops and community-based activities rooted in care, sustainability, and connection to the land. With a non-hierarchical approach that values diversity, inclusion, and artist participation, Oakenfest fosters a nurturing cultural space and envisions its future through the development of Oaken House, a year-round hub for music, care-based practices, and environmental stewardship.

On Marche (Morocco)

For over 18 years, Marche has brought contemporary dance to the heart of Marrakech. Conceived as a living laboratory, the festival creates space for creation, transmission, and resistance, engaging with sociopolitical realities in Morocco, Africa, and beyond. Firmly rooted in its local context, On Marche champions inclusive and civic-minded choreographic practices, viewing care as listening, trust-building, and long-term support for artists while bridging tradition and experimentation across generations and geographies.