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Programme
The first route of the museum ship will be the Mediterranean, an area of millennia of history and exchange, which has always mobilized and nourished the inspiration of artists, and naturally invites intercultural dialogue.
Discover the programme of activities on the quayside and in the towns: performances, concerts, conferences, screenings, workshops, meetings and other events.
Upcoming events
The ugly all
Expect a multisensory experience that will have the whole family laughing and shivering at the same time. A silent conversation about the power of creativity in the 21st century, disguised as a puppet show. Giant puppets, experimental dance, and group exercises come together to offer you a nonsensical story whose sole purpose is to navigate the complex labyrinth of the mind with a feather and tickle your soul. Accompanied and fused with Bartira's sound universe, she will use her ever-expanding sound bank to create an immersive sound environment live.
Stories from the Periphery, told by Silvia Albert Sopale and Kouyate Ansoumane
A collection of stories from diverse origins, told to broaden perspectives, open hearts, and bring souls closer together. All of these stories share a common thread: the presence of Afro-descendant people as protagonists. Brave, resilient, and joyful individuals who serve as mirrors for us to reflect on and imagine our own lives.
Migrating is not a crime
Top Manta proposes an afternoon of conversation, workshops and music to talk about the Mediterranean as a border, not as a tourist postcard. Based on the migrant experience, and from screen printing and sewing with recycled African fabrics, the proposal connects culture, anti-racism and social and solidarity economy to defend decent work and life without borders.
My continent of Africa, Beware the vampires قارتي أفريقيا، احذري مصاصي الدماء
The show takes its title from a song by Ibrahim Hesnawi, a Libyan reggae pioneer who started a musical movement that suffered political violence after Gaddafi's "Cultural Revolution" in the 1970s, when music was produced exclusively to serve the ideological propaganda of the state. The collaboration between Libyan artists Tewa Barnosa and boo.m is a sonic quest to explore reggae as a site of resistance in a time when pan-African solidarity is eclipsed and punished by imperial systems.
mebrat / መብራት
Adrasha’s project mebrat / መብራት explores the figure of the lighthouse as a symbol of guidance and border, translating its pulses of light into rhythms. Through field recordings, visual poetry, and personal archives, she articulates soundscapes that address displacement, communication, and belonging from a political and sensory perspective.
Ndox ak Ndox
NDOX AK NDOX is a sound performance based on the successive journeys of people from West and North Africa across the Atlantic and the Mediterranean, connecting paths that represent both hope and tragedy. PASAPORTEMAN treats these waters as a body in a coma. Through sound, and accompanied by the artists Nusmaïl (Jokkoo), opo (Jokkoo), and 3xOJ (Rahgoul), he seeks to honor and revive this body so that it can tell its stories.
NKISI Presents ‘Serpent Songs’
Inspired by Nkisi’s ongoing research into the ethnographic music archives (1893 till present), ‘Serpent Songs’ invokes the serpentine movements of sound and the migratory paths of its vibrations. The musical composition delves into the psycho-acoustics inherited from ancient musical traditions. Here, music emerges as an enchanted consciousness; a vessel for its mythopoetic remembrance. Inspired by the primordial snake ancestors of these ancient traditions who shaped landscapes, rivers, and hills, ‘Serpent Songs' traces the trails of music they left behind.
Interfaz 14
The Mediterranean is often a hostile border, but also a point of cultural convergence between continents. 14 kilometers of Mediterranean Sea, at its narrowest point, separate the African continent from the European one. This musical session, structured as a story, explores the African musical genres that filtered into western homes and dance floors with sounds arriving from the south, often reinterpreted through an increasingly diverse and growing diaspora at the end of the last century and the beginning of this one.
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La Bissaperie
La Bissaperie is a collective invocation of Frantz Fanon's memory through a shared reading of his texts and the preparation of bissap, a hibiscus flower drink. I propose a friendly and horizontal meeting place focused on the revolutionary ideas of the thinker and a platform for people to connect with their identity, heritage and community.
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In the depths
The proposal is entitled In the Depths and takes the form of a performative lecture. It begins with the real history of the Atlantic as a space of violence and memory: the slave trade, ports with a Black presence in Spain (Barcelona, Seville, Cadiz), and how this past has been silenced or fragmented. From there, it takes a creative leap into the realm of the imaginary: how artists such as Drexciya have paved the way for thinking about the ocean not only as a tomb, but also as an archive, as a place of possibilities and future.
Migritude
Migritude is a powerful solo musical performance by Dudù Kouate that blends ancestral rhythms, voice, and found objects into a deeply moving ritual of sound and memory. Rooted in Kouate’s Griot heritage and shaped by his transnational journey between Senegal and Europe, the performance explores migration, identity, loss, and resilience. Migritude is an intimate yet universal experience: a living bridge between cultures, where the stage becomes a shared space of listening, reflection, and collective humanity.
Nadah El Shazly presents Laini Tani
El Shazly's new album, Laini Tani, exudes an intoxicating and exhilarating sense of excess, evoking a sensual haze of warm nights that stretch effortlessly into dawn, while the clubs continue to vibrate unaffected. Each track functions as a vignette, capturing fleeting but intense moments of introspection, defiance, or unbridled euphoria. Through subtle wordplay, layered metaphors, and personal symbols, El Shazly weaves a richly meaningful sonic and lyrical tapestry, where every note and every phrase suggests a more intimate narrative. The album plays on contrasts—between indulgence and contemplation, spontaneity and observation—inviting the listener to lose themselves in its mesmerizing rhythms while deciphering the deeper truths hidden within. The album's soundscape achieves a refined balance, creating a dynamic dialogue between classical Egyptian improvisation, vocal manipulation, and electronic rhythms. Nadah collaborates with 3Phaz as co-producer.
Past events
In the Shadow of the Towers
A screening programme featuring new works by Phivos Philitas, Adonis Archontides and Androula Kafa, created for the exhibition The Right to Home: Diaries of Limassol’s Gentrification.
Trapped in Wordscapes and Staged Territories
A participatory poetry session hosted by artist Aggela Ioannidou, exploring how the transformation of cities affects individuals and their communities through the work of award-winning author Donna Stonecipher. Guests are invited to engage as much or as little as they wish by listening, reading, and sharing thoughts and experiences.
1953
1953, a dramaturgical exercise on the facticity of the present, reimagines the Rialto Theatre as a fluid space dissolving borders between stage and auditorium, inside and outside, day and night. Structured in three parts and lasting fifteen hours, from sunset to sunrise, it unfolds as a shifting landscape where the dramatised and the real intermingle. Its coordinates are set by the lives of scenographer Valentino Joseph and Julie the elephant, both born in 1953.
Open Studios: Tamara Al-Samerraei and Ghyzlène Boukaïla
Open Studio presentations by Tamara Al-Samerraei and Ghyzlène Boukaïla, artists-in-residence at Art Explora’s Mediterranean Crossed Residency programme in Cyprus. Al-Samerraei presents new paintings exploring memory, absence, and precarious spaces, inspired by makeshift studios and abandoned huts that echo a childhood home. Boukaïla presents a mixed-media installation linked to her lecture-performance Djebel al-Qāf — is it reachable?, on view 31 Oct–2 Nov.
1953: Night Works and Other Studies by Valentino Joseph
Bringing together sketches made in bed just before sleep, technical notes and sculptures maquettes that were never materialized, as well as a series of portrait studies culminating in a single painting, Pylon Art & Culture hosts the first solo exhibition of Valentino Joseph, seeking to shed light on another side of his multifaceted body of work. Opening on the second day of the Limassol Art Walks, the exhibition unfolds as both an epilogue and an autonomous continuation of the performance 1953 at the Rialto Theatre.
Necrogeographies: A walk around St Nikolaos Cemetery in Limassol
On November 1st and 2nd 2025, we invite you to Limassol’s old cemetery for a guided walk through its silence(d) grounds. Blending academic research with stories from those who sustain the cemetery, along with comparative material from our research in Greece, Denmark and Japan, we explore class-based, gendered and political necrogeographies. A reflective journey through social change, memory and care.
Exhibition Tour: The Right to Home
A walk through the exhibition The Right to Home: Diaries of Limassol’s Gentrification together with the artists and curator, exchanging insights and reflections on the works and themes of the project.
In the Shadow of the Towers
A screening programme featuring new works by Phivos Philitas, Adonis Archontides and Androula Kafa, created for the exhibition The Right to Home: Diaries of Limassol’s Gentrification.
Limassol: an open conversation about gentrification and culture
An open space for sharing and reflection, this conversation explores the impacts of gentrification on some of Limassol’s long-time residents and communities, as well as its cultural ecosystem. Local artists join academics, activists and social practitioners to exchange daily experiences and critical perspectives on the city’s ongoing transformation, while the public is invited to contribute their own views and stories.
Live concert: Something Messy, MUSHA, Mava + ΚαππαΧι + Nnocxela
A live concert of hip-hop, rock, and electronic music showcasing the talents of Limassol's underground scene. Held in the iconic EKA Group garage, the concert will be followed by an afterparty at the Tapper Bar.
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Your Face Sounds Familiar
This year marks a special milestone for the Overseas Filipino Workers (OFW) performers' community in Cyprus as they bring their much-loved talent show “Your Face Sounds Familiar” to a wider audience. For the very first time, within the framework of Art Explora Festival the event will be held in an outdoor public space, opening itself to the broader community and celebrating the creativity and spirit of the Filipino diaspora.
Jebel al-Qāf — is it reachable?
Ghyzlène Boukaïla’s Djebel al-Qāf — is it reachable? is a lecture-performance unfolding within an in situ installation, part waiting room, part forgotten checkpoint. Fragments gather around a mythical submerged mountain, echoing the threshold of the world in Islamic cosmology. Rooted in her film project Inner Sea Desire, the work drifts between stories, borders, and inner crossings. Installation on view 31 Oct–2 Nov, Performance on 2 Nov.
Secret
A nocturnal journey by Demetris Kolokotronis, recomposed with Stelios Ilchuk through sharp editing and a unique soundtrack. The footage captures Cypriot ecosystems: critters in caves, aquatic beings flashing or glowing in dark waters, legless and many-legged creatures moving across the dry landscape. Human presence remains only as that of an observer and explorer, another animal existing in parallel, in an ethereal time and space. In parallel, at the premises of the museum, the lecture “A history of Cyprus through its animals: introductions, extinctions, interactions and depictions in ancient art” will take place.
A History of Cyprus through Its Animals: Introductions, Extinctions, Interactions, and Depictions in Ancient Art
The history of humans and animals in Cyprus is long, complex, and fascinating. It encompasses numerous instances of introduction, extinction, and countless forms of interaction between animals and humans, right up to the present day. Join an interactive journey through time. Explore and discuss the extinction of Cyprus's endemic fauna, the introduction of wild and domestic animals, the evolution of their roles over time, subsequent extinctions, their presence in ancient art, and much more. As the objects on display in the museum demonstrate, the history and art of Cyprus are profoundly enriched by humankind's fascination with animals. In parallel, and throughout the day, the film Secret will be screened continuously in the museum.
A History of Cyprus through Its Animals: Introductions, Extinctions, Interactions, and Depictions in Ancient Art
The history of humans and animals in Cyprus is long, complex, and fascinating. It encompasses numerous instances of introduction, extinction, and countless forms of interaction between animals and humans, right up to the present day. Join an interactive journey through time. Explore and discuss the extinction of Cyprus's endemic fauna, the introduction of wild and domestic animals, the evolution of their roles over time, subsequent extinctions, their presence in ancient art, and much more. As the objects on display in the museum demonstrate, the history and art of Cyprus are profoundly enriched by humankind's fascination with animals. In parallel, and throughout the day, the film Secret will be screened continuously in the museum.
Frequently asked questions
The Art Explora Festival will take place from spring 2024 to spring 2026 in various Mediterranean cities.
Festival events take place both on the museum boat's quay and in heritage and/or emblematic sites in the stopover towns. To find out all about upcoming events in your town, consult our Agenda.
The Art Explora Festival offers a rich, multi-disciplinary program including visits to the museum ship, exhibition pavilions, virtual reality experiences, artistic performances, concerts, lectures, film screenings, creative workshops and meetings. You'll be able to discover local and international artists, as well as thinkers and cultural players exploring contemporary themes related to the Mediterranean region. To find out all about upcoming events in your city, consult our Agenda.
All Festival events are free of charge. Please note, however, that some events - such as workshops - require a reservation via the ticket office. Please consult the page dedicated to each event for more information on times and booking procedures.
To ensure that everyone has the best possible experience at the Festival, we have drawn up a visitors' charter listing a few good practices.
Yes, the boat is freely accessible on site. However, you can pre-book your time online on our website.
For reasons of safety and preservation of the boat, high heels and stilettos may not be worn on the boat.
To take part in the workshops and meetings offered during the Festival, you'll generally need to register in advance. Information on how to register will be available on the dedicated event page, where you can also find details of times and how to take part.
Yes, the Art Explora Festival also offers child-friendly activities, such as creative workshops specially designed for young participants. Take a look at the program to find out about events and activities for children and families.
The museum boat is open to all free of charge. To find out on which quay it will be moored, or to pre-book your slot, consult the page dedicated to your town.
Appropriate facilities have been set up on the Festival site for the reception and access of people with reduced mobility. The boat is equipped with a 1m-wide ramp, accessible to people with reduced mobility, but may require the accompaniment of a third party due to its gradient of over 6%. Access to the aft deck and immersive exhibition is possible. However, the upper deck is not accessible. Please inform us in advance of any special accessibility requirements, so that we can make the necessary arrangements.
Thank you for your interest in the Art Explora Festival! To find out more about our volunteer opportunities and to apply, please visit our "Become a volunteer"section of our website. There you'll find all the information you need about the roles available and the application procedure. We look forward to meeting you!
We're delighted to consider new partnerships for the Art Explora Festival. To find out how, please visit our dedicated page or write to us at contact@artexplora.org