2010-07-16 17:33

ATHENS -- Despite the ongoing economic crisis which hits Greece hard, thousands of Greeks and foreign visitors still get the opportunity to enjoy a wide range of high quality artistic performances this summer during the Greek Festival.

Art usually suffers during economic crises. But this is not the case in debt-ridden Greece which still promotes culture as a way forward "in a period of uncertainty and decadence," George Loukos, artistic director of the 56-year-old Greek Festival of Athens and Epidaurus, said recently.

From June to September each summer over the past decades millions of people were stunned by great singers such as late Maria Callas and Luciano Pavarotti, dancer Rudolf Nureyev and artists of the Beijing Opera performing in ancient theaters and modern venues in Athens and Epidaurus.

Despite poor means available in comparison with the past, the Greek Festival still offers the audience many chances to marvel at contemporary established artists, such as French actress Isabelle Huppert, and young innovative artists from Greece and across the world, Festival spokesperson Maria Panagiotopoulou told Xinhua.

"At the beginning we were very anxious about the possibilities we had this year. We had cutbacks in our budget. We don't host so many performances as in previous years. We dropped from 70 to 56, but we did a trick which worked. We lowered the prices of tickets to 15 and 20 euros," said Panagiotopoulou.

She explained that the organizers shunned bigger productions this year in order to give Greeks the chance to see exceptional performances without having to travel abroad.

This has helped more than 200,000 people enjoy concerts and theater plays this summer, according to early estimations.

Huppert starred as Blanche DuBois in Polish director Krzysztof Warlikowski's production based on Tennessee Williams' s play  "A Streetcar Named Desire," in a venue in Athens and the Festival reported a sold out. The same show was staged in France.

It was one of the highlights of this year' s Festival, along the performance by the Youth Orchestra Simon Bolivar from Venezuela which drew large crowds at the Herodes Atticus Odeon (Herodeion), a Roman theater under the Acropolis hill with a capacity of 5,000 seats.

Herodeion is the traditional focus of the Athens Festival which runs from June 1 to July 15 in 13 venues.

The ancient Greek theater in Epidaurus, which hosts the second part of the Greek Festival, from July to September each Friday and Saturday, has a capacity of 10,000 people.

While the Athens Festival hosts modern and ancient theater, ballet and modern dances, opera, jazz and classical music, Epidaurus Festival is dedicated to ancient Greek drama.

Since 1954, Greek and foreign productions are hosted in the  "original place of the original plays,"  stressed Panagiotopoulou during an interview at the headquarters of the Greek Festival, near Herodeion.

This year' s highlight in Epidaurus is expected to be the world premiere of a German production by Thomas Ostermeier based on William Shakespeare' s  "Othello"  on August 6 and 7.

As for the future, since there is a great interest in China, artistic director Loukos might have already something in his mind regarding new performances of Chinese artists in the Greek Festival, noted Panagiotopoulou.

Asia was represented in this year' s festival by Noh theater of Japan.