Light-painted historic buildings, creatures of light floating on a sea of tulles, interaction with artificial intelligence – the Zsolnay Light Festival will enchant all your senses in 2025 as well. This is not just a festival – it is one of the most spectacular urban events in Europe, which will illuminate Pécs for the ninth time between 3-6 July, attracting more than one hundred thousand visitors to the city.
The Cathedral as a Living Work of Art: International Competition
The Zsolnay Light Art Video Mapping Competition is the biggest attraction of the four-day festival, which conjures up stunning light creations on the monumental façade of the Cathedral of Pécs every night. This year, Hungarian, Czech, Polish and Bulgarian artists will compete for the favor of the audience. The theme of the competition is in line with the central theme of the festival, which is the buzzword NO//BODY.
Highlights of the city centre – spectacular stops on the historic streets
This year, we can get to know the sights created for the downtown of Pécs by walking the Path of Light. On the façade of the city's oldest residential building, a love story comes to life in the animation of the Italian video mapping artist Francesca Macció. On Színház Square, an installation by the Swiss Encor Studio transforms a shipping container into an extravagant light box.
Fényszórók will create a grandiose panoramic projection on Széchenyi Square, and this year's creator of the Light Carpet will be the Budapest-based graphic and design studio Anuri. The Spanish Javier Riera invites you to immerse yourself in the Cella Septichora by projecting geometric shapes, and his work promises a hypnotic experience of light.
In the Nádor Gallery, it is as if we were stepping into a sci-fi film: Koros Design's huge head installation explores the question of how robots will be able to imitate human facial expressions with the help of artificial intelligence – a shocking encounter with the future.
During your adventures in the city center, don't miss the giant LED display set up in the ÁRKÁD Pécs Shopping Center, where Filip Roca's and Zarko Komar's (ME-RS) installation Stardust takes us into an immersive universe both during the day and at night. The film focuses on the basic questions of human existence – where we came from, how we connect – as an endless story made of stardust, which we can also become part of by walking into the projection.
What happens when a cultural district meets one of Europe's most exciting light festivals?
As the biggest innovation of this year's Zsolnay Light Festival, the event will be enriched with a new dimension: in addition to the usual downtown venues, the Zsolnay Cultural Quarter will become an independent, all-night attraction of the festival. Visitors can walk the secret paths of an enchanted garden of light, where a new light experience awaits them at every corner.
In the E78 concert hall, Balázs Varga will create his audiovisual installation „Center Point” with the help of laser beams and robot lights, where the precisely choreographed play of light, sound and smoke completely draws the viewer in. The light installations of the young talents of the University of Pécs and MOME, a spectacular light carpet, a video mapping location, a dome projection, and sculptures brought to life with light make the quarter one of the most magical venues of the festival.
The sanctuary of light and sound – a mythical journey and a meditative spatial experience at the Kodály Centre
This year, the Kodály Centre will host two monumental installations. In Vince Varga and his team's work The Torches Are Already Burning, the mythical story of the boys who have become deer comes to life in a grandiose, immersive installation. During the virtual journey taking place in the tulle forest growing on the stage of the Concert Hall, we find ourselves in the thick of the Mecsek Mountains and in the familiar squares of Pécs, the visually captivating and emotionally moving experience places the plot of the centuries-old Bartók myth and its questions that are still valid today in a contemporary context.
Another sensation of the Kodály Centre is the site-specific installation Analemma by Japanese Yasuhiro Chida, which builds a calm, meditative space from fine threads and light. The Kodály Centre thus becomes one of the most intimate and profound experiences of the Zsolnay Light Festival.
Acrobatics, laughter and spectacle: street theatre and contemporary circus in the heart of the city centre
The Zsolnay Light Festival offers visitors magical experiences not only at night, but also during the day. In the squares of the city center, colorful street theater and contemporary circus performances await the audience. The Octopus Mama show is about those super mothers for whom eight hands would not be enough to meet all the challenges. In Muruya's performance, we can see an entertaining yet profound presentation about the chaos, joys and pains of becoming a mother. The Spanish Brincadeira team will take the stage in front of the Mosque on two nights of the festival, making their percussion performances special with rhythmic lights and choreographed movement. The atmosphere in the Embers Nest will always be fiery: fire jugglers and acrobats will amaze the audience in the Barbican moat.
The Zsolnay Light Festival attracts more than a hundred thousand visitors every year , and as the largest light-themed event in Hungary, it has deservedly earned its place among Europe's prestigious light festivals.
The programs of the festival and the attractions of the Way of Light presented in public spaces can be visited free of charge, while those in closed spaces can be viewed by purchasing a wristband, these are the Route of Light Extra locations. Discounted, early bird tickets are available from 20 May to 30 June.
Pécs is the highlight of summer!
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