Art & Life Festival in the Streets June 20 and 21

Publikováno: 17.6.2025

Street artists, folk musicians and skilled stallholders with a rich offer of food, drinks or gift items will fill the well-known areas and completely new locations of Poruba with aromas, imaginative melodies and laughter. There will be a children's zone, good food, the popular Wine Festival and a market with handicrafts by Czech artists. And just like every year - the admission to the festival is absolutely free.

Theater and dulcimers

As is tradition, the festival's program is interesting and varied and visitors of all generations and tastes will find something for themselves. The program will be provided by more than 200 artists, most of whom are representatives of street art or busking. Clowns and mimes from Israel, Chile, Spain or Italy will charm you with humour and exaggerations, world-class circus performers will amaze with their acrobatic tricks, and there will also be popular masked parades or modern flow art from Hong Kong. The evenings will traditionally end with the sounds of the Moravian dulcimer music on the square and a magical fire show, which will light up the courtyard next to Aleš Square.

Music across continents and genres

The Festival in the streets will also bring a rich musical program. Visitors can expect a packed international line-up with performers from Taiwan, Estonia, Spain, Poland, Slovakia, as well as the domestic scene. Flamenco fans will be delighted by a concert by Diego Guerrero, a Spanish singer and showman nominated for a Latin Grammy. Exotic rhythms will be brought by bands from Southeast Asia, the Slovak Balkansambel will move the crowds with Balkan energy, and the Czech colours will be represented by the groups Hrubá Hudba, Zooblasters, Lesní zvěř or the vocal band Voices.

New festival zones and stages

The Poklad House of Culture and both adjacent revitalized parks will be the new hosts of this year's program. In addition to the traditional main stage on Aleš square, a second music stage will be added right in front of Poklad. “Each year of the festival reflects how the city is changing – and we want to be a living part of it. The newly added venues this year create a unique axis that connects the main stage, chill-out zone, children's programs and concerts in the picturesque areas of Poruba. It will be a festival full of discoveries,” says Petra Hradilová about the map of the festival. In the parks, there will be an extensive Children's Zone full of games, competitions and workshops, as well as a relaxing Chill-out Zone with a tea room and a smoking room. On Hlavní třída, visitors will find popular lifestyle zones, a design market, a children's fair and the gastronomic offer of the Food Zone and the Wine Festival.

The best of the festival weekend

The festival begins on Friday afternoon and kicks off with a drum parade that will guide visitors across the area from Poklad to the roundabout. The opening ceremony will take place at Aleš square at 5:15 p.m. with the participation of festival director Petra Hradilová and mayor Lucie Baránková Vilamová. “This year, the Festival in the Streets will be held in Poruba for the fourth time, and I feel that each subsequent year is a little better than the last. This time, the organizers had to do without this place due to the finishing reconstruction of the area under the Hlavní třída roundabout, but this allows us to show people other beautiful locations in Poruba, such as the parks near the Poklad Cultural Center. Part of the program will take place there, and I believe that people outside Poruba will also appreciate the places that we have revitalized in recent years. The Festival in the Streets is an event that combines music, dance and street art, all in the beautiful setting of Hlavní třída and its surroundings. Everyone will find something for themselves at the festival,” the mayor says about the event.

After the official start, the fun will get underway on all eight festival stages. On Aleš square, during the evening, local music will alternate with electronics full of energetic rap and ambient jazz. At Poklad, Taiwanese folklore will be heard in an authentic and modern form, and local buskers of both well-known and lesser-known names will perform on the corner of Dukla, as in previous years.

Grunt and fairy tales on Saturday

On Saturday, the festival area will come to life again after noon. On Alšovo náměstí, the program will start off nicely with a show by the BORIS drum band, followed by a unique combination of the Taiwanese folklore group Taiwu Ballads Troupe with DJ Dungi Sapor. Saturday evening will get even more exciting with the Estonian formation OOPUS, which will draw the audience into hypnotic folktronics. If that's not enough, you can sit (and dance) into the night to live music with the dulcimer music of Grunt.

On the stage at Poklad, the fairy tales of Squirrel Terka and Mouse Klarka will be followed by Mikuláš Hrbáček with his band Nanovo, and in the evening, a festival dance floor of kizomba, zouk, bachata and salsa will break out under the stars. Busker stages at Alšák, on Hlavní třída, at Dukla and in the courtyards will once again offer a delicious cocktail of acrobatics, puppets, pantomime and clown acts from all over the world. All day long, processions of drummers, stilt walkers, dancers and acrobats in masks, and even underwater creatures from the depths of the ocean, will swirl through the streets.


Holiday of celebrating arts

The festival in the streets will once again be not only a celebration of art, but also a community holiday, as evidenced by the mayor of Ostrava, Jan Dohnal: “The city supports traditional festivals, as they enjoy great favor among residents and at the same time contribute to its positive image and perception among tourists. Festivals will help present Ostrava as a creative, cultural center that will attract a number of visitors, some of whom may return to the city even outside the festival season. However, we cannot forget the strengthening of community ties and the celebration of common encounters. We also appreciate the artistic contribution of the festival, which the presentation of Czech and foreign artists brings.” Thanks to cooperation with the Poruba municipal district, the statutory city of Ostrava, partners from cultural institutions and universities, and thanks to the involvement of local vendors, organizations and volunteers, a unique atmosphere is created that attracts thousands of visitors every year.

Admission is traditionally free.

More at: www.festivalvulicich.cz