CCP’s Pasinaya festival moves forward and around the country

Two decades of bringing the arts closer to Filipino people, and the Pasinaya: The CCP Open House Festival just keeps getting better. For the first time, Pasinaya goes beyond the capital area and spreads its wings to the Visayas and Mindanao.

The multi-arts festival will simultaneously happen at the CCP Complex and its partner museums, the Iloilo Museum of Contemporary Arts in Iloilo City, Iloilo, and Tagum City, Davao del Norte, on 3 and 4 February.

Following the theme “Sulong,” the country’s largest multi-arts festival returns on a grander scale with more artistic and cultural offerings in its 20th year.

“After escaping the confines of the pandemic in last year’s Pasinaya: Piglas, the new partnership with ILOMOCA and Tagum City pushes the boundaries. The CCP will always find ways to provide spaces for our artists and cultural groups where they can showcase their talents and create new audiences who will participate in artmaking and appreciate the best that the Philippines has to offer,” said CCP artistic director Dennis N. Marasigan.

A wide variety of exciting activities await the public in Pasinaya 2024. Happening in various venues at the CCP Complex such as CCP Front Lawn, Liwasang Kalikasan, Tanghalang Ignacio B. Gimenez and its surroundings, and parade ground of Vicente Sotto Street, and in partner museums and galleries, the festival boasts over a hundred shows, workshops and other activities in music, theater, dance, visual arts, film and literature to choose from.

With its experience-all-you-can, pay-what-you-can scheme, participants may go in and out of the different CCP venues to join 30-minute workshops in various art disciplines conducted by leading artists, resource persons, and teachers, or watch as many shows, screenings, and activities as they can.

Pasinaya starts on 3 February, 7 a.m., with an opening salvo and special program, followed by the flash mob dance featuring the festival jingle, Sulong Pasinaya, which has become a tradition of the art festival through the years.

Festival components include Palihan where audiences can join the different workshops; and Palabas where they can watch unlimited shows, featuring more than 3,000 artists from different art fields. Festival programmers and art groups will meet in Palitan to do some business-to-business meetings.

Paseo Museo shuttles audiences to various partner galleries, museums, and art spaces around the metro with the hop-on, hop-off tour scheme. Pagtitipon, meanwhile, gathers the Kaisa sa Sining partners from different regions of the countries to participate in the annual art festival. Finally, Pamilihan features the sale of goods from all over the country.

Registration starts as early as 6:30 a.m. at the Bukaneg side of the CCP Front Lawn and at Vicente Sotto Street.

In 2023, audience counts reached 37,888 — 12,055 participated in 43 Palihan workshops, 24,482 watched 101 Palabas shows (58 at the CCP Complex, and 43 in partner museums/galleries), and 1,236 enjoyed the Paseo Museo tours in 13 museums and galleries. Total donations amounted to P253,514.

With the partnership with ILOMOCA and Tagum City, CCP plans to exceed its target audience counts, collaborate with more artists, stagehands, technical crew, and other cultural workers from various places in the country, and create partnerships with more local government units.

“Breaking free from the common notion that CCP is just the building in 2023, we have continuously proved that we can be anywhere. This year, we are reaching farther and wider into different performing spaces, and into the regions. Year 2024 will be the year we, at the CCP, continue to move forward, despite the challenges that will come our way,” said CCP president Michelle Nikki Junia.

Established in 2005, Pasinaya was conceived to jump-start the celebration of National Arts Month celebration, hence its schedule on every first week of February. Originally, it was created as a preview for the CCP’s artistic programming for the year. But through the years, the festival has grown bigger and become a venue for art appreciation and education, networking, and collaborations.