Month-long World Culture Festival to start at ACP next month

The Arts Council of Pakistan (ACP) has announced that it will be holding over-one-month-long World Culture Festival starting next month in which participants from around 40 countries will showcase their artistic talents.

The announcement was made on Saturday at a press conference held at the Haseena Moin Hall of the ACP.

ACP President Muhammad Ahmed Shah, humourist Anwar Maqsood, actor and theater director Khalid Ahmed and others spoke at the press conference.

Shah said the World Culture Festival Karachi would commence on September 26 and continue till October 30.

So far, cultural delegations from 34 countries have confirmed their participation in the festival. These countries include Palestine, India, Turkiye, United Arab Emirates, United States, United Kingdom, Germany, Australia, Russia, Egypt, South Africa, Italy, Japan, Sri Lanka, South Korea, Norway, Brazil, Spain, Belgium, Ukraine, Oman, Qatar, Zimbabwe, Azerbaijan, France, Uganda, Belarus, Ireland, Kosovo, Burundi, Congo, Rwanda and others.

The festival will feature more than 100 cultural performances by more than 350 artists, including theater, music and dance groups, and experts of fine arts from Pakistan and abroad.

The ACP president explained that normally before the International Urdu Conference, a signature event of the ACP that is held in December, the ACP would organise the Youth Festival, Theater Festival, Music Festival and Dance Festival.

However, this time the ACP seemingly plans to merge all those festivals in what Shah claimed to be the largest arts festival in Pakistan's history.

He recalled that in the last Pakistan Theatre Festival, artistes from seven countries had participated. He added that they had initially planned to organise another Pakistan Theater Festival but the overwhelming response from international embassies, and music and dance artists led them to expand that into the World Culture Festival.

It was said that the festival would feature fusion of various music and dance forms from around the world, with workshops and talks alongside performances. It will be open to the ACP students and others through registration.

Shah highlighted that Pakistan's cultural heritage was rich, and the festival would feature Pakistani artistes, Qawwali and classical dance. Performances by Akhtar Chanal, Wahab Bugti, Mai Dhai, instrumentalist Abdullah, and Faqir Zulfiqar would be part of the festival.

The ACP president said he had been in continuous contact with the Sindh chief minister who had vowed full support for the festival and security arrangements.