The thirteenth issue of the quarterly newsletter “E-News” of the Association of Asian Performing Arts Festivals (AAPAF) again provides highly inspiring news from the Asian world of festivals. In this issue: 2009 AAPAF Annual General Meeting & Conference, AAPAF Internship Award 2010, Silk Road Arts Festival, JakArt@2009, Hong Kong Arts Festival, New Vision Arts Festival as well as some news from beyond Asia, like the Festival Internacional Cervantino and the EFA FestLab for Creativity and Innovation. 2009 AAPAF Annual General Meeting & Conference The 2009 AAPAF Annual General Meeting & Conference will be held in Seoul during the period of 19-22 October 2009, and co-hosted by Seoul Performing Arts Festival and Seoul Foundation for Arts & Culture. The itinerary includes a project sharing session, a roundtable discussion with Korean festival organisations and arts professionals, selected Festival performances and visits to Seoul’s key arts venues. Silk Road Arts Festival – 9 October to 8 November 2009 The Festival opens with Splendours of the Tang Dynasty, an extravaganza of songs and dance by Shaanxi Provincial Song and Dance Theatre. This is followed by a series of exotic concerts from Central Asia, South Asia and the Middle East. Renowned musicians from countries along the Silk Road roll out a rich tapestry of sounds that weave together the traditional and the new. The colorful and energy-charged performances by Georgian National Dance Company Sukhishvili and new work Re- (I, II, III) by Shen Wei Dance Arts promise to be a feast for the eye. Closing the festival will be the Buddhist Showcase by three famous Buddhist music ensembles from the Mainland. For more info, visit www.silkroadfestival.gov.hk. Updates from JakArt JakArt@2009 - An International Arts Cultural and Educational Festival - will host “An Exhibition of Images: Young in 60 Cities" from October to November 2009. The embodiment of two disciplines - Photography and Fashion – the exhibition will feature the winner and the best selections of the ITF Photo Competition. The competition expresses the insights of photographers, popular culture and fashion as well as their influence on youth and young adults. The exhibition is a compilation of artwork which explores the natural teenage impact on fashion, and through it, we hope to encourage a worldwide conversation about fashion. For more info, visit www.jakart.info or www.itf-pc.com. Hong Kong Arts Festival – 25 February to 28 March 2010 The Hong Kong Arts Festival is the pre-eminent annual arts events in Hong Kong, and tickets for its 38th edition are available from 15 October 2009. The finest Cantonese opera by the brightest stars kicks off the Festival, and there will also be programmes by conductors including Gergiev, Dohnányi and Jacobs, directors Berkoff and Mendes PLUS the Mariinsky Theatre, Red Leap, Wildrice, Nina Simone, Mikhail Rudy and Andreas Scholl. For more info, visit www.hk.artsfestival.org. New Vision Arts Festival 2010 The fifth edition of New Vision Arts Festival will be presented in the autumn of 2010. It has always been a challenging experience not only for programme organizers but also for audiences. The upcoming festival will showcase a rich range of innovative, cutting-edge and cross-cultural programmes with Asian elements and it serves as a platform to encourage new works with originality and creativity. For more info, visit www.newvisionfestival.gov.hk. For more information and all other issues, please download the AAPAF newsletter!