The International Ecoperformance Film Festival revives the Jiu Valley
Film, performing arts and ecology have come together in an international, creative and deeply present-day setting in the Jiu Valley, with the 5th Edition of the International Ecoperformance Film Festival (IEFF).
Ana-Maria Cononovici, 09.09.2025, 14:00
Film, performing arts and ecology have come together in an international, creative and deeply present-day setting in the Jiu Valley, with the 5th Edition of the International Ecoperformance Film Festival (IEFF). Inaugurated in 2021, in São Paulo, Brazil, as an artistic response to the ecopolitical challenges of the 21st century, the festival brings together films by interdisciplinary artists who work at the intersection of cinematic art, performing arts and ecology and investigate the tensions between environment, body and ancestry, in urban and virtual natural landscapes and seek to overcome the anthropocentric paradigms of performance and cinema. The festival is organized and curated by Taanteatro, the company where ecoperformance was theorized and developed as a performative artistic practice since the 1990s under the artistic baton and theoretical framework of artists Maura Baiocchi and Wolfgang Pannek from São Paulo. Over time, the festival has presented over 200 short films created by established and emerging artists from 50 countries (on 6 continents), in nomadic editions held in Brazil, Argentina, Australia, Germany, the USA, Romania and Thailand.
Alina Tofan, co-organizer of the International Ecoperformance Film Festival – IEFF Romania, shared this year’s experience with us: “This year I chose to hold the festival in Petroşani, because I wanted to bring the ecoperformance to a place where nature and human intervention share the same space so visibly, we know the story of the mines here, the way the area tries to develop and transform itself with the help of culture and ecological interventions. The organizations here that are our partners and with whom I am co-organizing this year’s edition, Urban Lab and Analog Valley, in particular, along with Tipografia (Printing House) Coworking Space and ADTI (the Association for Integrated Territorial Development of the Jiu Valley) are associations that work very close to the community, are involved, who know the community here and it was a real joy to be able to respond to their needs, but at the same time to bring something completely new, to which they have not been exposed before.”
The Tipografia Coworking Space, the former printing house in Petroșani, hosted this edition, both indoors and outdoors. Thus, for 3 days, the residents of the Jiu Valley were able to participate in outdoor activities: screenings, performances, installations, hikes, discussions, and a fair. Alina Tofan, IEFF International Ecoperformance Film Festival Romania Co-organizer, told us how the Jiu Valley was revived, but also why this place was chosen to host the event: “We had a lot of discussions, meetings and walks, the program is very busy, including a local fair with products from local craftspeople, a community meal, film screenings, as well as the performative installation created by Andrada Spahiu and me, with natural pigments obtained from the soil in the Jiu Valley. It was nice to be able to give back to the community, given how much it has given us. We also staged a series of screenings under the brand Plastic Art Performance Collective, including that of a video-performance entitled Dochia, the Oracle of fast-fashion waste, and a talk with the only woman who has walked around the world, Maria Crâşmaru. It was a joy to be inspired by her story and her advice to keep on dreaming.”
Petroșani also hosted a performative installation, entitled “Sedimentum”. The work of Petroșani-based landscape designer Andrada Spahiu and the multidisciplinary artist Alina Tofan, the installation explores the complex relationships between human intervention, ecological memory and the transformation of soil into pigment. It is set against the background of the rich history of the Jiu Valley, a mining region that has seen a lot of environmental transformations. The painting is created using pigments obtained from the soil, as a symbolic gesture of rebirth, but also of decay. The work is based on the interdisciplinary research of the two artists, capturing soil textures, the movement of the human body, the performative action and the surrounding landscape. The installation emphasizes the intersection between the body and the unseen world of the soil, creating a deep connection between the visible and the invisible layers of the earth.
Alina Tofan, a co-organizer of the International Ecoperformance Film Festival Romania, added: “So, this year’s program wasn’t just about films, it was also about going into nature and seeing with our own eyes the distance between the city and nature. Our friends at Analog Valley helped us make this more visible, with a guided walk in which we explored analogue photography and completely immersed ourselves in nature. We can’t wait for next year’s edition! It’s still unbelievable that we managed to do so much and it’s all thanks to the community here!”
The screenings, installation and other related events were available free of charge, making the festival a must for anyone who is passionate about the environment and the power of cinema. (LS, CM)
