"KYOTO EXPERIMENT Kyoto International Performing Arts Festival", which started in 2010, will be held from September 30th (Sat) to October 22nd (Sun), 2023 at ROHM Theater Kyoto, Kyoto Art Center, Kyoto Art Theater Shunjuza, THEATER. It will be held at E9 KYOTO, Kyoto City Kyocera Museum of Art, and other venues.

A press conference was held at Rohm Theater Kyoto in July, where co-directors Yoko Kawasaki, Yuya Tsukahara, Juliet Reiko Knapp, and other participating artists took to the stage to introduce the theme and program.

The theme for this year's 14th edition is "Mazemaze." Knapp says, ``As I thought about ideas such as language (including body language), inheritance, and identity, I realized that these concepts do not capture a single sense of authenticity, but instead are a mixture of various values and cultural phenomena.'' The director team discussed the fact that our identities are shaped by our state of affairs.Even when we think about our own identities and the languages we speak every day, they are constantly changing. ``I thought that by expressing this in words, we could gain a perspective on what the existing standards and correctness are in society, and how they are formed.'' .

It was also announced that there will be three programs that will make up the festival.
The first is ``Kansai Studies (Research Program),'' a program in which students consciously grasp the ``region'' in which they are based and explore it through fieldwork.
The second program is ``Shows,'' a program that welcomes cutting-edge artists from around the world and presents performing arts works that are noteworthy today.
The third program is ``Super Knowledge for the Future,'' a program that connects experimental performing arts works and society through dialogue and workshops to gain perspectives on the future, such as new thinking, dialogue, and posing fresh questions. SKF] (Exchange Program).

Tatsuki Imamura, Ryuichi Tani, Tara Nosaki, Eriko Mukai, and Junya Yamada participated in "Kansai Studies" as research members. Mukai, who attended the press conference, commented, ``This time, I'm researching water holes in Kansai such as Lake Biwa and Port Island.I want to continue making small, trivial things.'' Yamada, who is usually active in plays, said, ``I live in Tajima, and when I started researching the graves in the mountains, I came across the mysterious legend of Prince Shotoku.''I realized that there are many records that are on the verge of being forgotten. I understand, I want to research that kind of culture,'' he said with enthusiasm.