WELCOME TO THE OFFICIAL PAGE OF THE DANA FEST INTERNATIONAL FESTIVAL OF TRANSCULTURE!
I'd like to tell you about us, about our goals, objectives and of course our immediate plans for the future.
Dana Fest was born in November 2007 in Saint-Petersburg. It is named after israel singer Dana International, who won the competition of European song "Eurovision 1998" in Birmingham (United Kingdom).
The winner declared publicly herself as a transsexual. Beautiful and gifted Dana became a positive role model for many people in the world.
The first Fest took place on the 25th of January 2008, just in 10 years after Dana's victory and on the eve of her birthday. It gathered the artists of the travesty genre, transsexuals, parodists, singers, Dana's fans and other talented people from different corners of Russia and abroad. The representatives from Saint-Petersburg, Moscow, Pskov, Blagoveshchensk, Tallinn, Helsinki, Riga and Minsk met at the lounge-café "Barhat" on the Griboedov canal, in the center of Saint-Petersburg. They were performing their best songs and numbers supported by the ballet-show and the most trendy DJs of the city. Dana's birthday was celebrated with much éclat.
After our first festival we got a lot of messages with gratitude words and requests to continue what we started. Inspired by your support, on the 24th of January, on the eve of Dana's birthday in the night club "Gala" we held the second International festival of Trans Culture DANA Fest 2009. The conception was refined and some competition lines appeared in the festival program:
· Pop line: for the artists of parody genre. The best image of Dana style as well.
· Art line: photography contest "The New face".
The participants of all contests were travesty and transgender people from different corners of Russia, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Ukraine, Moldova, the Netherlands, Israel. The request for participation in "The New face" contest was accepted even from Mexico.
So we confirmed the title of the International Festival!
Rewards have found their heroes.
More details about the participants, the jury and the presents read the links below
"The history Fest2008" and "Fest2009".
In June 2009 the new literary contest "The Freedom of Speech" (within The Third International festival of Trans culture Dana Fest 2010) was announced in the magazine "TimeOut Petersburg" and on the official website of the project. But The Festival was never held due to the economic crisis.
The thought of the festival was postponed until better times. But no such luck! The law Homosexual propaganda was declared and the ant hill was stirred up. The society seemed before to be tolerant, but it bristled up against LGBT representatives. We, the festival organizers, got a lot of threat calls and messages against the festival and against the people who would take the risk to participate in the festival. The issue was challenging, but we made the only one right and sensible decision at that moment – the safety of the participants and the audience is much more important than here-and-now profit. Dana Fest was closed until better times.
We went on hoping to revive the festival, we negotiated with partners from Finland to arrange the festival in hospitable country of Suomi, but the negotiations were led into a blind alley because of financial matter (mainly because of the high price of the festival ).
In 2014 in Russia there was another crisis which caused the economic slump of our potential patrons and many other political events that disrupted the festival.
We didn't want to go far away from Russia and we didn't want to held the festival and put the participants in danger.
The winner declared publicly herself as a transsexual. Beautiful and gifted Dana became a positive role model for many people in the world.
The first Fest took place on the 25th of January 2008, just in 10 years after Dana's victory and on the eve of her birthday. It gathered the artists of the travesty genre, transsexuals, parodists, singers, Dana's fans and other talented people from different corners of Russia and abroad. The representatives from Saint-Petersburg, Moscow, Pskov, Blagoveshchensk, Tallinn, Helsinki, Riga and Minsk met at the lounge-café "Barhat" on the Griboedov canal, in the center of Saint-Petersburg. They were performing their best songs and numbers supported by the ballet-show and the most trendy DJs of the city. Dana's birthday was celebrated with much éclat.
After our first festival we got a lot of messages with gratitude words and requests to continue what we started. Inspired by your support, on the 24th of January, on the eve of Dana's birthday in the night club "Gala" we held the second International festival of Trans Culture DANA Fest 2009. The conception was refined and some competition lines appeared in the festival program:
· Pop line: for the artists of parody genre. The best image of Dana style as well.
· Art line: photography contest "The New face".
The participants of all contests were travesty and transgender people from different corners of Russia, Estonia, Lithuania, Latvia, Ukraine, Moldova, the Netherlands, Israel. The request for participation in "The New face" contest was accepted even from Mexico.
So we confirmed the title of the International Festival!
Rewards have found their heroes.
More details about the participants, the jury and the presents read the links below
"The history Fest2008" and "Fest2009".
In June 2009 the new literary contest "The Freedom of Speech" (within The Third International festival of Trans culture Dana Fest 2010) was announced in the magazine "TimeOut Petersburg" and on the official website of the project. But The Festival was never held due to the economic crisis.
The thought of the festival was postponed until better times. But no such luck! The law Homosexual propaganda was declared and the ant hill was stirred up. The society seemed before to be tolerant, but it bristled up against LGBT representatives. We, the festival organizers, got a lot of threat calls and messages against the festival and against the people who would take the risk to participate in the festival. The issue was challenging, but we made the only one right and sensible decision at that moment – the safety of the participants and the audience is much more important than here-and-now profit. Dana Fest was closed until better times.
We went on hoping to revive the festival, we negotiated with partners from Finland to arrange the festival in hospitable country of Suomi, but the negotiations were led into a blind alley because of financial matter (mainly because of the high price of the festival ).
In 2014 in Russia there was another crisis which caused the economic slump of our potential patrons and many other political events that disrupted the festival.
We didn't want to go far away from Russia and we didn't want to held the festival and put the participants in danger.
The Third International Festival of Trans Culture will be held from the
Our goal:
As before the Dana Fest is an unique festival that brings together all the transgender representatives: the artists of travesty genre, singers, authors
of the books dedicated to such people's problems, workers in culture and fashion industry and, of course, all fans of Dana International!
We suggest you all-out support and the platform for realizing the creative opportunities.
For the first time – the third Dana Fest will be several days' festival. We plan to arrange different events: seminars, discussions, master-class from the leading experts, the meetings with popular bloggers, theatrical performances. Informal communication during the buffet table, photosets, experience exchanges, educational seminars, excursions, press conference, and the most important thing – Gala concert with the results of the Fest, winners rewarding and guests of honor appearance.
There will be many great surprises!
of the books dedicated to such people's problems, workers in culture and fashion industry and, of course, all fans of Dana International!
We suggest you all-out support and the platform for realizing the creative opportunities.
For the first time – the third Dana Fest will be several days' festival. We plan to arrange different events: seminars, discussions, master-class from the leading experts, the meetings with popular bloggers, theatrical performances. Informal communication during the buffet table, photosets, experience exchanges, educational seminars, excursions, press conference, and the most important thing – Gala concert with the results of the Fest, winners rewarding and guests of honor appearance.
There will be many great surprises!
Our mission:
We help transgender people to realize their creative potential, support their ideas and projects. What is more, we provide psychological help. We find it important to get the message over to our society – WE ARE JUST LIKE YOU, and we shouldn't be considered prejudicedly. Nowadays the transgender people rights issue is very acute and it needs to be solved. That is why we are turning back to what we started successfully several years ago.
And also we brings together the fans of Dana International !
We are ready for fruitful cooperation and friendly communication.
We ask for your support, even like or repost will be helpful for us. Tell your friends about our festival and maybe you will help somebody who needs it.
On our YouTube channel DANA Fest we raise acute problems, invite experts in various fields, enlighten people on the issues of tolerance to transgender representatives in our society.
And also we brings together the fans of Dana International !
We are ready for fruitful cooperation and friendly communication.
We ask for your support, even like or repost will be helpful for us. Tell your friends about our festival and maybe you will help somebody who needs it.
On our YouTube channel DANA Fest we raise acute problems, invite experts in various fields, enlighten people on the issues of tolerance to transgender representatives in our society.
Join the DANA FEST style weekend in Tallinn!