BE a host
Would you like to offer a warm welcome to European artists visiting Birmingham, and be a part of an amazing International Festival? We are looking for generous and local residents to provide our visiting guests with somewhere to stay.
Performers won’t need feeding or looking after, just a bed and a chat. In return for your generosity and support, you’ll be invited to attend the festival on the night your guest is performing.
Get involved in BE FESTIVAL’s adventure this Summer and become a BE Host!
Each year BE FESTIVAL brings artists from all over Europe to Birmingham for an exciting week of performances and visual art. Those artists become part of our community for the duration of the festival and we aim to give them a greater connection to our fantastic city by hosting them in people’s homes.
Are you able to host an international artist in your home for one or two weeks between the 4th and 17th July this year?
This year we have artists from across Europe, including the UK, Spain, Italy, France, Slovenia and Switzerland.
Hosting gives you a great opportunity to get an insight into the festival through conversations with the artists you host. You can also improve your language skills if you wish (although most of them speak very good English).
BE FESTIVAL 2018 takes place 3rd – 7th July. In the week subsequent to the festival we invite artists from each of the visiting companies to create a new company called BE Mix, and develop a piece together that will be performed at BE FESTIVAL. Artists usually arrive on 3rd or 4th July and leave on the 7th or 8th July if they are just here for the festival, and will stay till the 16th July if they are participating in BE Mix. You have the option to host for one or both of the weeks.
If you would like to become part of BE FESTIVAL by hosting one or more artists then please get in touch with Selina Losa by email: selina@befestival.org
or phone: 07731502865
This is a fantastic opportunity to get involved with the festival and meet new people. We thank you in advance for your support.
BE host feedback
“Hosting was delightful! I had a young woman from Romania and it just felt very relaxed and easy. It was so nice to have someone who was so involved in BE, which made me feel more involved too. It’s easy when you get to my age to feel, you know, too old for this sort of stuff! But in fact, it’s just a huge mix of ages here and that’s really lovely.”
“There’s a real spirit of generosity here that I haven’t come across anywhere else. I’m not quite sure where that has come from. It’s only recently that BE has begun, but there has immediately been this up swell of warmth and positive feeling! People wanting to do what they can and everyone subsequently benefiting from it.”
“This was almost zero effort for me & in fact I hardly saw my guest. However when I attended the festival it made a big difference. I felt part of it, a small cog which enabled the festival to take place and not just a spectator.”
“Hosting was an exciting experience – meeting someone new, and getting a different perspective on life from them.”
“I really enjoyed hosting; it was an enriching experience, I felt invested in the festival as a whole so on the two evenings I went I got a lot out of it, and I’d definitely be glad do it again. They were considerate and interesting guests. What more can I say?”
“We really enjoyed having Edu to stay. My husband and I got a tremendous amount out of the experience and would be very happy to do it again and recommend others to do the same.”
“I was a first time host this year and had the pleasure of hosting Stefan from Romania. It was great to be able to get involved in what is clearly such a vibrant and thriving festival right on my own doorstep. Having one of the performers staying in my home made me feel like I’d contributed in some way to the whole thing happening, which was great because I was really impressed with BE Festival, the combination of theatre, dining together, chance to talk with performers and others in the audience, and then relax with entertainment and a bar was just staggeringly good.”
