When the Basovishcha festival came to an end after 30 years, we knew we needed a new version of it, so we got to work right away, and what happened in Belarus in August 2020, on the one hand, horrified us, this boundless cruelty of totalitarian power, and on the other hand, gave us wings, because finally the majority of Belarusian citizens began to think about a free Belarus.
And starting with political opposition and disagreement with blatant injustice, they quickly became convinced that no Nation exists without its culture. So we established the TUTAKA Festival of the Awakened. Awakened because, for the first time in history on such a scale, the citizens of Belarus have awakened to their citizenship, to their freedom.