Teatr Polski in Poznań will host the third edition of Bliscy Nieznajomi (Close Strangers) - QueerFest from 14 to 23 October 2026, bringing ten days of theatre, performance, film, visual art and conversation to the city.
This year's festival takes its inspiration from a familiar Poznań figure: the Bamberka. The motif provides a distinctly local starting point for a programme concerned with identity, belonging, community and the shifting boundaries between what feels foreign and what eventually becomes part of a shared place.
Rather than focusing on one particular form of queer culture, the festival brings together different artistic languages and perspectives, with productions arriving from theatres and artists across Poland.
Theatre from across Poland
The main theatre programme includes productions from Katowice, Wrocław, Kraków, Warsaw and Łódź.
Among the visiting productions is Strach zżera duszę (Fear devours the soul), directed by Jędrzej Piaskowski and presented by Teatr Śląski in Katowice. Inspired by the work of Rainer Werner Fassbinder, it explores loneliness, intimacy and a relationship that crosses social boundaries.
Wrocławski Teatr Współczesny brings Lubiewo, Piaskowski's adaptation of Michał Witkowski's novel, combining camp and dark humour with a story about creating an alternative world outside conventional expectations.
The programme also includes Sodoma from Kraków's Teatr Nowy Proxima, U mnie wszystko w porządku (Everything’s alright with me) from Warsaw's Teatr Studio and the dance production Heavy, Baby, created by Polish artist Alex Freiheit and French artist Auguste de Boursetty.
There is also space for work from Poznań and smaller independent performance projects, alongside productions created by emerging artists.
Film, performance and visual art
The festival extends beyond the theatre programme with Kino w teatrze, presented in partnership with OUTFILM. Three films will be screened during the festival, including Shamim Sarif's Polarised, Hannes Hirsch's Drifter and Rodrigo Bellott's I Miss You.
Performance is another important part of the programme, with artists working across dance, spoken performance and more experimental forms. These events take place alongside the main theatre productions rather than sitting separately from them.
The festival also has a visual arts strand, including the exhibition Kruchość (Brittleness) at Curators'LAB on ul. Nowowiejskiego. Presented in cooperation with the University of the Arts in Poznań, the exhibition brings together work exploring vulnerability and fragility through a range of materials and artistic approaches.
A Poznań starting point
The Bamberka is an especially recognisable choice for a festival rooted in Poznań. The figure is connected with the history of the Bamberg settlers who arrived in the region in the eighteenth century and subsequently became part of the city's cultural landscape.
For QueerFest, the Bamberka becomes a way of approaching broader questions about belonging. Who is regarded as an outsider? What makes someone part of a community? And how do those perceptions change over time?
Those questions sit alongside the festival's wider focus on queer experience, without limiting the programme to a specifically queer audience.
The organisers describe Bliscy Nieznajomi as a space for people who want to encounter new theatre, meet artists from different parts of Poland, hear experiences different from their own or simply spend time in an open cultural environment.
Ten days at Teatr Polski
With its combination of visiting theatre productions, local artists, film, performance, exhibitions and conversations, QueerFest will take over Teatr Polski and several associated venues across the city for ten days.
The festival runs from 14 to 23 October 2026, with the wider visual arts programme continuing beyond the main festival dates.
For Poznań audiences, it offers a chance to see work that might otherwise require travelling to other Polish cities, while bringing together different strands of the city's own arts community.
See more: Kafka, Drag Kings and Monkey Business at Studio Scena Robocza
Source and image credit: Teatr Polski w Poznaniu
