Annual One Caucasus International Festival is an interdisciplinary festival and a long-term borderland program that first took a place in Georgia in 2014. The event is located in a region called Marneuli, at the border between Armenia and Azerbaijan, in a small village called Tserakvi.

When?

One Caucasus Festival is organized every year during the last weekend of August (from Thursday to Sunday) in small village Tserakvi located in Marneuli, Georgia. Each year the main part of work for One Caucasus starts with the second week of August when the international volunteers arrive and start to work in various task teams. 

Why Marneuli?

The Caucasus suffers from many conflicts The region of Marneuli is a borderland of Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan and is known for being a place where many ethnic and religious groups have been living in peace for many years. It is quite unique in the Caucasus which continues to suffer from a range of conflicts and tensions. Our aim is, with the support of the local municipality, to create an inspirational & safe space to foster the meetings and collaboration of young people from the entire Caucasus region.

What makes this Festival special?

One Caucasus Festival brings together musicians, artists, architects, educators and volunteers from all over the world.

It is a festival of the next generation:

• joint international music projects created by professional musicians from Caucasus and beyond,
• multifunctional One Caucasus Town co-created by architects, volunteers and locals – packed with program of various interdisciplinary activities,
• visual arts program bringing prominent contemporary artists into the context of life of local villages.

A change-maker also to non-festival life:

• to support establishing the Marneuli citizen budget (first such program in Caucasus) with people deciding on local budget spending.
• the festival was the reason for some of the infrastructure development - including repairing parts of the road to Tserakvi - now villages such as Tserakvi, Sioni, Ahkula, Shaumiani have 5-10 minutes less to get to Marneuli, Tbilisi or borders of Armenia and Azerbaijan,
• conducting all-year Informal Educational Program for villages of Marneuli,

Festival made by people for people:

• offers an international volunteer program to co-create the Festival, 
• includes the art projects (films, installations, etc.) created by youth from Marneuli villages in framework of our educational program,
• the Festival has free admission, free transport (Tbilisi/Tserakvi/Tbilisi) and free living zone 

Come and join us for the unique One Caucasus experience!  

One Caucasus 2014-2017 in numbers:

• more than 180 volunteers from 29 countries came for One Caucasus International Volunteer Program to work in many international task teams to create One Caucasus Festival and educational program,
• 265 musicians (individual musicians and 35 bands & collectives) from at least 14 countries (Armenia, Azerbaijan, Algeria, Barbados, Georgia, Germany, Jamaica, New Zealand, Nigeria, Poland, Senegal, UK, Ukraine, USA) created together 25 new international music projects and performed @ One Caucasus Festival,
• 49 different workshops/cycles of workshops were led by educators coming from 21 countries (4 continents) for at least 500 kids from 18 villages (Armenian, Azerbaijani, Georgian, Greek and Armenian-Azerbaijani) of Marneuli region,
• architects and students of architecture from Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Poland and Tunisia that together (with other volunteers) designed and constructed each year unique One Caucasus Town called also Not-Perfect Town of Our Dreams (4 editions). The materials used for each year are stored and used to construct next year town. 
• around 8 000 people attended the One Caucasus Festival,
• One Caucasus initiated first participatory budget in Caucasus - that now covers 4 municipalities in Georgia (Marneuli, Gori, Sachkhere and Borjomi) with conducting trainings for more than 200 representatives of 43 villages of Marneuli and with at least 8 millions GEL invested or reserved for dozens of projects invented and selected by the residents of Georgian municipalities, 
• 9 One Caucasus organizers and partners (from Poland, Georgia, Armenia, Azerbaijan, Ukraine, USA, Myanmar and Germany) and 8 funding institutions (The Government of the United States, Marneuli Municipality, President Administration of Georgia, Ministries of Culture of Poland and Georgia, Ministry of Foreign Affairs of Poland, Warsaw Municipality, French Institute in Georgia).