City of Salzburg – Salzburg was “wyld”! Great success for the new youth culture festival “5020”
The DJ stage at the art pavilion was one of the locations
© Georg Waid
The youth culture festival 5020 celebrated its premiere in the city of Salzburg in July. 5020 is a festival for young people in Salzburg – in public space, in public places, decentralized and with low-threshold access. With around 42,000 visitors who experienced the festival at various locations in the city over five long weekends in July 2022, the organizers draw a very positive balance. “5020 is a complete success! 42,000 happy visitors from home and abroad confirm that the concept with its approx. 50 events of different genres in around 20 locations in the city of Salzburg, some of which have not been used before, is an exciting achievement for the young generation of Salzburg,” says Markus Rauchmann from the events team.
Promotion of cultural offers for young people necessary
The association “Fifty-Twenty for the Promotion of Salzburg Youth Culture” is behind the 5020 Festival. The aim of the event is to create a low-threshold and inclusive festival that is primarily intended to appeal to young people in Salzburg. The desire for more cultural offerings on the part of Salzburg’s youth has been growing and becoming more noticeable for years. After two years of the Corona Pandemic, which caused major restrictions on the cultural and event scene, ideas for a cultural offer for young people were written. Various initiatives of the city of Salzburg were heard by Deputy Mayor Bernhard Auinger and invited to a joint workshop. From this, the association 5020 developed at the beginning of 2022. “We have succeeded in putting together a diverse program at a wide variety of locations in cooperation with certain cultural institutions. In the spirit of the new cultural strategy 2024. It was an important step to create more awareness for a discourse about the youth culture offer and as a result to open established cultural institutions to young people. We are very happy about the great encouragement of the young people for the 5020 Festival. I hope that the youth culture festival will be a fixed point in Salzburg’s cultural calendar in the future,” says Deputy Mayor Bernhard Auinger.
Numerous program highlights
DJ sessions, poetry slams, vernissages, dance and graffiti showcases and much more – the 5020 Festival had a colorful program to offer over the five weekends. The opening of the young cult painter Leon Löwentraut was a real highlight for art lovers. Over the two-week period, 5,200 art lovers visited the modernly adapted baroque museum in the Mirabell Gardens. The young club culture scene opened the festival in Shakespeare with a night of dancing. The DJ’s Richard Dorfmeister or Freakadelle heated up the atmosphere in the Jazzit and ensured full houses. After a long break, the Re:Unite Parade creates a peaceful feeling of togetherness between young and old and people from different backgrounds. 13 trucks pulled through the city and people celebrated together. In addition to interesting poetry slams and readings, there were finally live concerts by Shantel, Nada Surf, Mynth and Titus Probst in the Salzburg concert halls. For the fourth weekend, FM4 acts Eli Preiss & Cid Rim wowed crowds at Jazzit.
A visitor raves about the modern offer: “We are so excited that after two years of the pandemic, the right freedom is offered for a whole month: great clubs, regional and international acts, a feeling as if it were a bit of Berlin or Paris, Salzburg will really be an international hot spot for the young scene!”
The grand finale took place on July 30th in the courtyard of Mirabell Palace with the international producer duo Klangkarussell. The visitors danced and celebrated until 3 a.m. at the sold-out closing party. All in all, there were hardly any organizational problems, and everything went according to plan during the festival. The organizers speak of a very good cooperation between politics, administration, authorities, business, culture and the association 5020.
Festival planned for 2023
5020 is scheduled to come back in 2023 – a 2nd edition of the festival is being planned. “5020 is wyld, young and exactly what Salzburg needs. And we are already planning for next year: new venues such as the Felsenreitschule, the ice arena in the Volksgarten and the Mirabell Palace open up new perspectives for 5020 – headliners in 2023,” says Marcus Rieder, who is part of the 5020 association as a marketing expert and artist.