The Matara Festival for the Arts (MFA) will be held this year, with the government announcing that the event will be held from 12 – 15 December 2025.
In a post on social media, Matara District MP and Minister of Industry and Entrepreneurship Development, Sunil Handunneththi, announced the return of the festival.
The contemporary art and music festival, inaugurated in February 2024, is part of the ongoing economic, tourism, and cultural revival of Matara Fort & City, and the larger district.
The 2024 festival featured 100+ established and rising Sri Lankan, diaspora & international artists, musicians and entrepreneurs, and employed local creatives in both its media and festival production. Of this, about 50 were Matarians. And over 4000 visitors (foreign and local tourists, and Matara community members) visited in 2024.
‘MFA 2025’ will seek to continue the Festival’s guiding ethos of ‘Culture, Community and Collaboration’ through facilitating new work collaborations between mentor-mentee pairings and peer-to-peer artist groupings. Some members of last year’s community artist trainings will be elevated to peer roles, and newer Matara community members will be engaged. Music, from Jazz to Dance, will feature in evening events, and workshops and talks will run throughout the programme.
The festival will be helmed once again by festival art curator and eminent contemporary artist and archaeologist Prof. Jagath Weerasinghe, in tandem with his festival co-founder and director Chanchala Samaraweera Gunewardena & fellow co-founder Jayanthi Samaraweera Gunewardena, who led the late Mangala Samaraweera’s Freedom Hub.
The festival announcement is in follow-up to the June 2025 passing of a Cabinet Decision to appoint a committee to draft a Matara Heritage and Development Act that will lay out the framework for Matara Fort’s revitalisation. MFA’s 2024 ‘Invest in Matara’ conversation series renewed investment interest in the city, and the upcoming framework will further strengthen opportunities to be a part of the city’s forward development. (Newswire)
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