In their proposal considered for the award, seventy-eight cultural projects were mentioned, which were independently organised by the city and in partnership with other institutions and commercial projects endorsed by the city. Events organised by the Krakow Festival Office (KFO) had more than 540,000 visitors, and furthermore, the events in which KFO was a production or media partner had nearly twice as many.
Andrzej Kulig said that French instrumentalist Vincent Dumestre would be next year's artistic director (more accurately, artist-in-residence) of the Misteria Paschalia. Kulig explained:
The annual change in artistic director, who is responsible for artistic programme of the event, increases the variety of choice of artists.
He added that Krakow Library would join the organisation of future literary festivals:
We are considering if Krakow Library, which is still being organised, shouldn’t become the operator of next year's edition of UNESCO City of Literature.
In 2015, Kraków, together with Edinburgh, Adelaide, Berlin, Barcelona, and Montreal, initialised the worldwide Festival Cities Network. It gathers the most important cultural centres, which analyse festivals’ influence on many other categories of social life, and recognises it as a tool for sustainable development.
Kulig said:
We achieved access to a higher league and this award may be considered as a form of appreciation of that fact.
He added that Krakow wants to start mutual transfers of various cultural festivals between these cities and that discussion about this has already been started.
Previously, the title of IFEA World Festival & Event City was conferred to London, Sydney, Rotterdam, Reykjavik, Ottawa, and Boston. IFEA awards statues and prizes for cultural events and festivals such as the Pinnacle Awards Competition or the Hall of Fame Award for persons involved in its organization.
Source: PAP, edited by AZ, 29th Sept 2016