Terra Cometa (Comet Earth) is an artistic project by Teatro Popolare Europeo and the Master’s in Social and Community Theatre of the University of Turin, born in 2011 in collaboration with the Caravan. Artists on the road project. The intent of the project was to involve communities and citizens of different ages, origins, and territorial backgrounds, calling them to confront, through theatre, the values of the Epiphany celebration and to build together, with simplicity and beauty, a moment of dialogue and sharing between people in the spirit of solidarity, brotherhood, and gratuitousness.

The goal was to reinterpret the tradition of the nativity scene in a contemporary key, offering the city a cultural event that reflected the multicultural identity of Turin and promoted encounter and fraternity among citizens. Through theatre workshops and moments of meeting, residents of different origins worked together to create a choral performance, presented in the courtyards of the Cavallerizza on the occasion of Epiphany 2012.

Terra Cometa is theatre that returns to the community, to ordinary people, and calls them to play together to share, to confront, to reflect, to play. It does so with art, through the work of professionals and artists, who – as in the Middle Ages – work side by side with the citizens, “masters of art” and the people, because together something beautiful and necessary can be done. It is a theatre simple in means but rich in people: there are readers, choirs, singers, musicians, youth groups from the suburbs, families, scouts, curious people, amateur theatre groups, teachers, veterinarians, tram drivers, in short, a bit of humanity of different races, cultures, ages, professions who decided to make a gift to themselves and to their city. Because it is beautiful to do it and to do it together.