The Belfast International Festival of Performance Art is an annual festival, which was established by Brian Connolly in 2013. It evolved out of a series of previous performance art events within the Belfast School of Art. It was established as an independent festival program within the University in 2016.

BIFPA generates new performance artworks by international, national & local artists, along with work created by students and recent graduates of the Fine Art Course.

The festival program has regularly included: Live and streamed performance art, key lectures, student seminars, public discussions, group performances, student workshops, films, performance documentation screening and book launches. See (link to You Tube https://www.youtube.com/@belfastinternationalfestiv7490 or national archive link https://www.nival.ie/digital/collection/p21086coll85).

The majority of the performance artworks occured within, or in the vicinity of, the Glass Box Gallery in the Foyer of the Belfast Campus, but other satellite venues and locations have been used in the past, these include: Pollen Gallery, City Streets, Buoy Park, T2, etc. This year the festival moves outside the Belfast Campus expanding consciousness and awareness of performance art between artist and audience. BIFPA25 performances will be hosted in disability accessible spaces namely ‘Ledger Studio’ University of Atypical and 2 Royal Avenue both situated in the city centre.

The festival would not happen without a voluntary organising committee that are dedicated to performance art: Dr Sandra Johnston, Sinéad O'Donnell, Brian Connolly, Thomas Wells, Brain Patterson and Zara Lyness, with administrative support from Bbeyond.

The annual festival has been funded via Arts & Culture Development within the Ulster University.