Fr 03.12./19:00 CET/ online
Keynote Dr. Nicola Scherer
The keynote examines ways in which international performing art festivals and collaborations contribute to alternative narratives concerning challenges of our present time and (im)possible futures. Dr. Nicola Scherer provides examples of practices of engagement for trans-cultural encounter through the performing arts. And the question will be raised if curators follow distinctive cultural policy aims in their decision-making process.
Panel with Annika Rachor, Dr. Nicola Scherer and Sasapin Siriwanij
Moderation Malin Nagel
Dr. Nicola Scherer studied Fine Art and Performing Art in Braunschweig and Cultural Management in Vienna, as well as post-degree university courses at Paris Lodron University Salzburg/ LMU Munich. In her research she focuses on international performing art festivals and curating as cultural policy practice. She has also formed over ten years of experience as an artist, curator and cultural manager through her art collective space ensemble and its exhibitions, and through performing art and art education projects between Berlin, Braunschweig, Vienna and San Francisco.
Annika Rachor is a curator, cultural researcher and artist based in Groningen, Netherlands, Hildesheim, Germany and Kampala, Uganda. In her bachelor thesis at the University of Hildesheim she researched on the topic of "REFRAMING. Central and decentral organizational structures in the work of intercultural teams". In 2019 she initiated the International Art Festival The Walls We Built, located in Kampala, Uganda, Hildesheim and Berlin, Germany. Main topics of her curational and performative work are identity, home, walls and borders. Through her work she is aiming to build up a platform of exchange for artists from Europe and East-Africa. In 2021 she founded together with other cultural practitioners from Uganda, Rwanda, and Germany the PENGO International Cultural and Artistic Network which is aiming to find new sustainable forms of international collaboration. She is the 1st chairwoman of PENGO Germany - International Cultural and Artistic Network e.V.
Sasapin Siriwanij is a core member of B-Floor Theatre as a performer, director, and producer, a decade-long career which has rendered her well-versed in movement-based performance practices with interests in social critique and personal and social empowerment. With Bachelor’s and Master’s degrees in English from the Faculty of Arts, Chulalongkorn University, Sasapin has taken the role of Artistic Director of Bangkok International Performing Arts Meeting (BIPAM) since 2018, and has co-founded Producers of Thai Performing Arts Network (POTPAN), alongside being an independent theatre artist and international touring producer.
Sa 04.12./ 10:30 CET/ online
The festival planning is underway, but now unexpected problems arise: What is a "Quellensteuer" (withholding tax)? For which productions do I have to deal with customs issues? And do the artists from abroad need a health insurance?
Felix Sodemann from touring artists gives an insight into challenges that are often only noticed (too) late. In conversation with Paul Viebeg (theatre and festival producer, e.g. Theater der Welt 2021) practical experiences from the organisation and production of big international festivals will be exchanged.
Paul Viebeg is an experienced producer and cultural manager for the performative arts – in both fields, the Off theatre as well as the 'Stadt- and Staatstheater'. He supported the William Forsythe company as tour- and stage manager for more than ten years and has been the Artistic Production Manager of the dance productions under the direction of Chris Dercon at the Volksbühne Berlin. Viebeg organises large festivals - recently Theater der Welt 2020/21 in Düsseldorf and right now the Kunstfest Weimar.
Felix Sodemann coordinates the projects touring artists and the Theaterpreis des Bundes (Federal Theatre Prize). Grew up in the Rhineland, and after periods of time in Tübingen and Turkey, ended up studying German and Literature in Berlin. As well as working at the ITI, he is also an independent theatre-maker, film-maker and freelance translator.
Sa 04.12./ 10:30 CET/ online
Since 2018, creating and developing the archive of the festival Theater der Welt has been one of the most important projects in the Media Library for Dance and Theatre at the International Theatre Institute. How does one approach such a huge and at the same time precarious project of archiving an entire theatre festival of over 40 years? How does one design accessibility? How to create sustainable structures for the archive of a festival that is held every three years by a new team, at a new location, with new protagonists? In this workshop, we will address these questions based on practical examples from the archive.
Maxim Wittenbecher directs the work area of digitalisation, digital technologies and digital networking in the performing arts at the International Theatre Institute Germany (ITI). He coordinates the media studio at the ITI. Topics of his work range from recording and streaming technologies to data ontologies and information systems.
Christine Henniger is Head of the Media Library for Dance and Theatre at the ITI Germany. She coordinates the ITI research area Archive and Practice, which focusses on the theoretical and practical intertwinings of the performing arts within archive processes, including questions of international and transnational relation within the heritage discussion, digitization and preservation, canonization and curation, as well as practice based research and mediation processes.
with the curators Chiaki Soma und Kyoko Iwaki
Moderation Jan Linders
Sa 04.12./ 13:00 CET/ online
“As the first Asian-female team to lead Theater der Welt, we will take the principle of non-Western, non-binary and even non-human perspectives as an opportunity to readjust and rethink our ideas about theatre, festivals and the world.”
Curated together by Kyoko Iwaki and Chiaki Soma the 2023 edition of Theater der Welt will take place in Frankfurt am Main and Offenbach. For the first time in the festival’s history, three equal partners from different fields of cultural work will collaborate as the festival organisers: a repertoire and ensemble theatre (Schauspiel Frankfurt), an international production house for independent performing arts (Künstlerhaus Mousonturm) and a museum (Museum Angewandte Kunst) that stands for an innovative understanding of arts, design, fashion and performance. The two curators introduce themselves and give a first insight into their reflections and ideas for Theater der Welt 2023.
Chiaki Soma is one of the Program Directors of Theater der Welt 2023 as well as Founder and Representative Director of Arts Commons Tokyo, an art collective founded in 2014. She is a curator and producer specialized in transdisciplinary contemporary art crossing over theater, contemporary art, socially engaged-art, and media arts with AR/VR technology etc. She has produced or curated various projects over last the 20 years in Japan and Asia: Program Director of Festival/Tokyo (2009-2013), Founding president and Artistic director of Theater Commons Tokyo (2017-present), Performing Arts Curator of Aichi Triennale 2019 and 2022, Executive Producer of Toyooka Theater Festival 2021. She has been awarded the Chevalier de L’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres from France’s Minister of Culture in 2015 and the Art Encouragement Prize from Japanese Minister of Culture in 2021. She is currently Associate Professor for The Graduate School of Fine Arts at Tokyo University of the Arts.
Kyoko Iwaki is one of the two curators of Theater der Welt 2023 in Frankfurt a.M./ Offenbach. She is a curator and JSPS post-doctorate researcher affiliated with Waseda University. Currently, she also gives lectures at Chuo University. Kyoko obtained a PhD in Theatre from Goldsmiths, University of London in November 2017. After her completion of PhD, she became a Visiting Scholar at The Segal Center, The City University of New York. Her recent publications include, Ushio Amagatsu: Des rivages d’enfance au bûto de Sankai juku (Paris, Actes Sud), Japanese Theatre Today: Theatrical Imaginations of Eight Contemporary Practitioners (Tokyo: Film Art Publishing, 2018). She has also contributed a chapter (chapters) to Fukushima and the Arts: Negotiating Nuclear Disaster (London, Routledge, 2016), A History of Japanese Theatre (Cambridge University Press, 2016), and The Routledge Companion to Butoh Performance (Routledge, 2018). She contributes to journals such as New Theatre Quarterly.
Jan Linders, born in Hamburg, studied German Literature and Philosophy in Hamburg and at the Johns Hopkins University, Baltimore. Internships with and assistant to George Tabori, Robert Wilson, Heiner Müller, Achim Freyer. Theatre work as dramaturg for drama, experimental performance, musical theatre, digital theatre etc.. International collaborations with Brazil, France, Georgia, Israel, Italy, the Netherlands, Romania, Switzerland, Thailand. Vice-President of the European Theatre Convention 2013-2019. Member of the board of the ITI-Germany since 2018. Currently head of programme, Humboldt Forum, Berlin.
Sa 04.12./ 15.00 – 15.45 CET (Group 1) / 16.00 – 16.45 CET (Group 2) / online
Outside of the Eurocentric paradigm of festival making, there are lots of alternative styles and concepts that can be employed to transform the future performing arts festivals. Starting from the notions of conceptualisation, curation, management, and implementation, until the notions of trans-culturality and trans-nationality, the workshop explores possibilities of decolonising our thinking and knowledge in order to create alternative models of festival making.
Nora Amin is a resident of Berlin since 2015 where she is a mentor at the LAFT/PAP (Performing Arts Program/Berlin) and at flausen+bundesnetzwerk. An expert on Theatre of the oppressed, critical pedagogy and dance/performance. Author, performer, choreographer & theatre director. Founder of the nation-wide Egyptian Project for Theatre of the Oppressed and its Arab network, founder and artistic director of Lamusica Independent Theatre Group where she directed, choreographed and produced 40 productions of dance, theatre and music. Advisor on arts management and cultural policy. Currently member of the steering team of the future Dance Mediation Centre in Berlin, and board member of the German Centre of the International Theatre Institute. Her latest publication is “Tanz der Verfolgten” (MSB Matthes & Seitz, 2021), an attempt to decolonise the history of Baladi dance from a feminist perspective, linking patriarchy with capitalism and racism.
Sa 04.12./ 18:00 CET/ online stream
by B-floor theatre (Bangkok, Thailand)
directed by Teerawat Mulvilai
part of Performative Arts Festival by Bangkok Art and Culture Centre (BACC)
Duration: 1 hour 48 minutes
The performance is a historical record of Thai politics in the form of performing arts. Originally created and premiered in 2010, Flu-Fool returned in 2020 as a performance that records and collages contemporary incidents, from the 2010 Red Shirt movement to the 2020 Khana Ratsadon or the New Citizen Movement in Thailand. More than a record, Flu-Fool serves as a mirror, revealing how the past and the present are in parallel, and we may ask ourselves: to which point is Thailand coming to? Or has it just been frozen in the same spot for so long that we can’t remember when it began?
FLU-FOOL probes into and plays with truth, hoax, mystery, and the ever-bystanders. The first part "FLU", short for 'Flu-O-Less-Sense', is a chapter that records what happened in the middle of 2010 when a severe contagion seemed to plague the whole society save for the rescue(?) by the CRES (Centre for Resolution of Emergency Situation). Yet, the ailment hit us so painfully that we had to ask what was left to make any sense of. And if that's not blindingly bright enough like fluorescence, then welcome to the second part - "FOOL", short for Fool Alright, where we'll dance our collage of foolishness away. Fools? Fooled? Alright! ...well, yes it IS okay!.
Based in Bangkok (Thailand) B-Floor has been at the forefront of creating highly visual theatre combining movement and multimedia elements for already 20 years. Their productions strive to raise social awareness by communicating personal experiences and inner struggles, and the points of view of suppressed ideas, people and events. Their performances are developed through a process of creative collaboration known as Devised Theatre. B-Floor's plays often involve little or no script, focusing instead on highly visual and sensory storytelling that can communicate across borders of language and culture. For both Thai and international audiences, B-Floor’s productions generate an exchange of experiences, opinions, attitudes, knowledge and concerns from a modern Thai standpoint.
Teerawat Mulvilai is an award-winning director and virtuosic performer with training in Butoh, Viewpoints, and other diverse physical practices. He has directed and performed in many critically acclaimed works, notably “San Dan Ka” (2009, 2013, 2014, 2018), “Flu-Fool” (2011), “Goya and Gruang” (2011), “Red Tank” (2014), “Iceberg” (2014), “Quiet House” (2016, 2019), “Something Missing” (2018) and “The (Un)Governed Body” (2019). His artistic excellence has led him to direct, perform and collaborate with international artists in Denmark, France, Germany, Netherlands, Sweden, Scotland, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Togo, Benin, Egypt, Laos, Cambodia, Myanmar, Indonesia, Philippines, Taiwan, Japan, South Korea, and the USA.
The Kick Off event of the ITI ACADEMY will be recorded visually by Irem Kurt.
Irem Kurt is a designer and illustrator based in Berlin. She co-created the OUSA collective in Berlin in 2020 with a huge interest in tackling social change issues visually and building a creative community for marginalized voices. When she is not drawing she likes to read or volunteer in her free time.
www.iremkurt.com