11th Festival - BONDS OF CULTURE
30th JUNE - 3rd JULY, 2010
EVENTS
THE STREFA CISZY THEATRE (POLAND) "SALTO MORTALE"
The Strefa Ciszy Theatre specializes in outdoor performances, street actions and happenings, consciously and consequently referring to urban culture. It is one of most important Polish alternative troupes accomplishing open air artistic actions. Their performance titled SALTO MORTALE is a stirring spectacle inspired by the story from the post-war Szczecin, plundered by Russians. It tells about grand pianos robbed by soldiers and then left to decay for years. For the Poznań-based artists the pianos became a symbol of "dying memory". Based on this idea, SALTO MORTALE shows a sequence of touching images presented by a peculiar troupe of derailed circus artists, successively rebuilding the destroyed instruments, and then playing with them, in result leading their form and their idea to the final destruction. The production was accomplished in cooperation with the Tel Aviv-based Clipa Theatre as an international project within the celebration of the Polish Year in Israel. Currently the work is continued by the Strefa Ciszy Theatre. Accomplishment of the production was supported by the Szczecin 2016 - a self-government institution coordinating Szczecin's attempts to the title of the European Capital of Culture 2016.
RASSEGNA (FRANCE)
Rassegna ('gathering' in the Sardinian language) is a collective name of singers and musicians gathered around Bruno Allary. They come from various parts of the Mediterranean coast - Corsica, Naples, Algeria, France, Spain, and Macedonia - and by exchange and mutual inspiration try to make a synthesis of various musical currents and traditions defining their common Mediterranean cultural identity. In Szczecin the group is going to present an intimate production titled "Bendita Madre", a set of songs collected in 2003 during their Christmas tour. The production, usually presented without amplification in churches and chapels, consists of folk pieces devoted to Virgin Mary. "Bendita Madre" is a peculiar homage to mothering and womanhood.
http://compagnierassegna.com/
http://www.myspace.com/rassegna
TANGO SUMO (FRANCE) "EXPEDITION PADDOCK"
Tango Sumo was founded in 2002 by Olivier Germser. Innovative, minimalistic stage-design devices combined with elements of theatre, circus and music shaping choreography, create a characteristic dancing style of the group, demanding versatile skills and talents of the artists. Using raw energy of street theatre, the team constantly seeks the means of communication with the audience. Their performance titled "Expedition Paddock" is a dynamic dancing story of madness, oppression and chaos. By means of technically flawless choreographic illustration, the team speaks to the hidden fears of spectators and their longings for safety and order, presenting diverse ways of dealing with the state of lost control, considering a sense of humor as one of most efficient among them.
THE CIRCOLANDO THEATRE (PORTUGAL) "CHARANGA"
- for the first time in Poland
Circolando is a team referring in its artistic research to the tradition of wandering theatrical troupes. They created the unique language based on the elements of physical theatre, dance theatre, imagination theatre, object theatre, music, fine arts, and video art. The reality created by the artists shares some features with the Portugal language - it's nostalgic, poetic, combining real life and dreaming.
The performance titled "Charanga" tells a story of a group of men that left the mines and with a fanfare of brasses to travel around the world riding their bikes and spreading the chants of ores. The chants are a voice of the mole-men inhabiting the depths of the earth. Sometimes they sob about the secrets and miracles of the Earth, sometimes they praise the delight of light and wind, and proclaim the time of day-dreaming in a winged merry-go-round. At first, the chants follow a straight path and then they begin to mark out a circle in space...
RENANA RAZ / OFER AMRAM (ISRAEL) "OV"
- for the first time in Poland
The productions of a young artist Renana Raz, described as "delightful" by the audience and critics alike, put her among the most eminent personalities of the Israeli dance scene. Her works, humorous yet at the same time subtly profound and extraordinary dynamical, were very well received all over the world. The piece titled "Ov", inspired by the classical Jewish play, "The Dybbuk" was created together with Ofer Amram in the Habima National Theater for the Israel Festival in Jerusalem. Using innovative audio-visual techniques, sophisticated choreography, accompanied by live music for cello and contrabass, and the astonishing Israeli punk klezmer group Oy Division, the dancers build a narration about the relationship between the world of the living and the dead souls.
http://www.renanaraz.com/english/
http://www.myspace.com/renanaraz
BUBLICZKI CASHUBIAN KLEZMER BAND (SZCZECIN)
The band was founded in July 2007 in Brusy, Kashubia, by musicians of the Kashubian Folk Group "Krebane". The founder and initiator of the band is Mateusz Czarnowski, who after experiences and practice with folk musicians from all over the world, convinced his friends from the "Krebane" band to play together. The group consists of six people of various musical characters yet one Kashubian identity. Despite its name, it is not a classic klezmer band. What makes them unique is their blend of Polish and Kashubian folklore with Eastern style, resulting in fusion of Balkan, Gypsy, and Jewish energy with Kashubian contents.
THE DEREVO THEATRE (RUSSIA) "THE FIGHT OF THE HARLEKIN WITH HIS OWN SHADOW IN SEARCH OF THE BARREL OF WINE AND THE ETERNAL LIFE"
In the form field "Occupation" in the customs I've put "Harlequin". The policeman asked me what it means. I answered: "this is what I'm doing already for many years in a theatre". "You should write 'an Actor'", said he. I apologized. He smiled. Going away from his desk I was feeling his glare on my back. And I suddenly realised that I'm walking differently. Lighter, snappier. as if I was 300 years younger.
FIGUREN TEATER TÜBINGEN (GERMANY)
Professional off-side theatre established in 1991 by two puppeteers: Frank Soehnle and Karin Ersching. Besides traditional forms of puppet theatre, they use elements of object theatre, drama, fine arts and music in innovative formal solutions. They productions, performed with live music, are based on uniquely precise and subtle animation. "Salto.lamento" is the ironic and original adaptation of Chekhov's novella "Rothschild's Fiddle". The production is inspired by medieval iconography of dance macabre, funeral rite practiced in Europe in the fourteen century, when almost half of population died in result of the Black Death.
MAWAWIL (EGYPT)
- for the first time in Poland
The group of Egyptian Gypsies playing broad repertoire of traditional music from the Nile Delta, reflecting everyday life of peasants through love and wedding songs as well as "A king of folk music" - mawwal, or narrative ballad. Mawwal refers to historical forms of Arab songs and poetry. A singer demonstrates his skills through arhythmic melodic improvisation to a poetic story and melody, adding or replacing poet's words with his own sentences. The Mawawil musicians play the rababah (two-string spiky fiddle made of half of coconut covered with fish skin, while a bow is made of horse hairs), kawala (end-blown cane flute with six finger holes), arghoul (ancient double clarinet, with two pipes of different length. The second pipe is a base, playing a monotonous sound, and can be extended by adding elements. For the effect of continuous sound, a musician uses a technique of circular breathing). Usage of these most traditional instruments helps the musicians of Mawawil to obtain the unique Egyptian sound: raw, lyrical, communal.
http://www.egyptmusic.org/r_mawawil.html
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=iTw_23Vb_4A
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5sT04xcbTIU
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nKhtnUEpuCM
THE LICEDEI THEATRE (RUSSIA) "SEMIANYKI"
The famous theatre of clowns, considered one of the best world troupes referring to classical clownery as a genre. The team was established in 1968 in Leningrad by Slava Polunin, a creator of a mime school which was revolutionary for European theatre. What makes the Licedei's silent clowning so unique is its versatility. Different from circus clowning, as it is commonly understood, it is situated between traditional clownery, revue and tragicomedy. Some critics called it 'poetic clownery'. "Semianyki" is a bittersweet, exaggerated image of Russian family, a site of constant battle for power between an alcoholic father who threatens that he will leave, a pregnant mother who threatens that she will give birth, and a band of their hyper-active offspring who threaten that they act violently without any special reason. The internationally acclaimed production was presented to the audience of the The Festival d'Avignon in 2005, the Theatre du Rond Point in Paris, The Hackney Empire in London in 2007, the Rome's Auditorium, the Londrinal Festival, Rio de Janeiro, the Helsinki Festival, the Montreal's Tohu, and in their native Russia.
ALAMAAILMAN VASARAT (FINLAND)
- for the first time in Poland
One of stylistically "wildest" musical groups from Finland, combining all possible ethnic styles - from klezmer music to flamenco - blended with jazz, punk, metal. Their unique style - for example, usage of distorted sounds of cello imitating the highest guitar tones - was appreciated in the famous Knitting Factory, the NYC jazz Mecca. Their chaotic and unpredictable music balances in completely schizophrenic way between manic fury and sentimental melancholy, not losing intensity and enormous sense of humor even for a while". The musicians of Alamaailman Vasarat refer to their style as being "kebab-kosher-jazz-film-traffic-punk-music".
http://www.vasarat.com/
http://www.myspace.com/alamaailmanvasarat
JOURNEY THROUGH WEIZACKER - EXHIBITION
Seeking the traces of forgotten cultures is a journey to the unknown. Discovering hidden layers of vivid past, excavation of events and images recorded long time ago helps us to see the today's reality in different way and redefine our own identity.
The exhibition titled "Journey through Weizacker" is a peculiar voyage along the paths of the unique and still virtually unknown culture, garment and life of habitants of Weizacker region (the pre-war Pyrzyce County, the Płonia river valley, to the Miedwie Lake). It presents photos and pictures from German and Polish historical resources. It provides opportunity to discover the complex identity of Western Pomerania and to ask questions about their former habitants, and overlapping layers of German and Polish culture. The exhibition is prepared by the Stowarzyszenie Spichlerz Sztuki (The Granary of Art Association) in collaboration with the Pyrzyce Library. In the second half of July it will be available in the Galeria Cysterska in Kołbacz
www.spichlerz-sztuki.pl
http://www.pascal.pl/wiadomosci.php?ind=wiadomosci&state=2&id=1453
http://www.facebook.com/notes/spichlerz-sztuki/podroz-przez-weizacker/325448149152
http://www.facebook.com/album.php?aid=191115&id=328093277268
http://www.spichlerz-sztuki.pl/foto09/
