Director Laura Kutkaitė and the team of the performance “Silence of Sirens”
Opera Social House Free admission
19:00
/ Wednesday
Pleasant Island Campo (Belgium)
INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMME
By and with Silke Huysmans and Hannes Dereere Arts Printing House, Black hall, 60’
19:00
/ Thursday
Out of the Blue Campo (Belgium)
INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMME
By and with Silke Huysmans and Hannes Dereere Arts Printing House, Black hall, 60’ + meeting with the artists
10.05 / Saturday
19:00
City of Mary: The Siege Diaries Vidlik projects, NASHi (Ukraine)
INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMME
Director Yevheniia Vidishcheva Arts Printing House, Black hall, 95‘ + meeting with the artists
10.06 / Sunday
12:00
La Plaza (Screening of the performance)
El Conde de Torrefiel (Spain)
CLUB
Text and direction: Tanya Beyeler, Pablo Gisbert Arts Printing House, Pocket hall, 85’ Free admission
14:00
Invisible Geographies (How to activate fictions)
Workshop with Tanya Beyeler (El Conde de Torrefiel)
CLUB
Arts Printing House, Studio II Prior registration is required
19:00
City of Mary: The Siege Diaries Vidlik projects, NASHi (Ukraine)
INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMME
Director Yevheniia Vidishcheva Arts Printing House, Black hall, 95‘ + meeting with the artists
10.08 / Tuesday
12:00
La Plaza (Screening of the performance)
El Conde de Torrefiel (Spain)
CLUB
Text and direction: Tanya Beyeler, Pablo Gisbert Arts Printing House, Pocket hall, 85’ Free admission
19:00
Una Imagen Interior
El Conde de Torrefiel (Spain)
INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMME
Text and direction: Tanya Beyeler, Pablo Gisbert
Lithuanian National Drama Theatre, New hall, 90‘ + meeting with the artists
10.09 / Wednesday
19:00
Una Imagen Interior
El Conde de Torrefiel (Spain)
INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMME
Text and direction: Tanya Beyeler, Pablo Gisbert
Lithuanian National Drama Theatre, New hall, 90‘
10.10 / Thursday
19:00
Nobody Died Today
Teatr Nafta (Ukraine), Theatre im Bahnhof (Austria)
INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMME
Director Nina Khyzhna
Arts Printing House, Black hall, 90‘
20:30 Discussion Arts as a form of resistance
KLUBAS
Arts Printing House
10.11 / Friday
19:00
Nobody Died Today
Teatr Nafta (Ukraine), Theatre im Bahnhof (Austria)
INTERNATIONAL PROGRAMME
Director Nina Khyzhna
Arts Printing House, Black hall, 90‘
I can take any empty space and call it a bare stage. A man walks across this empty space whilst someone else is watching him, and this is all that is needed for an act of theatre to be engaged.
– Peter Brook, Empty Space
Sirenos – Theatre – Space
When I think of theatre, a map begins to take shape in my mind. It’s a map of the countries I’ve visited and the performances I’ve experienced there. This map encompasses a diverse array of theatres – from classic Italian stages to black boxes, self-constructed venues, open-air stages, stages in prisons, forests, and even buses. As Peter Brook writes in “The Empty Space”: “I can take any empty space and call it a bare stage. A man walks across this empty space whilst someone else is watching him, and this is all that is needed for an act of theatre to be engaged.”
My theatre map is not limited to stages and their visuals. It also encompasses the faces and names of the creators, fragments of plays, and music I find myself searching for immediately after a performance –music that stays with me long afterward. An actor who, when I see them on the street later, feels like an old friend. It captures the emotions and experiences connected to specific performances, places, stages, smells, and the audience members seated next to me. The uncomfortable chairs, overly plush seats, blinding lights, and balconies that sometimes prove more captivating than the stage itself. We each carry our own unique theatre map in our minds, guiding us through and discovering new territories. These maps are deeply personal, shaped by our individual experiences and the performances we encounter.
The space of the performance exists in our minds, where the true theatre labyrinths unfold. With this in mind, I assembled this year’s Sirenos Festival programme in collaboration with theatre critics Alma Braškytė and Kristina Steiblytė, curators of the Lithuanian Theatre Showcase, composer Agnė Matulevičiūtė, curator of the club’s artistic program, and theatre critic Ugnė Kačkauskaitė, curator of the educational program. We sought to explore spaces for dialogue, meetings, protest, peace, and personal
reflection. We aimed to create spaces where we feel safe, which we are committed to defending, spaces that are disappearing or being destroyed by us, and to capture the shared space that belongs to all of us.
This edition concludes the Sirenos Festival’s threeyear thematic cycle, focusing on the three fundamental elements of theatre: body, word, and space.
The curators selected ten performances for the competition programme of the Lithuanian Theatre Showcase, which continues to grow as a significant platform for our theatre community to engage with international guests. Observing the selection process, it was evident that the showcase also serves as a space for dialogue between the two curators, each with their own vision. I believe these discussions enable us to gain broader and clearer perspectives.
In the international program, the theme of space will be explored through six performances. A highlight of this year’s festival is the inclusion of two Ukrainian plays, made possible through the efforts of Lithuanian cultural attaché Tomas Ivanauskas. Tomas introduced me to the vibrant resurgence of Ukrainian theatre, and after watching these performances, I was moved to tears and laughter. The works compelled me to reflect on our understanding of the situation in Ukraine and how we can help them, as well as the daily acts of courage by Ukrainians defending our freedom. The audience will see two Ukrainian productions: “Nobody Died Today” and “The City of Mary: The Siege Diaries”, both directed by women.
Questions of our responsibility for the spaces we inhabit will be explored by the Belgian creative duo Silke Huysmans and Hannes Dereere in their performances “Pleasant Island” and “Out of the Blue”. These works by the young creators, the second and third parts of a trilogy on the climate crisis, produced by the renowned Belgian theatre “Campo”, offer a documentary, detailed, and conscientious examination of both the artists’
mission and our collective responsibility for the future of our planet.
The centrepiece of this year’s festival is “An Image from the Inside” by the Spanish collective El Conde de Torrefiel. This performance invites us into the inner labyrinths of modern human consciousness, where we confront our reflections and explore the tenuous boundary between reality and fiction. The presentation of El Conde de Torrefiel at Sirenos extends beyond this single performance. Tanya Beyeler, one of the team members, will lead a creative workshop titled “Invisible Geographies (How to Activate Fiction).” Additionally, there will be video screenings of two other performances by this collective.
An experimental film and theatre screening will offer the audience a unique experience, bridging the gap between stage and cinema. Over two days, live premiere broadcasts of the play-film “Absent City” will be presented at the Kino Pasaka cinema in the Old Town. Eleusis, a city on the outskirts of Athens, will be transformed into a vast filming location and performance stage. Cameras and drones, along with the eyes of the audience, will follow the characters, creating a new synthesis of theatre and cinema and exploring how a city can become a stage with its inhabitants playing their parts.
The artistic program of the Sirenos Club, curated by Agnė Matulevičiūtė, extends beyond traditional theatre spaces. Agnietė Lisičkinaitė’s “Hands Up” will invite participants to engage in a protest on the city streets, while Aira Naginevičiūtė and Erika Vizbaraitė’s “Russian Roulette”, an artistic installation-performance under the Mindaugas Bridge, will encourage reflection on the realities of war. As part of the Sirenos tradition, the festival will also host an awards ceremony open to the public on September 29. Directed by Laura Kutkaitė and the team behind last year’s award-winning
“The Silence of the Sirens”, the ceremony continues the tradition of entrusting the direction to one of the previous year’s award-winning teams. This event is curated by Agnė Matulevičiūtė.
The educational program, curated by Ugnė Kačkauskaitė, includes the previously mentioned seminar by El Conde de Torrefiel and an additional seminar for stage art critics led by this year’s Sirenos jury member, Slovenian performing arts critic Rok Vevar. The program will also feature meetings with creators, talks, and discussions about performances.
This year, the festival will host GLEN – the Great Little European Network, a platform uniting performing arts organizations from small European countries. In addition to network meetings, there will be presentations of two works in progress: “Rainbow Choir” by network member and director Greta Štiormer, and “Impostor Syndrome” by actor and director Reinis Boters of the Latvian theatre “Kvadrifrons”.
I hope that the images, creators, sounds, and texts featured in this edition of the Sirenos Festival will expand your theatre map, adding new points and connecting new territories with bridges.
Kristina Savickienė, artistic director of the Sirenos Festival
Lithuanian Theatre Showcase 2024 09 25–29
The mission of the Lithuanian Theatre Showcase is to introduce the most interesting works of the recent seasons, which would look for new forms of creating, focus on new directions, and be brave enough to tackle unsafe subjects as well as come up with a distinctive bond with tradition. The showcase is here to expose a wider panorama of the processes of Lithuania’s performing arts scene to local people and foreign guests, to introduce the public to new authors, to show the works that reflect the relevant problems of today’s society and theatre, and to keep the idea of open theatre alive.
Since the very first festival in 2004, SIRENOS has been introducing the most capturing works by theatre creators from Lithuania and abroad every year. The showcase of Lithuanian theatre was born as an idea for a complex phenomenon that could show audience what’s exciting in the today’s theatre life and also collect works by local and foreign authors in a single festival, getting “here” and “there” closer, starting a dialogue with the processes of art throughout international waters. An equally important task is to invite professionals of diverse profiles so they could get to know Lithuanian theatre and open it to an international market, spreading the word about our country’s performing arts abroad, creating opportunities for Lithuanian plays to be shown at foreign stages, and fostering a space for absolutely any projects of international collaboration.
Lithuanian Theatre Showcase has undergone a major change in 2022: it has become a competitive event. Independent curators who change every year, watch all the premieres of the season and according to their vision select a number of shows for the views of local and international audience. During the festival five international experts are invited to be the jury and watch all the shows. They distribute three prizes for three shows or artists that have impressed them most. The award is the symbol of “Sirenos” festival - a musical instrument theremin. Appraisal of the international jury is also usually followed by invitations to present the productions abroad.
Theatrologist Alma Braškytė
Observing today’s world, it becomes evident that diversity, which should enrich our experiences and approaches, too often takes on a destructive power instead of fostering life and understanding. Disagreements escalate into open conflicts, and those with differing opinions become fierce adversaries. This realization inspired both the festival and us, the curators, to undertake an experiment: two theatre researchers from different generations, schools, and perspectives, who had never collaborated before, came together to co-curate the 2023–2024 Lithuanian theatre season showcase.
The programme we are presenting consists of ten performances and was born from active discussion. This process gave us the opportunity not only to reconsider our own assumptions about assessing theatre performances but also to step away from our personal preferences and embrace our partner’s viewpoint. In this lineup, you will discover the most intriguing works of the season, each unique in its own way. The programme also showcases a diverse range of institutions, dramaturgy, genres, and generations of creators and theatre disciplines, all coexisting within Lithuania’s small but vibrant and creative theatre community.
“Consider the Lobster”, directed by Yana Ross (Lithuanian National Drama Theatre), and “Caligula”, by Jokūbas Brazys (Old Theatre of Vilnius), pose sharp questions of conscience and self-awareness. These performances experiment with different methods of composition and acting, challenging the audience to interpret and combine them into their own maps of meaning.
Theatrologist Kristina Steiblytė
Kamilė Gudmonaitė and Dominykas Digimas’s opera “Things I Didn’t Dare to Say, and It’s Too Late Now” (Lithuanian National Drama Theatre, Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre, Operomanija), featuring numerous performers and stunning scenery, highlights the precious moments of everyday life and relationships, whose value becomes most evident in the face of loss.
“Mother”, directed by Kirilas Glušajevas (OKT, Oskaras Koršunovas Theatre), and “Patina”, by Eglė Švedkauskaitė (Šiauliai State Drama Theatre), delve into family relationships in contrasting ways. “Mother” presents a family portrait filled with painful emotions through psychological acting, while “Patina” complements this with the absurdity of pragmatic family dynamics as dictated by a new Lithuanian play.
An international team of dancers in the performance “Lustopia”, choreographed by Silke Z, Airida Gudaitė, and Laurynas Žakevičius, sensitively yet lightly and humorously explores the physicality of human coexistence. In the monodrama “PRAEis”, Justas Tertelis engages the audience from a completely empty stage, portraying an actor in the lead role of his own professional life.
In his visual performance “Dilettante” (Kosmos Theatre), Žilvinas Vingelis delves into the life (including the posthumous one!) and work of Jean Cocteau. Meanwhile, Paulius Markevičius invites the audience on a time-travel journey, immersing them in the vibrant atmosphere of a Parisian café, invigorated by famous existentialists, in the experiential performance “Café Existans” (Opera Social House).
Due to logistical challenges, we are unable to present “West Pier”, directed by Adomas Juška (Klaipėda Drama
Lietuvos teatro vitrinos žiuri
Nuo 2022 metų Lietuvos teatro vitrinos programos spektakliai, atrinkti festivalio kuratorių, varžosi konkurse, kuriame tarptautinė žiuri skiria tris apdovanojimus. Žiuri nariai turi visišką laisvę nustatyti vertinimo kriterijus, o jų sprendimai suteikia unikalią galimybę sužinoti, kaip mūsų teatrą vertina tarptautinė bendruomenė. Vitrinos programą vertina patyrę tarptautiniai ekspertai – prodiuseriai, teatrologai, festivalių ir teatrų vadovai, kurie dalijasi savo įžvalgomis apie Lietuvos teatro sceną, atskleisdami, kurie kūrėjai ir jų darbai labiausiai patraukė užsienio profesionalų dėmesį.
Šiais metais žiuri komisiją sudaro:
Glyn Roberts (Australia) – head of Creative Communities at Townsville City Council, where his responsibilities include overseeing arts, culture, festivals, and events in North Queensland. Glyn previously led Australia’s longest-running regional arts festival, the “Castlemaine State Festival”, and worked as a creative producer at Brisbane’s “La Boite” theatre. He is also one of the founders of the “Supercell Dance Festival” and is widely recognized for his ability to develop creative ideas into successful projects.
Kris Nelson (United Kingdom) – from 2018 until this summer, Kris led “LIFT”, one of the UK’s most important performing arts festivals. Prior to that, from 2013 to 2017, he directed Dublin’s “Fringe” festival, the largest interdisciplinary arts festival in Ireland. He also founded “Antonym”, a performing arts touring agency in Canada. His work at the “LIFT” festival was highly valued for its international initiatives, the presentation of foreign artists, and the creation of new collaboration opportunities.
Patrícia Portela (Portugal) –a performing arts creator and researcher from Lisbon, Patricia intertwines scenography, costume design, and philosophy in unexpected ways in her artistic projects. Since 2003, she has been creating performances and installations with artists from various countries, and her works have won numerous awards, including the “Gulbenkian Foundation Prize” and the “Revelation” Award. Patricia also writes novels and lectures on the relationship between dramaturgy and space.
Rok Vevar (Slovenia) –a contemporary dance and theater historian and critic from Ljubljana. After studying philosophy, he became a prominent dance dramaturg, collaborating with talented artists. Rok was one of the key founders of independent Slovenian festivals “Ukrep” and “CoFestival”. He has also taught at the AGRFT Academy and Anton Bruckner University. For his contributions to performing arts criticism, Rok has received numerous awards both in Slovenia and abroad.
Anna Maria Strauß (Germany) – a cultural facilitator with extensive experience in various countries. She studied theater arts, art history, and Japanology at the University of Munich and is currently the director of the “Goethe-Institut” in Lithuania. Anna Maria has also worked in “GoetheInstitutes” in Uzbekistan, Latvia, Germany, and Indonesia, and has led cultural programs in Southeast Asia, Australia, and New Zealand.
Consider the Lobster
Based on an Essay by David Foster Wallace
Time September 26th | 19:30
Venue Lithuanian National Drama Theatre
Duration 90’
Production
Lithuanian National Drama Theatre
Director
Yana Ross
Set and Costume Designer
Zane Pihlstrom
Composer punk after kant Light Designer
Dainius Urbonis
Creative Director’s Assistant
Naubertas Jasinskas
Costume Designer’s Assistant Pijus Dulskis
Director’s Assistant Rokas Lažaunykas
Producer Kamilė Žičkytė
Cast:
Elzė Gudavičiūtė Martynas Nedzinskas
Salvijus Trepulis
Jūratė Vilūnaitė
Translator Ignas Beitsas
Premiere Date
21st September, 2023
N-16, language of violence and animal torture themes are being used in the show
Lietuvos teatro vitrina
Yana Ross, who has been staging few performances in Lithuania recently, chose David Foster Wallace’s essay “Consider the Lobster” and other short prose texts for her new production. Wallace’s work fundamentally questions human nature and our relationship with other species. His texts delve into some of the most sensitive and uncomfortable issues in contemporary society, including empathy, childrearing, intimacy, miscommunication, and the decline of anthropocentrism.
“We hope to encourage viewers to reevaluate their own ethical and moral codes and values, while also highlighting the socially acceptable grey areas we aim to question. Susan Sontag’s significant book “Regarding the Pain of Others” was also instrumental in developing the play,” says Yana Ross.
“True to Yana Ross’s distinctive style, this performance is rich in meaning, narratives, and varied directorial and acting approaches. It invites the audience to fully engage their faculties – both intellectual and emotional. The issues addressed in the play often provoke discomfort, making it painfully challenging to witness the suffering that good and sensitive people both endure and inflict on others in their daily lives. The constant noise and chaos of our civilization can be overwhelming, obscuring the harm we cause to ourselves and the natural world: from the physical pain of animals used for food and gourmet entertainment to the almost invisible emotional suffering of others.”
Alma Braškytė
Director about the space of the performance
I have to say that Zane Pihlstrom and I graduated from the same theater academy, Yale School of Drama in 2006 and have started collaborating together while we were students. This creates a type of special bond and a way of communication that is full of trust and understanding, we share similar tools and ways of seeing creative space. So the design process for us is always collective, this encompasses the creative team and since big institutions always plan far ahead, it is not possible to include actors in such a process since the cast is not even clear by the time the set construction is due. Although I try to bend these rules and start the process very early. For example, I just had a creative workshop with actors and the designer in Copenhagen for a production that will take place in 2026. This is a great way to start imagining space and looking at ideas together.
With Lobster— the impulse for design started with a specific real place in the USA— Maine Lobster Festival. Exploring visual landscapes we both gravitated to a centerpiece of the cooking machine— the “world’s
largest boiling pan” — a metal box with lids and smokefilled chimneys— my mind immediately connected to gas chambers of Holocaust…
It was important to us to replicate some realistic details of this animal mascare/human holiday, the multiplication of cooking chambers/chimneys/ creates an industrial, efficient, productive optimized horror world. At the same time, the elements of fun fair and festivities, beach entertainment is also present. Grotesque absurdity, boiling creatures alive and having fun all together at the same time!
I would consider an outside/inside reveal of metal boxes representing a certain way we open up to each other. On the outside it could appear cold and steel gray and once you turn the box around it reveals a colorful and complex innerworld.
The actors were responsible for filling in the “inner world” of metal boxes with whatever elements their characters wanted to use. Of course, childrens toys painted red became also a multiple tool to express and create complex images.
The Dilettante
(*who dreamt of an Angel)
Time September 26th | 21:30
Venue Arts Printing House
Duration 45’
Production
Kosmos Theatre
Director and Dramaturge
Žilvinas Vingelis
Cast
Airida Gintautaitė
Designer
Neringa Keršulytė
Composer
Andrius Šiurys
Video Artist
Tomas Stonys
Engineer
Deividas Dzikevičius
Lighting Designer
Vilius Vilutis
Puppet Choreographer
Eugenijus Slavinskas
Producer
Darius Vizbaras
Age Recommendation 12+
Lietuvos teatro vitrina
Jean Cocteau is a hardly fully comprehensible personality, whose dilettantism in different artistic fields flows out like fragments of a particularly rich poetic world – incomplete, imperfect, hasty, brave, resembling nothing else.
He is a playwright, a poet, a painter, a drawer, a novelist, a graphic designer, a music manager, a boxing manager, an opium addict, an enemy of André Breton, but a good friend of Igor Stravinsky, Marcel Proust, Nobel Prize winner André Gide, Pablo Picasso or Erik Satie.
The suicide of his father, the influence of Catholicism and Surrealism, the parallels between boxing and ballet, opium addiction, journey around the world, friendships with the most extraordinary artists of the time and art work, poetry, drama, prose, cinema, theatre, music – all these are the main themes of Cocteau’s life, which are the focus of an audiovisual intermedia narrative developed in a laboratory-like creative process.
The work freely improvises on motives from Jean Cocteau’s graphic and paintings, poems, novels “Opium”, “The White Paper”, theatre play “The Human Voice” and his films “Blood of the Poet”, “Orpheus’
Testament” and his biography.
“The material for the performance becomes Cocteau himself, understanding him not just as an interdisciplinary artist, but also as an anthropomorphized montage of different media and disciplines. In this performance, all stage components are part of Cocteau’s personality. By dividing these disciplines (cinema, surreal objects, music, literature, fashion, etc.) and giving them to each member of the creative team, we aimed to break this montage back down into separate media and to montage them again into new contemporary intermedial pieces. With an incredibly talented team, we worked to find indirect connections, parallels, poetic paradoxes that would establish a symbolic relationship between themes, sounds, images and symbols that have nothing to do with each other outside this surreal world. We were working on a small scale so that we could freely and equally combine media art, music, animation, acting, cinema, mechanized scenographic object, texts, puppet and object theatre, soundspace and other contemporary theatre instruments.” – Žilvinas Vingelis, director and dramaturg of the performance.
Director Žilvinas Vingelis about the space of the performance
The Dilettante is a small-scale intermedial performance that deliberately avoids shaping or aestheticizing the entire stage space or acting area. The scenographic imagination of the performance is centred around a single, mysterious object that, following the classic examples of surrealist art, embodies absurdity, contradictions, hidden spaces, and paradoxes, and has the remarkable ability to continually recreate itself –transforming into a theatre hall, a swimming pool, a movie screen, or a boxing ring – while also influencing the stage action, becoming one of the two main characters, and serving as an equal partner to the actress.
In developing this concept, we collaborated closely with scenographer Neringa Keršulytė. Before the first rehearsals, we identified recurring images in Cocteau’s
work and integrated them into the object, allowing for transformations and various possibilities in its design. We consulted with robotics engineer Deividas Dzikevičius to refine our ideas. In the second stage, we adapted the object based on discoveries made during rehearsals, discarding some possibilities and creating new ones. The functionality of the scenography was also enhanced by the contributions of actress Airida Gintautaitė, projection designer Tomas Stonys, composer Andrius Šiurys, puppeteer Eugenijus Slavinskas, producer Darius Vizbaras, and assistant Vincas Juozapaitis.
This single piece of scenery, which reveals the inner spaces of the characters, serves as our entire scenography. It must be seen as it’s really difficult to describe it. As Jean Cocteau once said, “An artist cannot speak about his art any more than a plant can discuss horticulture.”
West Pier
Presentation of the performance “West Pier” with comments, photos, and video clips, conducted by director Adomas Juška.
Time September 27th | 14:00 (presentation)
Venue Arts Printing House
Time October 4th | 18:30 (performance)
Venue Lithuanian National Drama Theatre
Duration 60’
Production
Klaipėda Drama Theatre
Director
Adomas Juška
Set Designer
Lauryna Liepaitė
Composer
Vygintas Kisevičius
Light Designer
Julius Kuršis
Artistic Staging of Video Projections
Kornelijus Jaroševičius
Costume Designer
Nunilo Rumbutis
Assistant Director
Marius Pažereckas
Cast:
Darius Meškauskas
Renata Idzelytė
Eglė Barauskaitė
Digna Kulionytė
Igoris Reklaitis
Donatas Želvys
Laurynas Luotė
Michaël Nkenda
Darius Matevičius
Linas Bagdonas
Paulius Aleknavičius
Translator
Akvilė Melkūnaitė
Premiere Date
8th September, 2023
Lietuvos teatro vitrina
The story unfolds in an abandoned old harbour hangar, located in a decaying district of a major Western port city, separated from the city centre by a river. A wealthy businessman arrives in this heart of the harbour district with a clear intent – to end his life. However, a stranger rescues him from the water, leading to a confrontation with the locals who demand recompense for everything life has denied them. It is a tale of people who should never have met, yet they do –in an imaginary no-man’s land that exists on the fringes of society, on the outskirts of every city in the world.
Bernard-Marie Koltès (1948–1989), a French playwright, writer, and theatre director, is now considered a classic of contemporary French dramaturgy and one of the most translated and produced playwrights. His plays depict a modern world where human relationships are governed by negotiation, power struggles, and the fight for survival. “West Pier” was written in 1983.
Director Adomas Juška is one of the most interesting and promising directors of the young generation. His productions are frequently highlighted by critics as among the most memorable theatre events. “West Pier” won two of the highest Lithuanian theatre awards in 2023: the Golden Cross of the Stage for Best Director was awarded to Adomas Juška, and Lauryna Liepaitė received recognition for her scenography
“Four decades have passed since Bernard-Marie Koltès wrote “West Pier”, yet its characters continue to resonate in our cities and their outskirts. They are greedy, shamelessly pragmatic, and desperately unhappy. The director and the scenographer bring these figures to the forefront, presenting their complex relationships within an aesthetically refined, large-scale set that becomes an additional character in the performance by undergoing an impressive transformation. An outstanding ensemble of actors guides the audience through the dark recesses of a world spiralling toward disaster, culminating in a cathartic glimmer of hope.”
Alma Braškytė
Director Adomas Juška about the space of the performance
Real creativity in theatre is always a collective effort. When something truly works, the entire creative team can feel it. If I had to attribute a larger share of the contribution to the play’s scenography, I would undoubtedly credit Lauryna. However, what I found most beautiful in this process was that neither of us focused on dividing our roles, devoting ourselves fully to creating something beautiful and intriguing together.
I should also mention that while creating the performance space, there was always an invisible third participant – the material itself. At times, it demanded, suggested, or rejected certain ideas, but it always had an essential voice in the process. I believe Lauryna would agree that neither of us truly “came up with” the idea of water; it revealed itself to us.
The dark water on stage symbolizes death for me, above all else. It represents the onset of Noah’s
flood. By observing each character’s relationship with the water, I can see their relationship with death. One character fights it until the very end, wringing out wet clothes; another is too afraid to even step into it. There’s one who doesn’t notice the water at all, as they have long been dead. For yet another, it serves as a brutal baptism, marking their crossing into adulthood. Although water is traditionally associated with life, here it brings only death, while still calling for purification. The human-shaped dark cavity reflects each character’s relationship with the “other” – unfamiliar and thus dangerous. Some enter it recklessly, with nothing to lose; others approach cautiously, having made a deal beforehand; some avoid it altogether; while others pour all their bitterness into that silhouette.
We hope that each viewer will form their own connections between the characters’ lives, Koltès’s texts, and the space we’ve created. I can only share my vision, but it is not definitive or the only correct one.
Director set designer Lauryna Liepaitė about the space of the performance
The play “West Pier” itself strongly influenced the scenic decisions. There’s a pervasive sense of moisture throughout the text – I could feel it as I was reading it, as if water was constantly beneath my feet. Water became the first essential element I couldn’t imagine the performance without. The next challenge was figuring out how to bring that water to the stage: how to technically control it, what sound it would produce, what reflections it would create, and finally, what colour it would be.
Once the water was introduced, we needed a material that could best reflect its destructive power. This led to the inclusion of metal structures, which continue to change with each performance due to their exposure to water. Rust forms, details slowly dissolve, and corners of the set fall away – all of this is part of the pier, happening in real-time, as water claims its share. The same happens to our set with each performance, creating a beautiful connection to reality.
Our collaboration with Adomas was a truly collective process. I believe it’s a rare and wonderful gift – perhaps even a luxury – to work so closely without concern for who is responsible for what. We complemented each other to create an image, to see the actors within it, and to let the space influence them, just as they influence the scenery.
The most important element of the scenery in our performance is a pipe shaped like a human silhouette. It serves as a threshold that all the characters must cross. However, for me, the most significant aspect remains the water pooling on the stage. As I watch the reflections of the theatre’s walls in the water, I see the boundary between the stage’s architecture and the scenery blur. The water’s reflection seems to dissolve the rear wall of the theatre, giving the impression that it might spill out into the street. Water has the power to submerge or bring things to the surface, and it’s mirrored in the performance. The water interacts with everything – from a metal structure that appears to be sinking, to a dead body floating on its surface, to a shopping cart emerging from the water as if after a storm.
Ladies and gentlemen
While you‘re with us here tonight I‘d like to ask you to forget about the outside world
Completely
And try not to think about anything outside of this room
Anything at all
– Tim Etchells, „Uncertain Fragments“
Justas Tertelis Production Atviras ratas
PRAeis (It Will Pass)
Vid(utinio) aktoriaus monospektaklis
Time September 27th | 16:00
Venue Arts Printing House
Duration 100’
Director, Playwright, and Actor Justas Tertelis
Composer
Nikolajus Polujanovas
Set and Costume Designer
Laura Luišaitytė
Video Justas Tertelis
Translator Aivaras Mockus
Premiere Date 10-11th September, 2023
Lietuvos teatro vitrina
“PRAEis” is a one-person show for all theatre enthusiasts.
If you’ve ever been curious about how actors memorize extensive scripts, how they “enter” and “exit” roles, or what it feels like to be in a “good” performance or to miss out on awards, actor, playwright, and director Justas Tertelis offers an engaging, behind-the-scenes glimpse into today’s theatre world.
This mono act continues the exploration begun in Tertelis’s first play, “PRA, a One-Act Monoplay for an Aspiring Actor.” However, in “PRAEis”, the perspective shifts from that of a novice to that of an experienced, middle-aged theatre artist. Through a dialogue with the audience, Tertelis reflects on and challenges established beliefs about theatre and culture, delving
into the paradoxical situations faced by creators. He invites us to question why we continue to go to the theatre today and what kind of theatre and culture we truly need.
“This performance is the second (so far) instalment of a diptych documenting the professional journey of actor and playwright Justas Tertelis, as well as the evolving landscape of Lithuanian theatre culture. In his earlier work “PRA”, produced in 2007, Tertelis expressed an admiration for the acting profession, naively marvelling at the world of theatre and its participants, and placing stage art at the centre of the world. Now, he shares his accumulated experience, a transformed vision of the field, and reconsidered priorities, exploring the place and significance of theatre in a constantly changing world. He also invites the audience to reflect on the kind of theatre they desire and hope for as new generations of creators emerge.”
Kristina Steiblytė
Director Justas Tertelis about the space of the performance
This monoplay is a deeply personal, solo theatre project where I had to take on all the creative roles – playwright, director, and actor – entirely on my own. The concept for the scenery and its underlying idea was also an individual effort. The scenography of “PRAEis” stems from the central goal of the performance: to invite the audience not to witness another story, fiction, or metaphorical inclusive spectacle, but to experience the theatre itself – as a space where we all meet and as a process that we collectively and individually undergo in the same moment. The aim is to “expose” the theatre, to observe how it changes over time (or doesn’t), and to reveal what the theatre, as a process, offers its practitioners – directors, actors, playwrights – and the universal life lessons that being on stage imparts.
An empty stage, with only a few minimal details, was deliberately chosen as the scenery for this performance, leaving an open space for the actor to inhabit. This idea is directly inspired by Peter Brook’s concept of theatre as an “empty space.” While I won’t provide the exact quote, Brook’s idea can be paraphrased: theatre is an empty space where at least one person (the actor) and at least one person watching (the audience) are present. And that’s all it takes for theatre to happen. This monoplay directly puts that concept into practice.
In this monoplay, the actor uses a single roll of white paper adhesive tape on stage. This tape serves as the primary detail in the performance, becoming a symbolic marker of the theatre process, the passage of time, and the timeline of past, present, and future experiences. The “play” with the adhesive tape is the main tool that helps the actor convey the performance’s themes and thoughts.
Virginija Rimkaitė Production
Patina
Time September 27th | 19:00
Venue Arts Printing House
Duration 80’
Šiauliai State Drama Theatre
Director
Eglė Švedkauskaitė
Composer
Vytautas Leistrumas
Set Designer
Ona Juciūtė
Visual Artist
Aneta Bublytė
Lighting Designer
Julius Kuršis
Costume Designer
Elvita Brazdylytė
Cast:
Nomeda Bėčiūtė
Monika Šaltytė
Tautvydas Galkauskas
Josif Baliukevič
Aistė Šeštokaitė
Monika Geštautaitė
Inga Jarkova-Bučienė
Lina Bocytė
Premiere Date 6-7th October, 2023
Lietuvos teatro vitrina
Virginija Rimkaitė’s play “Patina” features close relatives, but their formal and cold communication reveals an underlying crisis in family relationships. At the centre of the play is the Mother, who constructs a myth of a harsh world outside the home and the contrasting illusion of safety within it. The security she offers comes at the cost of unlimited control. The eldest son, Henrikas, born with a congenital heart defect, lacks social skills, and we witness his absurdly comical attempts to build relationships with the women his Mother chooses to be his wives and caregivers. Alongside him is Albertas, a young man with a secret, who moves almost unnoticed. The play unfolds over a single day when they finally muster the courage to confront Mother’s oppressive system.
Director Eglė Švedkauskaitė says that she is fascinated by the world Mother creates, where the other characters gradually become hostages. “Being as ruthless to herself as to others, Mother maintains the
myth she has constructed about the family’s well-being and values. Family relations are a timeless and relevant topic for society – families change with the times, leading to fractures and conflicts between people with different beliefs and between different generations. In this performance, we explore the distorted reality where family values become a justification for cruelty,” says Švedkauskaitė.
“The world, depicted in white as if forgotten to be painted, serves as a stark backdrop highlighting the family’s dynamics. This family is strange and unhappy, lonely and sad, unwilling and unable to understand each other. The play’s exploration of their relationships – both comic and painful – provides rich material for director Eglė Švedkauskaitė, who consistently delves into collective traumas and the evolving structures of societal thought. It is no surprise that, in collaboration with Virginija Rimkaitė’s absurdist drama, a strong team of co-creators, and the remarkable Šiauliai Theatre company, the director has crafted a precise and delicate portrayal of the crisis in both personal relationships and worldviews.”
Kristina Steiblytė
Director Eglė Švedkauskaitė and Set Designer Ona Juciūtė about about the space of the performance
The scenery of our performances often takes shape more clearly when we discuss the feelings and images evoked by the original source material – whether it’s a book, play, or biography. The same was true for “Patina”. We shared our impressions and noted that the play’s characters seem to inhabit a puritanical space, cleansed of the possibility of sin. Our initial images were religious. We discussed the sense of discomfort and uncertainty associated with home, which led to the concept of architectural rendering. The scenography resembles a modern house, but it appears unfinished –lacking colour and detail, much like a 3D plan seen in real estate ads. This space is inhabited by a strange family whose relationships mirror the apartment’s
state: all practical functions are present, but something fundamental is missing.
A key decision was to use a single colour tone for all objects in the space. Although Eglė had ideas about incorporating more colours, Ona insisted that maintaining this colour integrity was crucial for the concept to work. This approach creates a strict, orderly environment for the character of Mother, within which other characters can perform their limited actions –much like characters in a computer game, under her permission, of course. An important element is the projection window, which displays constant bad weather – rain and fog – designed by Aneta Bublytė. This projection reflects the secrets and insincerity surrounding the characters. A clear sky appears only once, but it’s also a form of deception.
Café Existans
Time September 27th | 21:00
Venue Opera Social House
Duration 120’
Production
Tolyn Gilyn
Director and Playwright
Paulius Markevičius
Scenography
Karolina Rukšnaitytė
Make-up Art
Aneta Bublytė
Lighting
Julius Kuršis
Costumes
Fausta Naujalytė
Music
Jonas Narbutas
Movement
Greta Grinevičiūtė
Assistant Director
Justina Biekšaitė
Dramaturgical Consultant
Marija Kavtaradzė
Technical Director
Vlad Bajaznyj
Poster Photo
Tomas Kauneckas
Image Campaign Concept and Execution
Not Perfect Vilnius
Cast:
Jolanta Dapkūnaitė
Indrė Patkauskaitė
Vytautas Kaniušonis
Vygandas Vadeiša
Aistė Lasytė
Karolis Norvilas
Viktorija Žukauskaitė
Šarūnas Datenis
Important
The performance has narrow corridors, small spaces, stairs, smoke.
Lietuvos teatro vitrina
Here, the drinks are as bitter as the questions about the meaning of life.
But the choices are free, and you’ll have to find your own way out.
When the eight characters of the play converge in a café on an ordinary evening, extraordinary events unfold. As they gather for their favourite drinks, they find themselves in life-altering situations and, together with the audience, embark on a journey to infuse their lives with meaning.
By freely moving through various spaces, you will create a personal and unique experience in the world of CAFÉ EXISTANS. The action takes place right around you, and in this world, we advise you not to linger in narrow corridors and doorways.
CAFÉ EXISTANS is the latest work by director Paulius Markevičius, inspired by the era of Existentialism and its historical figures.
“In his 2017 performance “Albert, WRU?”, Paulius Markevičius not only directed and wrote the script but also performed as the sole actor, engaging one spectator at a time. This intimate exploration of themes such as the meaning of life and the fear of death has been revisited in 2024, now in a completely new form. This time, Markevičius populates four distinct spaces with eight characters, portrayed by actors from different generations. The director invites the audience to participate in a collective dream, following the characters, listening to snippets of conversation, getting lost, making discoveries, and embracing the fleeting and unpredictable nature of life.”
Kristina Steiblytė
Florian Zeller
The Mother
Time rugsėjo 28 d. | 16:00
Venue OKT studija
Duration 100’
Production
OKT / Vilnius City Theater
Director
Kirilas Glušajevas
Stage Designer
Marijus Jacovskis
Costume Designer
Marija Zalensaitė
Composer
Gintaras Sodeika
Lights Designer
Povilas Laurinaitis
Sound Engineer
Nikolaj Polujanov
Technical Director
Vladislav Bajaznyj
Props and Costumer
Laura Aurylaitė
Stage Manager
Malvina Matickienė
Subtitling
Aurimas Minsevičius
Touring Manager
Audra Žukaitytė
Cast:
Rasa Samuolytė
Dainius Gavenonis
Aurelijus Pocius
Augustė Ona Šimulynaitė
Translator
Akvilė Melkūnaitė
Premiere Date 17th December 2023
Lietuvos teatro vitrina
The everyday life of Anne, the main character in “The Mother”, is a mix of sleeping pills, diazepam, and alcohol – her attempt to escape depression and the suffocating confines of the house and family she once lived for. How should a mother come to terms with her children’s maturity? How can she learn to live her own life, take care of herself, and love herself?
“It is a brilliant study of the peculiar organization of the human soul, comparable to the case studies found in good psychiatric literature. (…) There is no attempt to label a diagnosis, which is common in such plays – this restraint makes the play remarkable. There is no intention to shock. Pain and joy arise subtly from everyday life and closeness.” (Kirilas Glušajevas)
Florian Zeller is a contemporary French novelist, playwright, and screenwriter known for his trilogy “The Mother”, “The Father”, and “The Son”, which has been translated into many languages. Both “The Mother” and “The Father” received the prestigious Molière Award in France. In 2020, Zeller directed the film adaptation of his play, which won numerous international awards,
including Oscars for Best Actor and Best Adapted Screenplay.
Kirilas Glušajevas, born in 1984, is an actor and director and a student of Rimas Tuminas. In 2004–2005, he studied at the Dartington College of Arts in the United Kingdom. He graduated from the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre in 2008 and now teaches there. Glušajevas has staged plays in various theatres across Lithuania.
“This performance offers a rare opportunity to witness the exceptional talent of Lithuanian actors from both the middle and younger generations in a play where masterful acting is essential to convey the nuances of the characters’ self-perception and their complex relationships.
“The Mother” stands out in today’s Lithuanian theatre as a rare example where the director intentionally remains “behind the scenes”, placing trust in the text, the actors’ precision, and their “here-and-now” energy on stage. The audience is drawn into a web of intricate relationships among the people closest to them. The mother, father, and son each strive for happiness in their own way, and it seems that each is justified in their perspective. The play blurs the line between truth and deception, objective reality and the subjective images created by a feverish consciousness.”
Alma Braškytė
Director Kirilas Glušajevas about about the space of the performance
OKT Studio is, for me, one of the most important landmarks on the theatre map of Vilnius and Lithuania. My first experiences there were watching “The Lower Depths” multiple times, each time re-reading the play and rediscovering how the entire team, along with Oskaras Koršunovas and Dainius Liškevičius, transformed a simple office room into an inseparable element of the performance’s magic. Later, during a brutally hot summer, we rehearsed “The Seagull” there. We held open showings with audiences, leading up to the premiere. I later produced “Therapies” in the studio, became part of the cast of “The Lower Depths” and experienced that space in a completely different way. The studio has hosted Christmas celebrations where people from all walks of life gathered – various
artists playing music and DJing. Significant periods of my life were born in this space. For me, the studio is a spontaneous “locus nascendi” of theatre. Its energy, charge, and history are as vivid and significant as the practice and legend of Grotowski’s studio in Wrocław, or the underground and revolutionary history of Teatr.doc in Moscow.
The creative process of “Mother” reflected what I had experienced in this space: the habit of using what is available rather than what could be, relying on the sparse space, where its age, history, and wear are both seen and felt. The intimacy with the audience, the architecture’s influence on performance solutions, and the synergy of authentic action and vibration – all thanks to this ready-made space and its actors –were crucial elements. It was important to me that the premiere of “Mother” also reflected the history of OKT, as March 2024 marks its 25th anniversary. During
rehearsals, I was struck by the rich simplicity of the room, so I decided to leave the corridor open all the way to the office, allowing a view of the dressing room and corridors from a particular angle. The actors – OKT’s creators and the foundation of modern Lithuanian theatre – Rasa Samuolytė and Dainius Gavenonis, contributed their suggestions. Rasa mentioned the carpet, and I immediately knew it had to be included. Dainius suggested running through the hall, which became one of the leitmotifs. The staircase, the rear curtain from “The Seagull”, the table, chairs, and even a bed made from the table – all elements of OKT’s everyday life and history – are used and reinterpreted here.
Anna’s inner world is equally intertwined, blurring the boundaries between herself and others, between yesterday and now. It is marginal, borderline, and unstable. As a result, the characters created by the young generation of OKT actors in this space are unique. Having grown with the performances of this space, alongside the actors who shaped it, they are the youngest here – just like their characters – but they are at home, they are family, and their lives are consumed by Anna’s pain, by her boundlessness.
The curtains and the construction that create additional framing of the space emerged from our
reflections on the allure of this authentic, “wrinkled” environment and the possibility of temporarily concealing it. What if we hid the space and then revealed it? This led us to the idea of hiding the space from Anna by reducing her acting area to the scale of a hospital ward, mirroring the partitions of an intensive care room. Until that point, the partitions represent no limitations, just as Anna’s boundless inner world knows no confines.
Everything we created was born from the space itself – the space led us, and we didn’t resist. For scenographer Marius Jacovskis, this was his first performance in the studio, and at the start of rehearsals, he said, “Nothing is needed here.” We allowed ourselves to be inspired entirely by the space. Much like in life’s vast spaces – whether often or seldom, more or less – we are products of our environment. Just like this play.
It’s a play where the house has no boundaries, a play whose space is the theatre itself, a play where Anna and her relatives live, and where several generations of actors have lived – 25 years of OKT, about 15 years for the studio.
The studio is a rehearsal space, a stage, a gathering place, a place to grow, create, be born, die, mourn, and celebrate. It’s like a HOME – our home. And Anna’s.
By perceiving images as objects, we perform a “natural” reduction of them into the domain of spatiality. We are condemned to do so if we wish to orient ourselves – it is precisely the coordinates provided by space that facilitate and simplify both real and fictional perceptions. This action cannot be controlled. Imagination, which is a fundamental temporality, itself supplies us with the constant illusion of “inner space.”
– Kristupas Sabolius “Space and Imagination”
Albert Camus
Caligula
Time September 28th | 19:00
Venue The Old Theatre of Vilnius
Duration 220’
Production
The Old Theatre of Vilnius
Director
Jokūbas Brazys
Set and Costume Design
Karolina Fiodorovaitė
Score
Mantas Mockus
Lighting Design
Karolis Zajauskas
Assistant Set Designer
Augustė Smaliukaitė
Stage Manager
Nadežda Pereverzeva
Cast:
Artur Svorobovič
Edita Gončarova
Viačeslav Lukjanov
Artūras Aleksejevas
Valentin Novopolskij
Aleksandr Kanajev
Igoris Abramovičius
Maksim Tuchvatulin
Dmitrij Denisiuk
Jekaterina Makarova
Liuda Gnatenko
Vladimir Dorondov
Translator
Birutė Gedgaudaitė
Premiere Date
28th February, 2024
Lietuvos teatro vitrina
The plot of Albert Camus’s play might seem straightforward: the Roman emperor Caligula grapples with the death of his sister and concubine, Drusilla. This profound loss transforms Caligula, impacting his relationships with those around him and his view of the Roman Empire. His behaviour becomes erratic, escalating into murder; numerous hypocrites, sycophants, and their innocent relatives fall victim to his wrath. The emperor, who exhibits traits of a serial killer, is ultimately revealed as a man wrestling with the absurd, using his killings as a perverse method of educating those around him. The play concludes with Caligula’s moral collapse and his dual confession –to his mistress, Caesonia, and to himself.
“The performance is set in a theatre café – a liminal space, a microcosm where reality and illusion intermingle. Caligula’s actions, akin to an artistic feud, expose the darker aspects of human nature and consciousness.” (Jokūbas Brazys)
Albert Camus (1913–1960), a French writer and philosopher and Nobel Prize laureate in Literature, wrote “Caligula” in 1938. His novel “The Stranger”
Director Jokūbas Brazys about about the space of the performance
“Caligula” by Albert Camus is a play in which the death of Caligula’s sister, Drusilla, serves as the catalyst for the unfolding events. This idea became the central axis for creating the space and scenery of our production. Together with set designer Karolina Fiodorovaitė, we decided to set the action in a theatre canteen – an intermediate space that, through its everyday intimacy, perfectly reflects the thematic layers of the play. The theatre canteen is a place where reality begins to crack, and illusion slowly dissipates.
In our play, the action begins with the death of the actress who was to portray Drusilla. Faced with this tragedy, the actors search for ways to integrate it into their work, making this personal loss a part of the
and philosophical essay “The Myth of Sisyphus”, both published in German-occupied Paris during World War II, offer a new perspective on this text.
Jokūbas Brazys, born in 1995, a theatre director and student of Oskaras Koršunovas and Eimuntas Nekrošius, completed his directing studies at the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre in 2021. He stages productions in Vilnius and Klaipėda theatres and collaborates with international theatre festivals.
“Who today experiences despair like Camus’s Caligula? Such profound disgust at the pettiness and corruption of oneself and others, and such an insatiable desire for the Moon? Jokūbas Brazys explores this intense experience through theatre and the actor who takes on the role of Caligula. The actor confronts his own weakness, facing himself through the absurdity of TV commercials and the realization that even grief over a loved one’s death will eventually fade. No one is immune to his contempt and hatred – not his colleagues, the theatre environment and its relationships, or society itself, where even the lifestyle coach wears Christ’s crown of thorns. Yet once the decision is made to cross that line, there is no turning back. To maintain consistency, the actor-Caligula must ultimately destroy himself.”
Alma Braškytė
Caligula character they are developing. This process mirrors both the actors’ and Caligula’s own attempts to understand and shape their identities. In his search for freedom, Caligula begins to create a theatre of his own.
In our performance, every element of the scenery is carefully considered and serves to reveal the inner world and emotions of the characters. Mirrors, trays, and other objects from the theatre canteen are not just scenography elements but also significant symbols that support the story’s flow and character development.
For example, the watermelon on the table at the beginning of the second act symbolizes Palestine. When the Saviour appears, the watermelon is pushed aside, leaving no room for it. This action transforms the scene into a lynching court, reflecting a drastic shift in both the space and the characters’ internal
states. In the play, the basketball becomes a symbol of Lithuanian identity. It fills with oxygen and explodes, never becoming a moon. The large ladder on which Herea tries to replace a burnt-out lightbulb, following Caligula’s order, symbolizes the character’s precarious balance between life and death. With no bulb to replace, Herea teeters on the edge of death, caught in Caligula’s absurd philosophy. Caligula’s act of washing his feet in a small aquarium symbolizes his power to grant and revoke the freedom of others. But enough has been revealed – the symbols must be decoded by the viewer’s imagination. Every item used on stage is meaningful and deliberately chosen, turning the theatre canteen into a space where each element has its purpose and contributes to the overall creation of the performance’s world.
“The architecture of the theatre, the container for the performance, plays a crucial role in the effect on the audience. Space shapes the experience.”
– Anne Bogart, “A Director Prepares: Seven Essays on Art and Theatre”
Lustopia
Time September 29th | 13:00
Venue Arts Printing House
Duration 65’
Production
Low Air (Lithuania), Silke Z. (Germany)
Artistic Director
Silke Z.
Choreography:
Silke Z., Laurynas Žakevičius, Airida Gudaitė
Light and Stage Design
Garlef Kessler
Music & Sound Design
Liam Giles, Laurynas Žakevičius
Costumes
Melina Jusczyk
Management
Hanna Held
Organisation
Rica Hellige
Assistant
Franziska Nagel
Dancers:
Caroline Simon
Hanna Held
David Winking
Grėtė Vosyliūtė
Dmitrijus Andrušanecas
Darius Stankevičius
Premiere Date 2024
Lietuvos teatro vitrina
“Lustopia” is an intergenerational and inclusive stage piece exploring the themes of desire and utopia. It is coproduced by the Vilnius urban dance company LOW AIR (Lithuania) and Silke Z. / Die Metabolisten (Germany).
Cologne-based contemporary choreographer Silke Z., along with dancers, choreographers, and dance teachers Laurynas Žakevičius and Airida Gudaitė, created this performance focusing on the themes of lust and utopia. The ensemble, comprising choreographers and six dancers from Lithuania and Germany, spans a wide range of ages, generations, abilities, and dance backgrounds, marking a significant step towards diversity and inclusion in the performing arts. The project moves playfully between pleasure, obscenity, body-shaming, and body positivity, deliberately rubbing up against social norms and existing taboos. In their pursuit of lustful freedom and joint dance exploration of boundaries and contact with each other, “Lustopia” follows the utopia of a moving fusion
of bodies. The performance creators question whether LUST is bound by specific characteristics such as age, gender, body, or disability, and examine whether shame and insecurities related to gender, age, or disability get in the way of UTOPIA.
“Lustopia” invites the audience to a dance performance that celebrates the differences of each individual and explores the utopia of a shared identity.
Choreographer Laurynas Žakevičius about about the space of the performance
From the very beginning of creating the performance, the aim was to offer the audience an experience, not just an aesthetic. The elements of the scenography transform during the performance, just as our preconceived notions about disability, the aging body, or the dancer’s body transform. Together with the set designers, we sought to create a space where one could first explore and later engage in the process of transformation during the performance.
“Dance has played a significant role in contemporary Lithuanian performing arts for quite a while. Recently, it has made bold strides into the repertoires of drama and puppet theatres, inspiring even actors with no previous dance experience to take the stage. Thus, it felt essential to represent contemporary dance in this year’s showcase. The performance is also a noteworthy example of international cooperation, which is becoming increasingly vital for Lithuanian creators. Most importantly, “Lustopia” speaks to the lost, lonely, and divided, offering a vision of creating a shared world and collective joy.”
Kristina Steiblytė
The scenography, music, costumes, as well as the direction and choreography, all begin with individual ideas, but once they enter the rehearsal room, they gradually become enriched by collective experience. In the creative process of the performance, the dancers are invited to step into their inner spaces, talk about their states, and courageously reflect on their most and least favorite parts of their bodies. The utopian reality created by the scenography and soundscape leads both the audience and the dancers toward an open encounter.
Things I Didn’t Dare to Say, and It’s Too Late Now
Phone Booth Opera
Laikas September 29th | 15:30
Vieta Lithuanian National Drama Theatre
Trukmė 90’
Production:
Lithuanian National Drama Theatre, Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre, Operomanija
Director and Dramaturge
Kamilė Gudmonaitė
Composer
Dominykas Digimas
Set Designer and Author of Video Projection Concept
Barbora Šulniūtė
Choreographer
Mantas Stabačinskas
Costume Designer
Juozas Valenta
Light Designer
Julius Kuršis
Video Designer
Jurgis Lietunovas
Music Director and Conductor
Ričardas Šumila
Choirmaster
Povilas Butkus
Director’s Assistants:
Agnė Ambrozaitytė
Kotryna Siaurusaitytė
Deivydas Valenta
Translator
Erika Lastovskytė
Cast:
Teodoras Lipčius
Ryo Ishimoto
Emilija Karosaitė
Viktorija Zobielaitė
Jolanta Dapkūnaitė
Vytautas Rumšas
Diana Anevičiūtė
Mantas Stabačinskas
Arūnas Vozbutas
Romalda Abramaitienė
Dmitrijus Babašinskis
Sandra Biaigo
Konstantin Kosovec
Daiva Lenčė
Rima Vaniarchina
LNOBT Choir Singers:
Gintarė Radauskaitė
Olga Radzevičienė
Lina Šarkienė
Monika Buožytė
Jovita Dovsevičiūtė
Evelina Greiciūnaitė
Julija Smolič
Anna Trošina
Egidijus Jonaitis
Mantas Ivanauskas
Kęstutis Papartis
Georgij Popov
Dainius Jakštas
Žygimantas Jasiūnas
Donatas Žukauskas
Povilas Butkus
Šarūnas Čepulis
Group of LNOBT Symphony Orchestra:
Dainius Peseckas
Aistė Birvydaitė
Tomas Savickas
Gabrielė Zaneuskaitė
Rokas Vaitkevičius
Mykolas Rutkauskas
Donatas Bagurskas
Samanta Ignatjeva
Vytautas Sriubikis
Vytenis Gurstis
Vytautas Giedraitis
Vilius Kalvėnas
Kazimieras Jušinskas
Tomas Kulikauskas
Almantas Puidokas
Ernestas Verba
Lukas Budzinauskas
Marija Grikevičiūtė
Partner
Technarium
The work’s development commenced in 2021 within the framework of a collaborative project “Opera Genome,” a joint effort between LNOBT and “Operomanija.”
Premiere Date 1st December, 2023
N-16
In 2010, Itaru Sasaki from Otsuchi, Japan, learned that his beloved cousin had cancer and only had three months to live. After his cousin’s death, Sasaki built an old telephone booth in his backyard so that he could communicate with the deceased every day and have his words carried away by the wind.
In 2011, a tsunami struck the Otsuchi area, killing ten percent of the city’s population. Gradually, people became aware of the telephone booth and started visiting Itaru Sasaki’s garden to call their lost loved ones.
From 1 March 2022, just one week after Russia started the war in Ukraine, an old telephone booth, identical to the wind phone that stood in Japan, was installed next to the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre. People were invited to come and ‘call’ those to whom they didn’t have the chance to say what they wanted in time, and now it was too late. In over six months, the phone has been picked up about 4000
times. The audio recordings of all the authentic stories became the basis for the opera’s libretto.
The telephone booth opera Things I Didn’t Dare to Say, and It’s Too Late Now is a sensitive, subtle, bright, and hopeful story about a grieving person. At the same time, it is a clear cut through the geographical territories opened up by grief, a journey towards encounter, reconciliation, and the experience of the world as a whole.
Set Designer Barbora Šulniūtė about about the space of the performance
The creative process of designing the scenography for this performance began from conversations with Kamilė about life, the passage of time, and an intuitive sense of the beyond. As I started developing the scenography, I sought to create a space that was both monumental and abstract, yet still evoked references and associations to temporality and transitional states. I have always found airports intriguing as liminal spaces – places not bound by the dimension of time, where different people, races, and histories intersect, some travel in winter jackets, others in sandals and shorts, everyone is waiting, suspended in this border zone. There is so much life and movement, even though being there feels like a glimpse into the future, a period of waiting. This in-between state reminded me of the stories from payphone booth recordings, where conversations most often turn to the beyond, to loved ones who are no longer present but still feel close. The closing gate, the slanting vertical, the plane taking off – a portal within a portal.
From the beginning, we aimed to create this space architecturally, maintaining a contrast between the monumental and the minuscule, as if looking from afar, reminiscent of the Japanese painting tradition. This led to a reference to a crematorium in Belgium, which inspired the scenography as a principle of spatial construction and further emphasized the feeling of moving toward the beyond.
Our collaboration with Kamilė is highly intuitive, intertwined, and fluid. It evolves through our conversations, journeys, and shared experiences, accumulating in the creative material and laying the foundation for future work.
The scenery, while monumental and “empty,” provides ample space to evoke feelings of sadness, longing, and loneliness experienced by the characters. Throughout the performance, several elements emerge that serve as associative references to the stories we’ve heard, Kamilė’s childhood memories, and the setting of the action.
I aimed to avoid overloading the space, allowing it to breathe and hold the stories that resonate within these walls and are reflected in Dominykas’s music, Julius’s lighting, and Jurgis’s projections.
Director Kamilė Gudmonaitė about about the space of the performance
Listening to the recordings from the payphone booth, I began to perceive images from my subconscious through the quivering voices of those who left them. These images depicted both the speakers and those they spoke about – those who had departed and those still walking the city streets. I wanted to create an extremely fragile world of people, objects, and things that pass through the stage and life itself. Interestingly and sometimes rather illogically, the associative images began to evoke memories of my own childhood: the sisters with roller skates reminded me of roller-skating trips with my dad to Vingio Park in the wild ‘90s, when we once returned to find our car missing. A parachute recalled one of the toys my dad gave me when I first imagined flying. A small remote-
control car being repaired on stage, with front lights like eyes, guided me back to my grandfather who was a huge fan of technology and gadgets. As rehearsals progressed, it became clear that these unconscious images originated from the light, painful, and pure constellations of my past. These images proved to be so universal that they resonated with the audience’s own experiences of loss. We needed a space where these images could “get through,” and Barbora suggested a most beautiful setting: an airport, inspired by the architecture of a crematorium in Belgium. This liminal, in-between space allowed us to explore themes of being stuck, transition, and travel in a deep, minimalist way. Barbora and I create very intuitively together, deeply immersed in world perceptions, feelings, and personal experiences. Our collaboration is a blend of complementary ideas and mutual inspiration.
“There are many ways to understand space, and there are many dimensions of space. There is the immediate environment, also known as the egocentric environment. There is an environment that we can understand as if seen from a bird’s-eye view, like a map that shows the relationship between oneself –a person – and different objects.”
– Dr. Julija Krupič. Excerpt from podcast “Minties Eksperimentai” by Ignas Klėjus
International Programme
As the biggest and oldest ongoing festival in Lithuania, since 2004 SIRENOS has been proudly presenting a large number of the most prominent theatre makers from Europe and the rest of the world. The festival has been introducing new theatre realities and innovative artistic visions pertinent to the times we live in. Quite often these visions would push audiences out of their comfort zones, demanding them to turn their imaginations on and explore unknown territories, act curiously, observantly, and notice thousands of diverse elements in the puzzle of the contemporary world.
It is precisely this quest for diversity and the urge to find new functioning models for the world, that motivate us to expand on the festival’s geography and philosophy. Belonging to a certain nation, country, culture, sex, or language in the global world of today means constantly adding new dimensions to our identity. Art festivals are probably the best platforms to ground these dimensions without becoming slaves to the narratives thrown at us, to look at the world through the eyes of a particular artist.
International Programme is curated by Kristina Savickiene, artistic director of the festival.
The Space We Change and in Which We Change
Rimgailė Renevytė
The audience hall only became dark in the 19th century with the invention of gas lighting, which solved one of the biggest challenges in theatre: actors could see the audience, and more crucially, the audience could see each other.1 The primary reason creators needed darkness –cutting the feedback loop (“feedback-Schleife”) – was to put the actors back in control of the play’s action. Until then, not only did the actors’ actions affect the audience, but the audience’s actions during the performance also affected the actors and other spectators. The unpredictability of the audience’s actions and the actors’ reactions to these actions became seen as errors, unplanned flaws in the performance. Thus, the creators aimed to transform the audience’s external reactions into internal ones, encouraging engagement with the performance through observation rather than participation (where participation could include commenting on the action or responding to the actors). The most significant experimentation with theatre/ stage space occurred when the perception of space and theatre itself fundamentally changed in the 1960s, following the so-called shift in performativity.
During this period, audience activity became essential for plays, performances, happenings, political manifestations, actions, or other theatrical events. Artists of the time drew inspiration from the works of Brecht, Artaud, and Grotowski, and the spectator’s role evolved into that of an active “participant.”2 However, the “theatrical connection,” based on the metaphor of a meeting between the spectator and the actor, soon became unsuitable for post-dramatic theatre.3
The existing tools, such as Brecht’s and Grotowski’s experiments with the distance between the actor and the spectator, became outdated and ineffective. Thus, new, unexpected possibilities were sought, primarily in unfamiliar spaces that offered these opportunities. Alternative spaces gradually became venues for theatre, with factories, printing houses, commercial and administrative premises transforming into stages. Even entirely new spaces were created for performances. The concept of the theatrical spectacle itself changed. Experiments proliferated, aiming to impact the spectator through impressions and appealing to individual experiences and senses. Audiences were captivated by interactive, immersive, and multimedia performances,4 where visuality and direct experience played significant roles. Consequently, the spaces where these theatrical phenomena took place became equally “performative”, offering participation opportunities to the spectator. This shift raises questions about how the space of the actor and the spectator is constructed. What effect does this have on the actor-audience relationship? What new communication possibilities do these spatial transformations offer to performance participants? Having become central figures of the performance at the beginning of the 20th century, directors changed the trend of a separated and obscured audience space, which had prevailed until then. They did not seek to eliminate the audience’s reactions but rather to control them in alignment with the performance’s concept: “[…] directing had to include the audience’s behaviour, to organize and manage the feedback loop.”5 A key method for controlling (or even manipulating) the audience’s reactions was transforming the performance space. For example, Max Reinhardt turned the stage into an arena, provoking unexpected reactions from the audience,6 Meyerhold eliminated the stage ramp by lowering it to the stalls and bringing it to the audience level,7 Artaud abandoned the separation of the stage and the hall entirely, replacing it with a single space without
Fischer-Lichte, Erika. „Performatyvumo estetika“. Vilnius: Menų spaustuvė, 2013, p. 62.
partitions or barriers separating the actors and the audience,8 and Grotowski, reducing theatre elements to just the actor and the audience, designed a new space structure for each performance.9 While Brecht’s epic theatre treated the audience as observers rather than participants, it still aimed to engage them by appealing to their awareness, encouraging a certain activity from the spectators.10 Alongside these experiments, traditional proscenium theatre also flourished, reacting to world events (wars, occupations, etc.) by coming to the fore or stepping back to allow space for experimentation. The shift in performativity provided an opportunity not only to play with the customary theatre space but also to venture into non-theatre spaces or even create new ones, fostering new connections between actors and spectators.
In today’s theatre, the relationship between the actor and the audience, as well as the course of the performance itself, has become much less predictable. This unpredictability encourages a multifaceted mutual dialogue and new shared experiences. However, it is important to note that “the performance space, organizing and structuring the relationship, movement, and perception of actors and spectators every time, does not determine them in any way. Performative space opens up possibilities but does not dictate how to use or implement them.”11 Since the theatre space itself is just a black box stage, “free” from meanings and open to the creation of any new world (performance), the creative team can transform this neutral space into a vibrant storytelling environment.
The actor in the audience’s space “The hall is filled with seats – armchairs and chairs. This indicates that the space called the ‘hall’ is meant solely for a group of people known as the audience to sit and watch. The stage, on the other hand, is an
empty space at a higher level than the hall, intended for other people who, unlike the quiet audience, actively move and act, hence they are called actors. But the most interesting thing is that everything the actors do on stage is performed for the audience to watch; when the audience leaves, the actors leave too – in other words, it all happens for the audience to see.”12 And yet, even though everything the actor does on stage is for the audience, the separation of the actor’s space from the audience’s space has both a physical and emotional effect. Physically, the actor’s space is separated by a ramp; they are lit, placed at the centre of attention, emphasizing that they are not equal to the audience. Emotionally, a “fourth wall” emerges between the actors and the audience, isolating the emotions of both parties. This separation suppresses feedback: by pretending that their space is invisible to the spectator, actors do not encourage the spectator to react, thus “condemning” the stage to remain closed. However, an increasing number of examples in contemporary theatre aim for emotional interactivity between actors and the audience. In performative theatre, the actor’s entry into the audience space allows the audience to abandon passivity. When the audience’s role changes, the actor’s role changes as well. By “encroaching on” the spectator’s space, creators seek new spatial compositions and embrace the altered relationship between actor and spectator: “We abandoned the structure of the ‘stage and audience hall’: while producing each new performance, we map out a new space for the actors and the audience. Then the relationship between the performers and the audience opens up the possibility of unlimited variations.”13 By combining the stage and the audience hall, the creators merge groups of people with different functions: observers and actors. This transformation changes not only the relationship between the two but also their roles: “It doesn’t make much sense to talk about producer (“Produzent”) or perceiver (“Rezipient”). Rather, we should talk about co-authors, who contribute to the performance Artaud, Antonin. „Teatras ir jo antrininkas“. Vilnius: Scena, 1999, p. 85. Grotowski, Jerzy. „Skurdžiojo teatro link“. Vilnius: Apostrofa, 2011, p. 16. Bertoldas, Brechtas. „Epinis teatras. Teatrinės minties pėdsakais“. Sud. Antanas Vengris. Vilnius: Mintis, 1969, p. 185. Fischer-Lichte, Erika. „Performatyvumo estetika“. Vilnius: Menų spaustuvė, 2013, p. 178.
y Gasset,
Ortega
Jose. Teatro idėja. „Mūsų laikų tema ir kitos esė“. Vilnius: Vaga, 1999, p. 393.
Grotowski, Jerzy. „Skurdžiojo teatro link“. Vilnius: Apostrofa, 2011, p. 16.
in different ways and extents but cannot determine it. By interacting, they create a performance that, in turn, only makes them actors and spectators. The actors and the audience, with their actions and behaviour, are elements of a feedback loop – the performance creates itself as such a loop.”14 Thus, the actor’s impact on the spectator is significantly stronger as in traditional theatre, but equally crucial is the effect the spectator has on the actor. The spectator shifts from being a passive observer to becoming an active, or at least potentially active, participant. This new role for the spectator demands greater responsibility from the actor, both for their actions and for the potential reactions of the spectator. The merging of the actor and spectator spaces requires the actor to pay exclusive attention to the spectator as an equal partner. The “authority” granted to the audience by the creators themselves not only changes the role of the spectator but also makes them responsible for the work nurtured collectively “here and now.” Although this approach is risky and requires carefully thoughtout boundaries for the spectator’s role, it offers new, previously unexperienced possibilities and leads to a constantly evolving creative outcome.
The space of the gaze Schechner emphasizes that in a decentred space, the spectator simply cannot see everything: “The spectator must move or completely refocus his attention to catch everything that is going on.”15 The role of the spectator in the performance doesn’t change significantly due to the specifics of the space, except for one thing – without changing their position, the spectators must still follow the performance, which unfolds simultaneously in different areas, at least minimally visible from their vantage point. Therefore, the plot of the play partly depends on the spectators and how they “direct” it with their gaze: “As the spectator in the theatre focuses his attention, he has to make choices
Fischer-Lichte, Erika. „Performatyvumo estetika“. Vilnius: Menų spaustuvė, 2013, p. 81.
Schechner, Richard. 6 Axioms to Environmental Theatre. „The Drama Review: TDR“. Cambridge: The MIT press, 1968, Vol. 12, No. 3, p. 58.
as to where he will look at any stage of the performance: at the hero’s action, or the villain’s re-action, up at Juliet, or down at Romeo in the balcony scene, and so on. In that respect the spectator in a live performance does what the camera does for him in the cinematic forms of drama: he creates a sequence of close-ups and longshots, a freely chosen ‘montage’ of focused images.”16 In this case, the decentred space itself becomes a factor not only for the form but also for the content of the performance, allowing the spectator to choose the direction of their gaze. This gaze in the performance of the decentred space is equivalent to the “gaze” of the camera in the cinema. The spectator in the theatre “encounters” the space directly, whereas the cinema and television viewer is “drawn in” and guided through different spaces. The camera acts as the viewer’s eye, leading them to whichever space presents.17 However, the fundamental difference between the camera and the spectator’s gaze is that the camera makes it easier for the spectator to identify with a character or action, allowing them to experience the story more intensely: “[...] the audience’s anxiety about losing coherence and the threat of being either left behind or exposed to the gaze becomes the glue that forces them to stick even more fervently to the flow of the film – that is, to ‘identify’ with its dominant gaze.”18 In the theatre, the spectator’s gaze wanders between objects and different scenes of action taking place simultaneously. The decentred space inherently requires a gaze functioning like a camera or a gaze that creates a montage. Otherwise, the spectator only observes the chaotic breathing of an unfamiliar world: “The stage is divided into separate parts, and the ‘montage’ of those parts gives the spectators the impression that they see separate series of parallel actions.”19
Esslin, Martin. „The Field of Drama: How the Signs of Drama Create Meaning on Stage and Screen“. Methuen Drama: London, 1988, p. 94. Ibid., p. 96.
Elsaesser, Thomas; Hagener, Malte. „Kino teorija: įvadas per juslių prizmę“. Vilnius: Mintis, 2012, p. 112–113. Lehmann, Hans-Thies. „Postdraminis teatras“. Vilnius: Menų spaustuvė, 2010. p. 228.
The spectator in the actor’s space
“The theatre spectator has long been defined by his position in space: in front of the stage, involved in theatrical relations based on the coexistence of the audience and the actors in the same spacetime.”20 However, when considering the traditionally separated spaces of the actor and the spectator and the communication between them, with the “fourth wall” restricting any personal connection, a question arises: how is the spectator involved in “theatrical relationships” when their space is isolated from the actor? Perhaps the idea that “the stage space acts as a mirror in which the homogeneous world of the audience recognizes itself in the equally consistent world of the drama”21 no longer satisfies the expectations of the audience, either in terms of the actor or the performance. “[…] when we compare our behaviour in everyday life to our behaviour in the theatre, we see that as an audience, we do nothing or do a little more than nothing: we want the actors to “act on” us, for example, to “make” us cry or laugh. So, the theatre consists of hyperactive and hyperpassive people. The hyperpassive audience performs the most minimal action imaginable – they just “watch”, and that’s all.”22 The everyday world of the spectator is inundated by media and increasing chaos, confusion, and even infantilism. In response to the changing human relationship to the environment, creators are seeking new spaces, genres, and forms of communication. To let the spectator into the actor’s space, the spectator’s own space is transformed – an empty space with a changing composition or even a different purpose is used. The spectator is guided not only from the hall but sometimes even from the theatre itself, so that the space would provide a new experience: “[...] they feel transported, sometimes against their will, to a performance and an event, for example, to disputes,
manifestations, walks in the city, etc., where reality and fiction constantly alternate. Thus, they no longer watch the performance from the sidelines, ready to analyze its ‘inner’ signs, but are in the performance, or sometimes they “are the performance”.”23 As Patrice Pavi notes, the spectator becomes an essential element of the performance, actively contributing to its meanings. The transformed space of the spectator itself offers unconventional forms of communication: “Creating your own vision for the spectator means evaluating from which perspective, from which point of view they look. [...] Where the performers do not play roles but are themselves, addressing the audience directly and discussing personal experiences, the spectator is no longer opposed to fictitious characters or the plot. Instead, they search for the best position (distance) when observing both real testimonies and theatrical moments.”24 In many cases, the distance between the actor and the observer is eliminated through the actor’s own initiative, which changes the role of the spectator from a passive observer to an active participant, actor, creator, or co-author. However, as both the spectator’s and actor’s spaces become fluid, traditional comfort zones and control over the action disappear. Therefore, the chosen space must be carefully designed to ensure that the spectator is “safely” integrated into the action. When offering the spectator an active role, creators consider the “contemporary spectator’s” awareness and the influence of the environment and entertainment culture in particular. Interactivity becomes a key tool for engaging the spectator – facilitating communication that involves them directly: “The spectator moves from one framework to another, crosses thresholds, and gets accustomed to not looking for a new ‘message,’ which previously triggered him and made him analyze the dramatic situation. Rather than analyzing (conducting a dramaturgical or semiotic analysis), he yields to the experience, critical impressionism, and atmosphere.”25
Patrice, Pavis. Žiūrovas. „Recepcijos menas“. Vilnius: Lietuvos kultūros tyrimų institutas, 2016, p. 127.
Lehmann, Hans-Thies. „Postdraminis teatras“. Vilnius: Menų spaustuvė, 2010, p. 226.
Ortega y Gasset, Jose. „Teatro idėja. Mūsų laikų tema ir kitos esė“. Vilnius: Vaga, 1999, p. 394.
Patrice, Pavis. Žiūrovas. „Recepcijos menas“. Vilnius: Lietuvos kultūros tyrimų institutas, 2016, p. 125.
While examining contemporary theatre, it becomes evident that changes in the space and the role of the spectator can significantly alter the form, genre, or structure of the performance. Creators often strive to find the most effective ways to connect with their audience and may explore various approaches, such as involving the audience in the creation of the performance, playing while focusing on the audience as the central character, or moving beyond traditional theatre spaces into non-theatrical settings, which become part of the scenery themselves. Found spaces, newly created spaces, or even transitional spaces are employed by creators as theatrical tools, encouraging the audience to use their imagination and actively “try out” the theatre themselves. As Schechner notes, when moving through different spaces, the action “breathes,” and the audience itself becomes a major scenic element. 26 Additionally, the concept of “immersive” theatre is particularly relevant here. Immersive theatre involves the movement of spectators through non-traditional spaces specially prepared for the performance. This genre is characterized by open dramaturgy – allowing for a non-linear, flexible structure – and emphasizes the involvement and participation of the spectator in the action of the performance, becoming part of the narrative and becoming a character without losing their individual identities. 27 Regarding the choosing of found spaces for performances, it is crucial that creators consider the architecture, function, materiality, acoustics, and other characteristics of the space. As Schechner points out, it is necessary to “explore” the chosen space in order to make the most of it. 28 Ignoring the specific features of a chosen space can lead creators to become disconnected from the inherent qualities of the environment. The inherent activity of found spaces cannot be easily suppressed. Even if creators attempt
to manipulate the space, venturing into site-specific theatre, it doesn’t mean that the space itself doesn’t impose any constraints, and it becomes a challenge. In contrast to the neutrality of a traditional black box theatre, which is empty and devoid of narratives and meanings, a “speaking” space requires attentiveness. Failing to engage with the space’s existing narrative can result in excessive “noise” and create a conflict where the space and the performance tell contradictory stories.
Therefore, when constructing the performance space, the director also transforms the relationship between actor and spectator: “[...] there is only the actor and only the observer, and there are no veins that would connect these two separate bodies with the circulation of creative energies.”29 It turns out that what Meyerhold described as “two mutually alien worlds,”30 i.e. the distinct spaces and experiences of spectators and actors, can be bridged by moving beyond traditional theatre spaces – the audience hall and the stage – or by manipulating these spaces. “Strategies that serve as catalysts and seek to ‘jolt you out’ of dominant, ideologized forms of experiencing reality can be highly effective. Such approaches aim to explore and alter prevailing perceptions rather than merely reproducing or reinforcing them through conventional and stable aesthetic conventions.”31
Schechner, Richard. 6 Axioms to Environmental Theatre. „The Drama Review: TDR“. Cambridge: The MIT press, 1968, Vol. 12, No. 3, p. 49.
Bouko, Catherine. Interactivity and immersion in a media-based performance. „Participations“. 2014, Nr. 11, p. 254 – 256.
Schechner, Richard. 6 Axioms to Environmental Theatre. „The Drama Review: TDR“. Cambridge: The MIT press, 1968, Vol. 12, No. 3, p. 50.
Mejerhold, Vsevolod. „Apie teatrą“. Apostrofa: Vilnius, 2008, p. 45. Ibid.
Staniškytė, Jurgita. „Kaitos ženklai: šiuolaikinis Lietuvos teatras tarp modernizmo ir postmodernizmo“. Vilnius: Scena, 2008, p. 31.
Pleasant Island
Time October 3rd | 19:00
Venue Arts Printing House
Duration 60’
Production Campo (Belgium)
By & with: Silke Huysmans
Hannes Dereere
Dramaturge
Dries Douibi
Sound mixing
Lieven Dousselaere
Technical Anne Meeussen & Piet Depoortere
Premiere 2019
“I always ask my parents: during your time, you failed to address this. And this is what we inherit as your children. It is not our fault, but we inherit it because of what you prepared for us. Then that question always challenges me as I become a parent myself of two sons. I always ask myself: what is Nauru I’m preparing for my two sons? What are we preparing for our children to survive on?”
— Quote from the performance
Silke Huysmans and Hannes Dereere, two young creators of documentary theatre, have already earned acclaim on major European stages. Exclusively focused on environmental themes, their work is characterized by long and meticulous preparation. Rooted in extensive artistic, scientific, and journalistic research, the process begins with conversations with experts in the field and people who have found themselves in the midst of the action, culminating in documentary performances that address universally important themes. This year, the Sirenos Festival will present two performances from their environmental trilogy.
“Pleasant Island” is the second work by these artists about one of the smallest nations in the world. With an area of only 21 square kilometers, one can cross the island in less than 20 minutes by car on its only road. This is the Republic of Nauru, once called “Pleasant Island” by European explorers, but now one of the least visited places by tourists in the world.
The island’s landscape, maimed by European mining corporations and destroyed ecosystems, resembles that of an unknown planet. It unfolds as a metaphor for the broken fates of the island’s residents. At the same time, the creators see Nauru as a post-apocalyptic parable for the future of our planet. Once the richest nation in the world for a short while, today the island of Nauru has been left in economic and ecological ruins, impacted by the effects of colonization, capitalism, migration, and ecological distress, the consequences of which still linger today.
Today, Nauru is most known for hosting Australian refugee detention centers in return for a large amount of Australian money. This arrangement led the government of Nauru to ban most journalists and researchers from entering the island in an attempt to suppress negative news from reaching the outside world. Meanwhile, the island faces the imminent threat of being swallowed by the ocean due to rising sea levels.
Silke and Hannes were granted exceptional permission to enter the island for a couple of weeks in the summer of 2018. In this post-apocalyptic setting, they sought to capture the historical, ecological, and humanitarian exhaustion of the island, and by extension, of our entire planet. How do we confront the limitations of a world fixated on endless growth? What idea of the future remains for Nauru and the rest of the world?
Silke Huysmans & Hannesas Dereere’as
Silke Huysmans (Brazil, 1989) studied drama at KASK School of Arts in Ghent, and Hannes Dereere (Belgium, 1990) studied theatre science at Ghent University. With their work, the two Brussels-based artists investigate the use of journalistic and documentary elements within theatre. At the heart of their artistic practice is extensive field research. From 2016 to 2022, they worked on long-term research on mining, which resulted in a trilogy.
The first part, “Mining Stories”, premiered at Beursschouwburg in Brussels (2016). For this performance, Silke & Hannes returned to the place where Silke grew up in Brazil. In 2015, a dam burst, flooding this place
with toxic mining waste, causing one of the biggest ecological mining disasters in recent history. “Mining Stories” was selected for Het Theater Festival 2017 (Belgium) and received the main prize at the Zürcher Theaterspektakel 2018 (Switzerland).
In 2019, the second part, “Pleasant Island”, premiered at Kunstenfestivaldesarts in Brussels.
“Out of the Blue” concludes the trilogy. In this final piece, Silke & Hannes look at the future of mining from the perspective of a Belgian deep-sea mining company. Through interviews and conversations, they sketch an in-depth portrait of an emerging industry. The piece premiered at Kunstenfestivaldesarts in 2022.
Out of the Blue
Time October 3rd | 19:00
Venue Arts Printing House
Duration 60’
Production Campo (Belgium)
By and with:
Silke Huysmans
Hannes Dereere
Dramaturgy
Dries Douibi
Sound Mixing
Lieven Dousselaere
Outside eye
Pol Heyvaert
Technique
Korneel Coessens
Piet Depoortere
Koen Goossens
Babette Poncelet
Coproduction:
Bunker (Ljubljana), De Brakke
Grond (Amsterdam), Noorderzon –
Festival of Performing Arts and Society (Groningen), Zürcher
Theater Spektakel (Zurich), Beursschouwburgm
Kunstenfestivaldesarts (Brussels), PACT Zollverein (Essen), Théâtre de la Ville (Paris), Festival d’Automne à Paris (Paris)
Residencies:
Kunstenwerkplaats, Pilar, Bara142 (Toestand), De Grote Post, 30CC, GC De Markten & GC Felix Sohie
Special thanks to John Childs, Henko De Stigter, Patricia Esquete, Iason-Zois Gazis, Jolien Goossens, Matthias Haeckel, An Lambrechts, Ted Nordhaus, Maureen Penjueli, Surabhi Ranganathan, Duygu Sevilgen, Joey Tau, Saskia Van Aalst, Kris Van Nijen, Vincent Van Quickenborne & Annemiek Vink
Premiere 2022
The world is now fully colonized.
And right down to the smallest microscopic element of biodiversity is fully colonized by humankind. There’s nothing left on this planet.
People need to really think about where clean energy will come from.
OR
The Observers
They stood in the shadows
Quiet and invisible
Yet watching and listening
Looking from the surface
Everything
Observing
— Quote from the performance
Silke Huysmans and Hannes Dereere, two young creators of documentary theatre, have already earned acclaim on major European stages. Exclusively focused on environmental themes, their work is characterized by long and meticulous preparation. Rooted in extensive artistic, scientific, and journalistic research, the process begins with conversations with experts in the field and people who have found themselves in the midst of the action, culminating into documentary performances that address universally important themes. This year, the Sirenos Festival will present two performances from their environmental trilogy.
Out of the Blue is the third part of the trilogy, focusing on the deep sea.
We often hear saying, “We know more about the surface of the moon than we do about the bottom of the ocean.” when discussing the deep sea. Scientists point out that only 10 percent of the ocean floor has been mapped and explored, highlighting just how little we know about it.
After their acclaimed performances Mining Stories and Pleasant Island, Silke Huysmans and Hannes Dereere present the final part of their trilogy on mining. This time, they focus on a completely new industry: deep sea mining. With resources on land becoming increasingly scarce and overexploited, mining companies are turning towards the ocean. In the spring of 2021, three ships gather on a remote patch of the Pacific Ocean. One of them belongs to the Belgian dredging company Deme-GSR. Four kilometres below the sea surface, their mining robot is scraping the seabed in search of metals. On another ship, an international team of marine biologists and geologists keep a close watch on the operation. A third ship completes the fleet: aboard the infamous Rainbow Warrior, Greenpeace activists protest against this new industry, potentially bringing new ecological catastrophes.
From their small apartment in Brussels, Silke and Hannes connect with the three ships via satellite. Each of the ships represents one pillar of the public debate: industry, science, and activism. Through a series of interviews and conversations, an intimate portrait of this new industry emerges. The piece attempts to capture a potentially pivotal moment in the history of the earth. How much deeper can mining companies dig, and what are we as humankind actually digging towards? What are the challenges and risks? What opportunities potentially lie ahead?
Silke Huysmans & Hannesas Dereere’as
Silke Huysmans (Brazil, 1989) studied drama at KASK School of Arts in Ghent, and Hannes Dereere (Belgium, 1990) studied theatre science at Ghent University. With their work, the two Brussels-based artists investigate the use of journalistic and documentary elements within theatre. At the heart of their artistic practice is extensive field research. From 2016 to 2022, they worked on long-term research on mining, which resulted in a trilogy.
The first part, Mining Stories, premiered in the Beursschouwburg in Brussels (2016). For this performance, Silke & Hannes returned to the place where Silke grew up in Brazil. In 2015, a dam burst flooded this place with toxic mining waste, causing one of the biggest ecological
mining disasters in recent history. Mining Stories was selected for Het Theater Festival 2017 (Belgium) and received the main prize at the Zürcher Theaterspektakel 2018 (Switzerland).
In 2019, the second part, Pleasant Island, premiered at Kunstenfestivaldesarts in Brussels. In this performance, the island state Nauru holds up a mirror to the world. Nauru is often seen as a parable for our current world. The island was severely impacted by the effects of colonization, capitalism, forced migration and ecological distress, the consequences of which still linger today.
Out of the Blue concludes the trilogy. The piece premiered at Kunstenfestivaldesarts in 2022.
Artists about the performance
Mining is indeed not an obvious subject for theatre. It is perhaps a bit more obvious in the visual arts because you work with raw materials more concretely. But everything that surrounds us is raw material that comes from somewhere, and it is interesting to find out how it ends up here.
It was a very challenging project that ultimately is also about us, Hannes and Silke. We try to make our interpretations and feelings tangible. The title Out of the Blue refers to the resources that could be extracted from the blue ocean right now. But “Blue” also refers to a feeling that came over us during the making. We know that the world is not doing so well.
We are overwhelmed by bad news. Deep-sea mining is yet another way to further exploit the world and at the same time is presented as a way to get “out of the blue”.
The deep sea belongs to us all: it is humankind’s common heritage that makes us think about the world and the future. Do we still want this form of exploitation or not? What do scientists think today, themselves confronted with a thousand new questions with every new discovery? Do we still listen to scientific facts? Companies use scientific facts to their advantage. Greenpeace uses their facts to do storytelling. Scientists help to make visible something that could also have remained hidden. Is it sometimes better not to know something?
There was a time when the image of the world was spontaneous and in constant movement. No one made decisions about space. No one made decisions about time. There was no intention to the image of the world because there was no prevailing gaze.
City of Mary: The Siege Diaries
Misto Marii: The Siege Diaries
Time October 5, 6th | 19:00
Venue Arts Printing House
Duration 105’
Production:
Vidlik Projects and NASHi.etc
Present (Ukraine)
Director
Yevheniia Vidishcheva
Playwright
Andriy Bondarenko
Saksofonas
Andrii Barmalii
Heroines:
Anya Hrechkina
Nastya Hrechkina
VJ
Pavlo Sirko
Costume Design
Oleksandra Verkhovska
Visual Design
Oleksandra Kovalova
Performers:
Andrii Barmalii (saxophone)
Andrii Sokolov (electronic music)
Marusia Ionova (voice)
Nadiia Golubtsova (voice)
Oleksandr Yavdyk (drums)
Premiere 2023
“Do you have a safe space?”
“I did.”
“Tell me about it.”
“My granny and her home. She couldn’t solve my problems, but at least she didn’t make them worse. She simply told me – ‘Nastya! Everything will work out!’Granny never criticized me like mom did. She would make me pancakes in the morning and life would be happy again.”
— Quote from the performance
Anna and Anastasiia Hrechkina are twin sisters, artists, and activists from Mariupol, Ukraine. They were dedicated to transforming their city through educational and artistic projects, even dreaming of one day opening their own vegan café and recycling shop.
On February 24, 2022, the sisters woke up to a fullscale Russian invasion of Ukraine outside their window,
About the artists
Yevheniia Vidishcheva is a director of theatrical and musical projects that create a space for reflection. She is also a producer of artistic projects and a co-founder of Vidlik projects. Working on documentary projects with social and political themes, her recent focus has been on war and its consequences.
Andrii Bondarenko is a playwright and founder of the Theatre of Playwrights, working with social and political themes, combining subtle psychological nuances. His plays have been staged in various theatres in Ukraine and abroad.
Nadiia Golubtsova and Marusia Ionova (Mariia&Magdalyna) are artists working in theatrical-musical form, exploring Ukrainian literature and providing modern contexts and new sounds through collaboration with various musicians.
Andrii Martynenko (Andrii Barmalii) is a cross-sectoral artist, performer and composer. The experience of the COVID-19 pandemic inspired him to actively create music, and the full-scale Russian war in Ukraine pushed him to reject social isolation and start a solo project. Andrii reflects on personal and social crises, transforming feelings into musical and physical performances.
becoming living witnesses to the tragedy of their city. The three weeks, days, and minutes of the siege of Mariupol, alongside the sisters’lives, are reflected in their diaries, which are voiced in the performance by actresses Marusia Ionova and Nadiia Holubcova.
Blending music and authentic experiences, Misto Marii: The Siege Diaries opens a window to a space where we experience firsthand how quickly daily life can turn into a nightmare. Live on stage, the performers blend various musical genres and traditional Ukrainian folk songs, including those from the Donetsk region. The soundscape envelops the audience, while images of the sisters’childhood home videos are juxtaposed against chilling news clips exposing the horrors of blockaded Mariupol.
Oleksandr Yavdyk is an artist and drummer with 13 years of experience. His years of practice and a refined sense of the world allow him to improvise and create voluminous sounds in various musical and theatrical projects.
Andrii Sokolov (Walakos) is an artist, electronic musician, and composer. His main genres include fusion of breakbeat, IDM, and predominantly dark, lyrical styles. When creating music, Andrii works with dramaturgy and contexts.
Pavlo Hunko (Pavlo Sirko) is an artist and VJ. The overarching idea and goal of his artistic works are to see and touch the unreal in real life, mixing media, various devices, and technological solutions.
Producers
NASHi Experimental Theatre Club is dedicated to empowering emerging theatre artists in Ukraine to create new and innovative performing arts programming for a global audience. Our mission is to uplift the inherently diverse stories of the Ukrainian people as they wrestle with the complexities of good and evil under the shadow of war.
Vidlik projects is a team working on artistic projects, meanings, and contexts.
Note from the Artists
Today, Ukraine is the frontline of the largest ground war since WWII. But Ukrainians know that they have been at the frontline of information warfare for much longer. For decades, Russia has attempted to destroy Ukraine through propaganda and russification. They used culture, art, and false testimony to erase the Ukrainian national identity. Now we see these tactics spreading
and strengthening through political strongmen across the globe – Putin, Modi, Orban, Trump.
Anna and Anastasiia’s story is greater than just a tale of survival. It reclaims Ukrainian stories and tells them through Ukrainian voices.
We hope that Misto Marii makes space for a sincere discussion with the world about the war taking place at the heart of Europe and the solidarity needed to defeat tyranny once and for all.
An image from the inside
Una imagen interior
Time October 8, 9th | 19:00
Venue Lithuanian National Drama Theatre
Duration 90’
Production
El Conde de Torrefiel (Spain)
Concept and creation:
El Conde de Torrefiel in collaboration with the performers
Text and direction:
Tanya Beyeler
Pablo Gisbert
Performers:
Gloria March
Julian Hackenberg
Mauro Molina
David Mallols
Anaïs Doménech
Carmen Collado
Set Design: Maria Alejandre
Estel Cristià
Costumes
El Conde de Torrefiel
Sculpture pieces
Mireia Donat Melús
Robot design
José Brotons Plà
Scenos koordinatorius
Miguel Pellejero
Light Design
Manoly Rubio García
Sound Design: Rebecca Praga
Uriel Ireland
Construction of the set:
Diego Sánchez (Los Reyes del Mambo)
Isaac Torres
Miguel Pellejero
Technical coordination
Isaac Torres
Sound technician
Uriel Ireland
Light technician
Guillem Bonfill
Production and Administration
Uli Vandeberghe
Executive Production
CIELO DRIVE
Sound technician
Uriel Ireland
Sceneshifter
Roberto Baldinelli
Distribution
Alessandra Simeoni
Vadyba Haizea Arrizabalaga
With the support of:
ICEC - Generalitat de Catalunya; TEM Teatre Musical de Valencia; Centro Párraga de Murcia
Coproduction:
Wiener Festwochen (Vienna); Festival d’Avignon; Grec Festival (Barcelona); Conde Duque (Madrid); Kunstenfestivaldesarts (Brussels); Le Grütli - Centre de production et de diffusion des Arts vivants (Geneva); Teatro Piemonte Europa / Festival delle colline Torinesi (Turin); Points communs - Nouvelle Scène nationale de Cergy-Pontoise - Val d’Oise; Festival d’Automne à Paris; La Villette (Paris)
Premiere 2022
When the bomb falls, museums and theatres quickly become scrapyards. When flesh tears, books are no use as shields. When fear of death prevails, churches, parliaments, and schools become spaces emptied of content.
No well-expressed sentence can withstand an arson attack at a hospital. — Quote from the performance
In the performance space, set up as a contemporary art gallery exposition, two men are seen hanging an abstract painting that visitors will soon encounter. From the outset, the Spanish collective El Conde de Torrefiel seeks to reveal the mechanics of creating theatrical fiction right before the audience’s eyes. Using associations, symmetries of signs and forms, and sharp, concise dramaturgy, they invite us to hear the thoughts of the characters – or perhaps our own –
El Conde de Torrefiel
El Conde de Torrefiel is a Barcelona-based duo comprised of playwrights Tanya Beyeler and Pablo Gisbert. Their aim is to understand the connections between the rationality and significance of language-determined things, alongside the abstraction of concepts, the imaginary, and the symbolic in relation to the image. Their creations seek a visual and textual aesthetic where theatre, choreography, literature, and visual arts coexist, with a focus on the 21st century and the existing relationship between the personal and the political. Their theatre reinstates the
witnessing fiction as it transforms into new forms, or perhaps into reality.
With firm and calm guidance, the creators lead the audience on a journey to explore the relationship between fiction and reality. They reveal that the main component of the theatrical mechanism is our imagination, prompting us to question whether, in a civilization inundated with images, blinded with their abundance and resolution, we are still capable of distinguishing fiction from reality.
The renowned Spanish duo, Tanya Beyeler and Pablo Gisbert, embark on creating An image from the inside as “a poetic task that explores the fundamental principles of the concept of fiction, constantly challenging the indisputable law of gravity to which bodies are subject.”
An image from the inside, as implied by its title, is an abstract work that argues that reality is not solid, stable and immutable as we expect it to be. According to the creators, it is prone to transformation or fragmentation at any moment, particularly when confronted with war, pandemics, or natural disasters. It is a piece of visual theatre that navigates the delicate balance between dream and reality, consciousness and subconsciousness.
fourth wall, facilitating a return to collective sensuality: they aim not to touch audience members directly but to evoke their engagement, reinstating their role as active witnesses, attuned to their reception, and as close as possible to their sensations and impressions. While their theatre reports on the contemporary world, it refrains from presenting dogmatic thinking or political analysis, as they believe “works should not close by postulating, but open by questioning.” Their theatre is one of emotion, poetry, and the present, allowing subjectivities to exist freely amidst the demanding ambiguities of contemporary collective life.
“What is reality?”
“Reality is that which, when you stop believing in it, doesn’t go away.”
(Philip Dick)
The word “reality”, a term with a certain prestige but increasingly difficult to grasp, appeared in human language relatively recently – just over 1,000 years ago. The Greeks didn’t have a word for this condition; instead, individual and collective existence was governed by the fantastic logic of
myths. These stories, constructed through a process that articulated internal forces, produced extraordinary images that concretely affected consciences, guiding people in material life.
This work aims to translate onto the stage the image of a parallel and subterranean story, revealing the effects of what lies within the folds of material life and the gaps and paths that ghostly traverse existence. It explores that layer below the surface, which speaks about humans both individually and collectively.
Artists about An image from the inside
Nobody Died Today
Time October 10, 11th | 19:00
Venue Arts Printing House
Duration 90’
Production:
Theatre Nafta (Ukraine)
Theatre im Bahnhof (Austria)
Director
Nina Khyzhna
Composer
Nick Acorne
Performers:
Artem Vusyk
Dmytro Tretiak
Vladyslava Chentsova
Nina Khyzhna
Support: Monika Knegel
Victoria Fux
Premiere 2022
There was this darkness, strange feeling. There was a kind of grey fog here. Invisible, but you constantly feel it, even when you breathe and everything around you seems to be polluted. I don’t know how to explain it. All the buildings are the same, all the streets are the same, people seemed almost the same, but everything was kind of gloomy. They seem to have brought with them some kind of gloomy air, I think… damn, it’s my city, what I’ve always known and they brought here the smell of death.
— Quote from the performance
The city in which we live is our extended personal space, as large as we can reach by foot, sight, and thought. It encompasses the streets, squares, benches, and cafes we have chosen – the places where we feel safe and at home. But what happens when the arteries of our beloved city are torn by the tanks of occupying troops?
The Kharkiv creators from Nafta Theatre, led by director Nina Khyzhna, have created the documentary performance Nobody Died Today, revealing their personal traumas and the collective traumas of their city and Ukraine. Movement, physical experience, and the physical presence of the audience play crucial roles in the performance. The original music for the performance was composed by Nick Acorne.
Nobody Died Today is a documentary performance based on the stories, reflections, and insights of Ukrainian soldiers, volunteers, and the play’s creators. It explores their internal transformations, revaluation of values, perception of time and space, and sense of belonging.
How do artists survive when war breaks out? Do they still have the right to create, or must they take up arms? Can you be a pacifist when your country is being attacked by the enemy? Why is it important to have a place where you can be understood with half a word, and why do you feel the pull to return to it and defend its freedom?
While sharing personal stories – both their own and those of other people – the Ukrainians reflect on the experiences thrust upon them by the war: the proximity of death, the constant search for safety, anger, fatigue, life in unfamiliar places, and constant arguments with pacifism supporters. In response to ideas of “peace at any cost,” distancing, and “war fatigue,” they proclaim a kind of manifesto: “We don’t know how long this war will last, who will return home, who will remain alive, and what the price will be for our right to be free. We didn’t plan to be soldiers, volunteers, medics, or to leave our homes. We didn’t choose this war, but we must win it. This performance was created to give voice to the stories of our friends who are now risking their lives to defend what we love.”
Nafta Theatre is an alternative independent theatre founded in Kharkiv in 2018. Nafta is an open theatre platform that does not have a permanent company and does not follow classical canons. Actors, directors, musicians, choreographers, and painters can join Nafta with their ideas, gather a team, and initiate new theatre projects.
According to the creators, Nafta stands for openness, experimentation, new forms, and creative synergy. The goals the artists set for themselves are “to destroy standards, break boundaries, and burn with content.”
Meeting Point –Sirenos Club
In the context of the festival the Club is slowly turning into a place for outsiders. It’s a space to flourish for such fields of art, left on the outskirts of the theatre, as music, poetry, dance. It’s a place for experiments, interdisciplinary art, post-drama events that do not fall into strict categories of genre or style.
That’s how music left out from the productions becomes sound installation, poetry acquires the form of the performance, theatrical analysis becomes the huntfor a beast, silent disco gains the powers of a time machine and pieces of music created for concerts and bound by prefab concepts and clear dramaturgical canvas suddenly drop out of their contexts and start telling a whole new story. Sirenos Club events remix different generations, decades and fields of art and invite theatre audience to dive into interdisciplinarity.
Club artistic programme
This year’s Sirenos Club program will once again step beyond traditional theatre halls, expanding the spaces of perception. The focus of the club program is on social spaces. The program, and the entire Sirenos Festival, will be opened by choreographer Agnietė Lisičkinaitė with her piece “Hands Up” (creators: Agnietė Lisičkinaitė, Odeta Riškutė, Bush Hartsorn, Povilas Laurinaitis, Morta Nakaitė, and Jokūbas Tulaba). This work is an experience that blends performance and political intervention, inviting the audience to participate in the reconstruction of public space. Lithuanian artist Agnietė Lisičkinaitė views dance as a tool of social activism that can provoke, promote dialogue, and raise thoughts and questions. She has been researching the role of the body in protests and how protests are embodied in different cultural, social, and religious contexts. “Hands Up” interactively explores the fragile line between surrender and dedication, reconciliation and resistance. Additionally, this year’s club program will traditionally include the awards of the Sirenos Lithuanian showcase, held in the well-known space of the Opera Social House. The team from last year’s winning performance, “The Silence of the Sirens” (directed by Laura Kutkaitė), will be in charge of the awards ceremony. Kutkaitė shares her thoughts on the upcoming awards ceremony: “I am still very happy that the international jury has acclaimed “The Silence of the Sirens” alongside performances like “Fosillia” and “Guided”, and that we have the opportunity to create a celebration of these awards for the theatre community. Those who have seen the performance know that tongues will be sharpened
for the awards; there will definitely be ‘black’ jokes, but most importantly, it will be sincere because the Sirens aren’t silent, they don’t know how to be silent, and don’t promise to learn.” This year’s club program includes a 6-hour performance that pushes the boundaries of theatre: the Aira Dance Theatre artistic action
“Russian Roulette” (creators: Aira Naginevičiūtė, Erika Vizbaraitė, Arūnas Adomaitis). It will take place in a highly unexpected public space – under the Mindaugas Bridge. This work addresses the meaninglessness and absurdity of war, reflecting the DNA encoded in the stories and principles of today’s war aggressors. It presents the opposition between life and death, extended temporality, political and social intervention, and offers a sharp look at the questions of life’s value, its fragility, human brutality, and the meaninglessness of killing that arise inexorably in the face of war. This year, the club’s program will guide the audience through unexpected internal and external spaces, taking them to the fringes and expecting maximum involvement from everyone.
Artistic Curator Agnė Matulevičiūtė
Hands Up
Time September 26th | 6pm
Venue The square of Simonas Daukantas, near the Presidential Palace
Duration 60’
Production BE COMPANY
Idea, choreography and performance
Agnietė Lisičkinaitė
Dramaturgy
Bush Hartsorn
Video
Odeta Riškutė
Costume
Morta Nakaitė
Music
Jokūbas Tulaba
Light design
Povilas Laurinaitis
Project funded by:
Lithuania Culture Council
Lithuania Dance Information Center
Agnietė Lisičkinaitė presents an experience halfway between a performance and a political intervention, inviting the audience to participate in reconstructing a public space. The Lithuanian artist considers dance a tool for social activism, capable of provoking, stimulating dialogue, and triggering thoughts and questions. For a long time, Lisičkinaitė has been investigating the role of the body in protests and how protests are embodied in different cultural, social, and religious contexts, starting from the assumption that all protests start and end with human bodies. “Hands Up” examines the fragile distance between surrender
and devotion, reconciliation and resistance. What are the consequences of a non-constructive protest close to recent global movements? What kind of protest do we want to create in the future? Will it be a symbol of freedom or aggression? This ever-evolving research has no single truth or answer.
“Hands Up is an activist work informed by local specificities that asks the audience to take action in changing our world, beginning from the ambiguous gesture of lifting the hands up. […] The political is not only personal but above all physical.” — Ariadne Mikou, springdancemagazine.com
Russian Roulette
Time September 28th | 12:00
Venue Kind Mindaugas Bridge
Duration 360’
Prodiuseris
Dance theatre AIROS
Authors Aira Naginavičiūtė
Erika Vizbaraitė
Arūnas Adomaitis
“Russian Roulette” is an extreme and dangerous game of chance where players use a revolver with only one cartridge in the cylinder, aim at their temple, and pull the trigger. This game symbolizes the absurdity and senselessness of war, reflecting the deeply embedded DNA in the narratives and actions of today’s aggressors. It highlights the opposition between two fundamental elements of existence: life and death. The performance addresses themes of temporality, political and social intervention, while offering a sharp reflection
on the value of life, its fragility, human brutality, and the meaningless killing that arises in times of war.
The artistic action “Russian Roulette” intensifies the tension between life and death. A weapon, rotating 360 degrees under the influence of physical forces, symbolizes war, brutality, and ever-present threat, creating palpable tension as it could aim at anyone at any moment. Meanwhile, a flowing river serves as a metaphor for both objective and subjective time.
Klubas
Lithuanian Theatre Showcase Awards
Laikas October 29th | 9:30pm
Each year, four performances are recognized at the Lithuanian Theatre Showcase, with one of the creators receiving the honor of organizing the following year’s awards program. This year, a powerful collaboration has formed: the team from the “Sirenos” festival and the creators of the performance “Silence of Sirens.”
During the event, the jury that evaluated the showcased performances will be introduced, and they will announce their verdict on the three most outstanding works of the past season. The fourth award will be given based on votes from the audience through lrt.lt.
Vieta Opera Social House
Club’s Educational Programme
The 21st time—SIRENOS has been around for that many years. In many parts of the world, that’s the age when one is recognized as an adult. An adult who can have their own space and create without depending on others. The SIRENOS Club has also been alive for that long, and now it too is officially grown up.
This year, SIRENOS invites you to explore and reflect on new spaces: a space can be an empty room where an artist reveals their imagination and brings an idea to life, or it can be an inner world where visions form and stories are contemplated—stories that will one day be told to others. A space may also be linked to a specific location defined by the walls of a building where performances take place. Alternatively, it can spread across the entire city and its surroundings.
Space can provide creators with the freedom to think, feel, and create, but it can also impose limits. However, it can also be a different place each time, meant for conversations, sharing ideas, and knowledge. In the educational part of the SIRENOS Club, we invite you to co-create such a space: to speak, listen, think, calm down, and be inspired. All of this is centered around the performing arts, which, when complemented
by dialogue, allow us to discover ways to communicate even when we disagree.
For the second year in a row, the SIRENOS Club’s educational program will introduce us more closely to one artist or collective. This time, the focus is on the Spanish-Swiss creative duo El Conde de Torrefiel: Tanya Beyeler and Pablo Gisbert. Tanya will represent the duo at SIRENOS. Their work is internationally recognized for expanding the boundaries of traditional theater, inviting audiences to explore complex and often uncomfortable topics in innovative ways. El Conde de Torrefiel performances are characterized by striking visual aesthetics, layered meanings, and minimalist yet powerful scenography. A glimpse at photos of their shows might make you feel as if you’ve stepped into the pages of an art magazine like Aesthetica. The impactful, minimalist visuals invite you to enjoy looking at the stage while simultaneously experiencing notso-pleasant narratives. This concentrated, visually potent style helps the audience engage more deeply with the verbal stories of El Conde de Torrefiel. You can experience this in their work The Inner Picture, part of SIRENOS’ international program, and in the recording
of their performance La Plaza. Some of you may have encountered another work by El Conde de Torrefiel: Ultrafiction No. 1 / Parts of Time, which took place in Kaunas at the Contempo Festival in August, and which will also be shown in the club’s program. We will discuss time, ultrafictional narratives, and fragments of ideas in a conversation with Tanya Beyeler.
In El Conde de Torrefiel performances, the conventional narrative structure is often abandoned in favor of a fragmented, non-linear storytelling, emphasizing mood and atmosphere rather than traditional plot development. Their work often incorporates elements of movement and visual art, resulting in a rich, multi-layered fusion of the arts.
Tanya Beyeler will extend our exploration of El Conde de Torrefiel’s work in the seminar “Invisible Geographies,” designed for performing arts professionals. She will discuss fictions and how to activate them in artistic creation. This will be a space to explore how intangible elements, such as text and sound, can become powerful generators of physical spaces on stage.
Another source of inspiration, both for performing arts creators and critics, who are less frequently included in performing arts programs, is a seminar organized in collaboration with the Association of Performing Arts Critics. It will be led by Slovenian theater scholar, dance historian, and curator Rok Vevar. A highly active and internationally respected critic, he is the founder of Slovenia’s Temporary Dance Archive, a member of the Nomad Dance Academy, and one of the curators of the international contemporary dance festival CoFestival, as well as a promoter of Ljubljana’s non-institutional dance scene. In the seminar, R. Vevar will focus on common challenges in contemporary performing arts criticism. It’s no secret that many of these challenges also exist in Lithuania: the evolving scene requires renewed analytical and critical tools, as well as a different way of discussing things in general.
We also invite you to other inspiring meetings: conversations about creativity with the creators of Pleasant Island and Out of the Blue from the international program, Silke Huysmans and Hannes Dereere, as well as discussions about the raw reality of
war and siege diaries with the creators of Mary’s City from Ukraine. A closer look and deeper listening will be encouraged during the discussion “Art as a Space for Resistance,” which will bring together Lithuanian and international artists.
These are the educational “geographies” of this year’s SIRENOS Club: perhaps less visual but more audible. Designed to listen to conversations and the silences between them, creating space for your own thoughts to emerge.
Program Curator Ugnė Kačkauskaitė
Introduction to Contemporary Performing Arts Criticism
Workshop by Rok Vevar
Session I
September 25th | 10am – 1pm
Session II
September 25th | 2:30pm – 5:30pm
Session III
September 26th | 10am – 1pm Venue Arts Printing House Language English
The workshop focuses on the challenges of contemporary performing arts criticism. By examining selected paradigmatic cases from the history of contemporary theatre and dance, it introduces forms of performing arts that move beyond interpretation as a dominant creative approach. The workshop explores various aesthetic aspects, offering participants new tools and perspectives for analyzing and discussing modern artistic strategies. Instead of teaching how to write, it opens up new genres, styles, and approaches for reflecting on contemporary performances. With video examples and structured terminology, Rok Vevar highlights key elements that are useful for practicing criticism today.
Who is it for?
The workshop is open to beginners and those who enjoy contemplating and discussing performing arts. It is for anyone intrigued by the ideas presented on stage and wishing to engage through critical writing. It is especially suited for those who are curious and open to learning, valuing the public nature of performing arts and the critical engagement that affirms a shared love for these forms.
Rok Vevar (1973) is a theatrologist, dance historian, and curator from Ljubljana, Slovenia. He founded the Slovenian Temporary Dance Archives and co-curates CoFestival, an international festival of contemporary dance. His published works include “Deadline” (2011) and “Ksenija, Xenia: The London Dance Years of Ksenija Hribar” (2020). He has received the Ksenija Hribar Award (2019) and the Vladimir Kralj Award (2020) for his contributions to theatre criticism and research.
Invisible Geographies (How to Activate Fictions)
Workshop by Tanya Beyeler (El Conde de Torrefiel)
Date
October 6th | 2pm – 5pm
Venue
Arts Printing House
Language English
Through moments from works by El Conde de Torrefiel (“La Plaza”, “Ultrafiction nr. 1”, “Una imagen interior”), this workshop explores how immaterial elements such as text and sound can create physical spaces on stage. The workshop investigates how words, sound, and music can evoke rich geographies, crafting mental spaces where fiction is built in dialogue between the performance and the audience.
Tanya Beyeler, born in Lugano and based in Spain, has a background in drama and human sciences. She co-founded El Conde de Torrefiel with Pablo Gisbert in 2010 and has collaborated on dance projects in Spain and Switzerland. Beyeler’s work, blending theatre, choreography, literature, and visual arts, examines the personal-political interface, inviting audiences to reflect on society and the world we live in. In 2021, she was awarded the Swiss Performing Arts Award.
Networking Events
During the festival, two networking events will be held to foster connections between Lithuanian organizations and creators, and international festival guests
GLEN Network Meeting
On September 25-26, a meeting of the GLEN network (Great Little European Network), which unites performing arts organizations and creators from small European countries, will take place in Vilnius.
The network was established in 2023 with the aim of helping young performing artists from smaller countries build an international network of contacts, develop their professional skills, visit festivals organized by network members, and participate in a mentorship program. The network connects the smallest European countries through collaborative networking and training programs, aiming to contribute to more meaningful practices and the development of sustainable performing arts sectors in these countries. The network aspires to become an incubator for those who, while making use of local opportunities, seek to advance their practice on an international scale.
GLEN aims to establish new connections between the smallest European countries. From September 2023 to June 2025, GLEN will implement three areas of activity: networking, the “Critical Friendships” mentorship program, and open webinars discussing the peculiarities of production and distribution of performing arts works in small countries, as well as opportunities for international dissemination.
September 27th, 12:00–13:30
A meeting with the curators of the Lithuanian Theatre Showcase, designed for curators to present their vision, and for guests to ask questions about Lithuanian theatre, including the showcase performances and those not featured.
September 28th, 13:00–16:00
A networking event open to Lithuanian performing arts organizations, creators, and international guests. The first part of the event will introduce the producers of the Lithuanian Theatre Showcase performances, followed by informal conversations and networking opportunities.
The GLEN network members are the following organizations:
Kanuti Gildi SAAL (Estonia) https://saal.ee/
New Theatre Institute of Latvia / Homo Novus Festival (Latvia) theatre.lv / www.homonovus.lv
Sirenos Festival (Lithuania) / Theatre Information Centre https://www. sirenos.lt / lithuaniantheatre.com
Performing Arts Centre (Iceland) performingarts.is
Kultur | lx – Luxembourg Arts Council https://www.kulturlx.lu/en/
Glej Theatre (Slovenia) glej.si/en
Teatri ODA (Kosovo) https://www.teatrioda.com/en/home
