DNA of Polish Theater – Panel I

Paradigms and Dynamics – Panel II

Aldo Milohnić, „On Dynamic Developments in Slovenian Postmodern and Contemporary Theatre”
In my short presentation, I will highlight several important theatrical paradigms that had an essential influence on the development of theatre and related performing practices in the second part of the 20th century and in the beginning of the 21st century in Slovenia. For instance, body/physical theatre as a recognizable artistic practice emerged in Slovenia at the turn of the 1960s and 1970s, at a time commonly referred to as that of the neo-avant-garde (the work of the groups OHO, the Pupilija Ferkeverk Theatre, Glej, Pekarna, Nomenklatura, among others). Then, so-called retro-avant-garde practices of a performing arts unit of the artistic movement NSK (Neue Slowenische Kunst / New Slovenian Art), especially the most important performances by the theatre director Dragan Živadinov, followed by the younger generation of Slovenian directors at the turn of the 1980s and 1990s. Finally, I will also touch on some paradigmatic examples of the explicit presentation of the anatomy of social relationships in contemporary Slovenia, such as psychological and physical violence, asymmetrical power relations, increasing intolerance, and so on, through selected performances directed by renowned Slovenian theatre directors (Jernej Lorenci, Sebastijan Horvat, Janez Janša, Matjaž Berger, among others).
Aldo Milohnić, PhD, is an associate professor of the history of theatre at the Academy of Theatre, Radio, Film and Television of the University of Ljubljana (Slovenia) and the head of the Theatre and Film Studies Centre. He is the author of the monographs Theories of Contemporary Theatre and Performance (2009), Art in Times of the Rule of Law and Capital (2016), Theatre of Resistance (2021) and I Worked for 40 Years: Dramatisations and Adaptations of Cankar’s The Bailiff Yerney (2022). He is co-author of several other books, edited volumes, and author of numerous articles in performing arts journals. He is an editorial board member of the performing arts journals Amfiteater and European Journal of Theatre and Performance, a member of the Association of Theatre Critics and Researchers of Slovenia and International Federation for Theatre Research as well as a board member of the Slovenian Theatre Institute and the European Association for the Study of Theatre and Performance. His research interests include the history and theory of theatre, contemporary performing practices and the sociology of culture and arts.

Višnje Kačić Rogošić, „Dynamics of Croatian independent scene in the 20th and 21st century”
Croatian theatre outside of the institution developed steadily during the 20th century from the individual examples at the very beginning of that period until the emergence of the interconnected strong scene at its very end. Thus, the new millennium welcomed a vibrant and aesthetically diverse scene, fully aware of its potential but also shortcomings. The paper will present the dynamics of the development of the Croatian independent scene in the second half of the 20th and at the beginning of the 21st century as well as its relationship with the institutional theatre through selected examples. It will focus on several specific groups working in the 1970s and 1980s which followed the legacy of student theatre of the 1960s, furthermore it will present the specificities of the new young scene which spontaneously erupted during and after the Homeland war in the 1990s and conclude with the description of the current non-institutional theatre scene and its controversies.
Višnja Kačić Rogošić is the Assistant professor at the University of Zagreb. She is on the editorial board of Croatian Theatre Journal and an associate of the Miroslav Krleža Institute of Lexicography. She is on the executive committee of Croatian Association of Theatre Critics and Theatre Scholars and a member of Croatian centre ITI. She also works as the member of the managing board of City Puppet Theatre Split. She published a book Group Devised Theatre (2017) but her interests include contemporary and experimental theatre and performance in general.

Katarina Tomps, „Estonian theatre – how do You do?”
My presentation will introduce Estonian theatre life – how we learn, work and play! There will be a small overview of what kind of theatres we have and what are the new tendencies in the performance art field. There is a saying that Estonians are a theatre goers’ nation – our population is 1.3 million and we have 1.1 theatre visits in a year. If Estonians love theatre so much is there a point to go abroad? What kind of international relationships do we have? I will speak of our international festival´s field, what kind of festivals we have and how they enrich our theatre culture.
Katarina Tomps works as a theatre producer in Vaba Lava. Vaba Lava is a performing arts centre that creates theatre projects with international collaboration. She has a master’s degree in theatre studies from the University of Tartu. Her theses were concentrating on theatre festival culture in Estonia. She is an active member in the Estonian Association of Theatre Researchers and Theatre Critics.

Political and Laughter – Panel III

Radka Kunderová, „The Political versus Laughter in the Czech Post-1989 Theatre”
The political has often been interwoven with comedy on stage. Comical elements may amplify the political dimension of performance when employed in such genres as satire. However, in case of productions whose aesthetic is related to the so-called postdramatic theatre, the relation between the political and the comic is far more complex and often rather ambivalent. In this paper, I am going to explore such an interrelation using the Czech production „Our Our Swaggerers” premiered in 1994 as a case study. This production was directed by an outstanding Czech theatre director of the 1990s, Petr Lébl, and premiered at the Theatre on the Balustrade in Prague. In times of the post-1989 social transition and shortly after the division of Czechoslovakia, Lébl settled on a canonical nineteenth-century play „Our Swaggerers” which commented on the Czech national character. Lébl, who was perceived as the postmodernist enfant terrible in the Czech theatre milieu, adopted the original playtext in collaboration with the playwright Lenka Lagronová and added a number of new layers and perspectives. In his production, he – among other things – ironized Czech national myths and satirised xenophobic tendencies, employing a number of techniques later associated with the concept of postdramatic theatre. In doing so, the production mostly communicated in a light-hearted manner and perhaps also for this reason, its socio-critical dimension seems to have been overlooked by most of the spectators and theatre critics. Which factors contributed to the fact that the comic overshadowed the political in Lébl’s production will be discussed in the paper.
Radka Kunderová is a theatre academic, the main focus of her research and teaching is the relationship between theatre and society, and the political in particular. Currently, she works as an Assistant Professor at the Theatre Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. She was a Marie Skłodowska-Curie Research Fellow at the Institute of Theatre Studies of the Freie Universität Berlin (2019–2022), where she ran the project “Redefining the Agency: Post-1989 Crisis of the Czech and Former East German Theatre”. Her other international research and academic collaborations include Royal Central School of Speech and Drama in London, International Alternative Culture Centre Budapest and ITI Berlin. She published numerous studies on the socio-political dimension in Czech theatre of the 20th century, East-West collaborations during the Cold War, and artistic research. As a theatre critic, she has been associated with the Svět a divadlo theatre magazine. In the past, she worked as the Head of the Institute for Theatre Research and an Assistant Professor at the JAMU Theatre Faculty in Brno, Czech Republic.

Gašper Troha, „What Shakes the Mind and Heart in Eastern Europe at the Beginning of the 21 st Century?”
In The Theatre of the Absurd (1960), Martin Esslin observed an interesting paradox that the theatre of the absurd turned out to be a prominent means of political theatre in Eastern Europe. At the turn of the millennium, a new dramatic form – in-yer-face theatre – developed in the UK and soon spread all over Europe and overseas. Aleks Sierz defined it in his book In-Yer-Face Theatre: British Drama Today (2001). A so-called new drama, with texts that were very violent and direct as well as political, marked the theatre in Eastern Europe in the first decade of the new millennia. As Polish playwright Dorota Masłowska puts it: “When I started writing for theatre, I realized that a good performance has a stronger impact than any other artistic form. It hits the mind and the heart of the audience. I fell in love with that as a writer and as a spectator.” What are these plays in Eastern Europe like? What connects them to in- yer-face theatre? These questions will be discussed in light of three texts from different Eastern European Countries: The Dust by György Spiró (2005), Na dnu (At the Bottom) by Vinko Möderndorfer (2006) and Między nami dobrze jest (All is Good Between Us) by Dorota Masłowska (2008). Their common characteristics are the themes of the post-socialist society, materialism, consumerism and radical social criticism. By comparing the three plays, we will analyse the influence of in-yer-face theatre in Eastern Europe and discuss its specificities that might once again be its social critique.
Gašper Troha graduated from the Department of Comparative Literature and Literary Theory of the Faculty of Arts and the Academy of Music, University of Ljubljana. In 2007, he received his PhD with the dissertation “Artikulacija odnosa do oblasti v slovenski drami 1943–1990” (The Articulation of the Relationship to Authority in Slovenian Drama 1943–1990). His research focuses on the sociology of literature, especially concerning the questions of the contemporary world and Slovenian drama and theatre. He is a head of Slovenian Theatre Institute and a part-time researcher at the Academy of Theatre, Film, Radio and Television, University of Ljubljana. He has contributed to numerous national and foreign scientific journals and edited several scientific monographs, among them, History and its Literary Genres; Literarni modernizem v “svinčenih” letih (Literary Modernism in the Years of Lead) and Lojze Kovačič: življenje in delo (Lojze Kovačič: Life and Work). His recent publications include a book on cultural opposition and Slovenian dramatic literature entitled Ujetniki svobode (Prisoners of Freedom).

Dino Pešut, „Mapping The Millenial Directors In Post Yugoslavian Context”
In my short presentation, my aim is to present a new generation of theatre directors which are currently shaping the new theatre aesthetics and approaches in Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia. All of them born around the wars in former Yugoslavia, they are now entering the mainstream and repertoires. Nina Rajić Kranjec and Žiga Divjak from Slovenia, Ivan Penović from Croatia, Selma Spahić from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Jovana Tomić and late Igor Vuk Torbica from Serbia all seem to communicate around similar topics and historical complexities, around themes of trauma and social injustices. Each in their own way are critical about the world they have found themselves in, navigating the times of the monsters, awaiting for new worlds which still have not fully emerged, and relentlessly reevaluating history and present with a sharp humour.
Dino Pešut was born in Sisak, Croatia in 1990. He graduated from the Academy of Dramatic Arts in Zagreb and works as a writer and dramaturge. As a dramaturge, he collaborated with the directors Selma Spahić, Franko Perković, Nina Rajić Kranjac and Jernej Lorenci. As a playwright, he was invited to the Stueckemarkt program at the Theatertreffen Festival in Berlin (2016) and was a resident at the program for young playwrights at the Royal Court Theater in London (2019). He has received six Marin Držić Awards given by the Croatian Ministry of Culture for best dramatic texts. In 2018, he also received the Deutscher Jugentheaterpreis award for his play Penultimate Panda or Static. His plays have been translated into English, German, French, and Polish and have been staged in theaters across Croatia and abroad. He has written two novels, Poderana koljena (Scraped knees) and Tatin sin (Daddy Issues), both published by Fraktura. Editions of Tatin sin has been translated into English, Slovene, German, Spanish and Italian.

War and Freedom – Panel IV

Tamás Jászay, „The last days of independent performing arts in Hungary”
In the twenty-fourth hour: the last days of independent performing arts in Hungary „The previous government gave money to theatre artists, the current one gives subject” – it’s been almost ten years since Béla Pintér, Hungary’s best-known and most successful independent theatre artist, said these words in an interview. What seemed like an angry outburst at the time has now become an everyday reality. Hungary stands at a historic moment right now: by the end of the 2023/2024 season, a significant part of the independent theatre and dance scene will have disappeared. This is not an alarm or a threat, but a fact: the minister responsible for cultural policy has repeatedly said that he does not understand why so many independent theatre companies are needed. In my presentation, I will briefly outline the journey to this point, but instead of complaining at length, I will try to address the way out. Today’s independent Hungarian theatre is a jewel of Hungarian culture that it would be a crime to let it die: international collaborations and co-productions, participation in the dunaPart contemporary performing arts platform in Budapest between 23-26. November, invitations to Hungarian artists are all direct support.
Tamás Jászay – theatre critic, editor, university lecturer, curator. Since 2003 he’s been working as a freelance theatre critic: in the last 20 years he published more than 1200 articles (mostly reviews) in more than 20 magazines all around the world. Since 2008 he is co-editor, since 2021 editor-in-chief of the well-renowned critical portal, Revizor (www.revizoronline.com). Between 2009 and 2016 he was working as the co- president of the Hungarian Theatre Critics Association. In 2013 he defended his PhD thesis on the history of Krétakör Theatre (Chalk Circle Theatre). He regularly works as a curator too: Hungarian Showcase (Budapest, 2013), Szene Ungarn (Vienna, 2013), THEALTER Festival (Szeged, since 2014), dunaPart (Budapest, 2015, 2017, 2019, 2023). Since 2015 he’s been teaching at Szeged University, since 2019 as an assistant professor.

Dária Fehérová Fojtíková and Marek Godovič, „Slovak totalitarian system and freedom in Slovak theatrical productions through eyes of foreign directors”
Slovak professional theatre has dealt with events, phenomoms and themes in its own pace and point of view. Our paper looks on two poles of our history – censorship and totalitarian regime that took place in the second half of the twentieth century. We focus on the way that these events (including Velvet Revolution in 1989) influenced our society and in what way they were reflected in work of chosen foreign directors. Reflection gives a strong stimulus to realize the differences and similarities in context of countries of Central and Eastern Europe.
Mgr. Dária Fojtíková Fehérová, PhD. (1984) completed the study of theater science at the University of Performing Arts in Bratislava, complementary pedagogical study focused on children’s creativity, and postgraduate studies at the Department of Aesthetics of the Philosophical Faculty of the Comenius University in Bratislava. She is a theatre critic and historian, actively participates in domestic and foreign professional events, conferences and festivals. She focuses on contemporary Slovak drama and new tendencies in staging. As a historian she studies Slovak theater directors. She works at the Theatre Institute Bratislava, currently as the head of the Center for Theater Research and Education. Since 2009, she has been working with the Nová dráma/New Drama Festival. She regularly publishes for theatre magazines and scientific journals, and is author or co-author of theater anthologies.
Marek Godovič – Having graduated from the Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava in theatre and Polish studies. He also studied screenwriting and dramaturgy at the Film and Television School of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague. As an author, playwright and screenwriter, having collaborated on various stage and radio productions within the Film and Television Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts in Prague, Czech Radio, and Slovak Radio and Television. He spent a semester at the Escola Superior de Teatro e Cinema in Lisbon and at the Jagielloński University in Krakow. In 2017, he received PhD in theatre studies of the Theatre Faculty of the Academy of Performing Arts in Bratislava.In 2011–2018 he was playwright in Studio 12 in Bratislava. Currently, he is specialist staff member at the Theatre Institute in Bratislava. As a dramaturge, he collaborated with the independent slovak or czech theatres and dance groups Farma v jeskyni, Pôtoň Theatre, NUDE Theatre, Jedným dychom Theatre and Radical Empathy. Marek Godovič has published reviews and critiques in theatre periodicals and newspapers. He has external lectures of Polish drama and theatre on Academy of Permorming Arts in Bratislava. He is the member the Academy of theatre creators and SC AICT.

Aneeli Saro, „The wars that unite and separate us. Depictions of war in Estonian theatre
There are three historical events that have had a major influence on the fate of the Estonian Republic and Estonian national identity. First, the Estonian War of Independence (1918–1920) when Estonians managed to declare and fight for their independence during the battles between Soviet Russia and the German Empire. Then World War II (1939–1940) when Estonia was occupied by the Soviet Union, then by Nazi Germany and finally by the Soviet Union again and Estonians were recruited to both armies. The Russian war in Ukraine that escalated in 2022 seems to be as crucial as the abovementioned events, since it polarised politically not only the world but also Estonian and Russian speaking population in Estonia. World War II and the Russian war in Ukraine have had a major impact on European history and mentality – they have both united and separated countries, nations and social groups. These dramatic and conflict loaded events have been reflected also in the arts. In my paper, I would like to investigate, how the wars have been represented in Estonian theatre in the second half of the 20 th century and in the beginning of the 21 st century. There are two challenges related to the topic, one of them belonging to the artistic and another to the social field. What are the ways to represent tragic and violent events? How to address the issue among different ethnic and social groups? I will analyse Estonian performances through the lens of politics of representation and affect theory.
Anneli Saro is Professor of Theatre Research at the University of Tartu (Estonia). In 2010- 2014, she was Lecturer of Estonian Culture at the University of Helsinki. Saro has been a convener of the international working groups Project on European Theatre Systems (2004- 2008, 2017-) and Theatrical Event (2011-2017). She has been active as the Editor-in-Chief of Nordic Theatre Studies (2013-2015) and as a member of the executive committee of the International Federation for Theatre Research (2007-2015). Saro has published articles and books on Estonian theatre history and system, performance theory and audience research. She has edited books and special numbers of journals.

Cheers and Struggles – Panel V

Irene Moundraki, „Greece, Home of Drama, in real Time and the mission of a National Theatre”
Irene Mountraki was born in Athens. She obtained a BA, a MA and a PhD in Theatre Studies from the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens (Faculty of Theatre Studies). She also studied Arts at the University of Milan, Italy. She works at the National Theatre of Greece since 1999 as a special artistic collaborator and she is head of Drama, Library, Archive and International Relations Departments. As a dramaturg she has collaborated with important directors from Greece and abroad. She is visiting professor at the Departments of Theatre Studies of the Universities of Athens and Peloponnese. She teaches History of Theatre and Dramaturgy at Drama Schools. She taught Theatre in the Army for five years and has directed several plays with her students. She is the founder and head of the Greek Play Project (www.greek-theatre.gr) a dynamic platform in Greek and English for the promotion and study of contemporary Greek theatre. GPP is a dynamic network of collaborations and activities; the annual Greek Play Project New York is part of it. She is a theatre critic and her texts, critiques and essays have been published in various editions, theatre programs and magazines in Greece and abroad. She has participated and lectured in many conferences about theatre all over the world. Her books: Carlo Goldoni. His life, his work and its reception in Greece (2019) and Entos, Ektos kai Epi ta afta (2021) are published by Egokeros Editions. She has translated various texts and plays from Italian. In 2019-2020 National Theatre performed The New House by Carlo Goldoni translated by her. Head of the research project „Mapping Contemporary Greek Theatre” aiming to the creation of a valid and updated database of theatre institutions, theatre groups, festivals, drama schools, repertory, theatre artists. The project was commissioned by the Ministry of Culture for the purpose of reforming a solid cultural policy (2008-2010). Researcher for the Theatre Studies Department of the National and Kapodistrian University of Athens. Member of the Research Laboratory „Pythagoras” compiling a complete Greek Theatre’s Bibliography. (2005-2009). Head – Editor of the Dramaturgy Series, the Complete Works of the most important contemporary Greek playwrights of Egokeros Editing House. In 2013 she participated in the International Visitor Leadership Program on “Promoting Social Change Through the Arts” organised by the United States Department of States –Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs. She has been a member of several Committees. Among others President of the Consultative Committee on the Theatre Grants of the Ministry of Culture (2017-2021) and President and Vice President of the Hellenic Association of Theatre and Performing Arts Critics (2016-2023).

Nikolay Iordanov, „Contemporary Theatre Landscape In Bulgaria”
My speech will present the contemporary situation in the Bulgarian theatre as a generalised picture of the cultural heritage from the 20th century and challenges of the 21st century. The focus will fall on the current theatrical life, on the main processes that take place in it and the existing priorities in cultural policies. The ways and structures subsidising theatre activities and projects will be presented, as well as the opportunities for international cooperation, with an emphasis on theatre festivals in Bulgaria that have international programs.
Prof. Nikolay Iordanov is a theatrologist, a research fellow at the Institute of Art Studies in Sofia and a part-time lecturer at the National Academy for Theater&Film Arts. His publications include three books as well as many studies and articles on theatre theory, history and practice. From 2004 he is director of the Via Fest Foundation – organiser of the International theatre festival Varna Summer and of the platform World Theatre in Sofia. N. Iordanov has been an expert in evaluation of theatre projects within different public bodies as the Education, Audiovisual and Culture Executive Agency (EC), Swiss cultural program in Bulgaria, Ministry of Culture, Sofia Municipality, etc.

Monika Yaniskaite, „Waiting for Market: Cheers and Struggles in Contemporary Lithuanian Theatre”
Since 1990’s Lithuanian government has shifted to a market economy thus affecting various industries aspects of people’s lives, yet transformations in the local performing arts system have been far from bold. Although municipal and independent companies have been allowed to develop besides inherited state theatres, the latter have remained at the centre of governmental regulation. Today, actively producing independent companies are highly contributing to the variety of Lithuanian performing arts, moreover they compete for the same artists and audiences. Consequently, both sectors are interlacing, yet both are facing challenges and achievements of their own. The presentation based on quantitative and qualitative research focuses on the major changes in the Lithuanian performing arts system on various levels and explores funding instruments, organisational shifts, artistic developments. Although such advancements proposed solutions to various challenges, the systemic and emerging issues in the performing arts markets for both, the governmental and the independent companies, are far from resolved. The report suggests different effects of neoliberalism to the production and the distribution domains in Lithuanian performing arts.
Monika Jašinskaitė is a theatre researcher and critic from Lithuania. She studied Arts History and Criticism in Vytautas Magnus University, Kaunas (BA in 2014). In 2012, she began writing about theatre and dance and became involved in questioning conditions for creation. She worked with several theatre companies, including Artūras Areima Theatre, Juozas Miltinis Drama Theatre. In 2018, she initiated a statistical survey on behalf of the Performing Arts Critics Association of Lithuania “Lithuanian Theatre in Numbers”. Now she is a Ph.D. student in the University of Tartu.

Dance as The New Theater – Panel VI

Helmutas Šabasevičius, „Lithuanian contemporary dance scene”
The Lithuanian dance scene has significantly changed in the last three decades. In the second half of the 20th century, professional dance was identified only with ballet, but nowadays, the contemporary dance field is quite active in Lithuania, and ballet, which for some time was a rather conservative part of the theatre, is also undergoing changes. The report presents the diversity of forms of expression evident in state opera and ballet theatres, Lithuanian contemporary dance initiatives, festivals, leading choreographers, discusses the problems of dance education, and also draws attention to the integration of contemporary dance principles into the repertoire of drama theatres performances.
Dr Helmutas Šabasevičius (b. 1964) 1989 graduated from the Lithuanian State Art Institute (now the Vilnius Academy of Arts) with a degree in art history. In 1994 defended his doctoral dissertation in the field of humanities, since 1997 researcher in the Department of Music and Theatre History in the Lithuanian Cultural Research Institute. Researches the history of Lithuanian theatre, art, scenography, choreography, visual culture of the 19th century, and theatre and art relations, has published numerous scientific and popular articles, reviews of exhibitions and performances in the Lithuanian and foreign press, participates in scientific conferences and gives public lectures. He teaches at the Vilnius Academy of Arts, the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre, and is the editor-in-chief of the art culture magazine „Krantai”. Awarded the Lithuanian Government Culture and Art Prize in 2017 and Golden Cross of Merit of the Republic of Poland in 2019.

Orsolya Bálint, „Dance is the new theatre in Hungary”
The Hungarian contemporary dance scene, which emerged in the 1980s, is still very much influenced by the first teachers, as well as choreographers from abroad holding occasional workshops, and an establishment structure that hasn’t changed much since the fall of the iron curtain. Therefore, it took longer for the so-called conceptual dance to arrive here. However, after 2010 a new generation of choreographers started using dance dramaturgy (working with theater dramaturges), creating movement-based performances which are actual theater performances – no wonder these win the most prestigious awards from both scenes. These game changers are questioning the rules of theater, challenging societal norms, and creating freedom and inclusivity in an authoritarian political system that is constantly shrinking the spaces and funds for independent artists with a critical mindset.
Orsolya Bálint – dance writer, journalist, curator. As a journalist, she became the youngest editor of Népszava, a social-democratic daily print newspaper with 150 years of history, where she writes about culture, politics and social affairs, from a feminine perspective. She started classical ballet training at a very young age, continued later with contemporary dance, and has been writing about the Hungarian performing arts scene since 2010, among others for the dance section of the monthly periodical Theatre (Színház). She is member of the curatorium of the Rudolf Laban-prize, an annual award for the most innovative choreography, and is a dance curator of dunaPart, the Hungarian international dance&theatre platform. During the pandemic, she was also involved in creating a new format called Slippery Project, a series of short solos/duets combining stand-up comedy with contemporary dance.

Instytut Teatralny im. Zbigniewa Raszewskiego jest Narodową Instytucją Kultury finansowaną ze środków budżetu Państwa.

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