We would like to invite you to a workshop and performance entitled On the back of the photograph, lower left corner, lies everything I can’t forget about my mother directed by Alin Uberti. Both events will be held on 5 November at the Zbigniew Raszewski Theatre Institute, 1 Jazdów, Warsaw. Participation in the workshop is free – registration is open until 22 October. Tickets to the performance (PLN 25 and 35) are available at Goout.net and the Institute’s website.
The workshop accompanies the performance entitled On the back of the photograph, lower left corner, lies everything I can’t forget about my mother (directed by Alin Uberti) which premiered on 7 September 2024 at La Mama Experimental Theatre Club in New York. The performance is a shared, participatory experience where the narrative of emigration and longing intertwine. The workshop will be held from 11:00 to 13:00 and the performance will start at 19:00 at the Zbigniew Raszewski Theatre Institute.
The 2-hour workshop, run by Alin Uberti, director and playwright, will offer a welcoming space where stories serve as a bond that brings us closer together. We will begin with theatre-specific exercises to break the ice, which will be followed by engaging writing activities. Our focus will be on the art of the ‘dramaturgy of lists’ — a unique theatrical approach where simple lists blossom into rich tapestries of shared experiences and memories. The final part of the workshop will concentrate on writing a monologue using the words, phrases, and images from the lists made earlier at the earlier stages of the workshop and a photograph that each participant is expected to bring (workshop participants are asked to bring with an old photograph that you would like to tell the group about).
The exercise related to lists helps our minds loosen up to create a more sincere, a more personal narrative in the final part of the workshop. One of the monologues created in the workshop will be performed during the performance by its author.
Alin Uberti is a theatre and film director and playwright from Bucharest, Romania. He has national and international experience in directing dramatic and postdramatic theatre. His preferred working method is a devising theatre process that involves but is not limited to, site-specific venues and themes, contemporary adaptation of classic texts, postmodern collage, a democratic, equal and collective approach to creation and lots of jokes. Contrary to his intention, his work has been characterized as cyberpunk, multimedia, absurd, local, aimed at young audiences. In turn, he likes to think of his work as coming from within the tension that arises when you admit that poetry is political.
Registration
Recommended age of participants: +18 years old; the number of places is limited.
Please send your applications using the form by 22 October 2024. Participants will receive an email confirmation of acceptance.
If you have any questions, please write to Alexandru Ivănoiu, the workshop coordinator at ivanoiu.alex@yahoo.com and type “Workshop in Warsaw” as the e-mail subject.
Workshop language: Romanian and English.
Participation in the workshop is free. Prior writing or theatrical experience is not required.
On the back of the photograph, lower left corner, lies everything I can’t forget about my mother – a performance
5 November at 19:00, at the Zbigniew Raszewski Theatre Institute
Immediately after the 1989 revolution, many Romanians chose not to wait and see what would become of their country. They needed distance. They uprooted themselves and settled in other lands, seeking more than the deprivations of the last decade of communism — the absence of food, warmth, and freedom. Today, 35 years later, while living conditions in Romania have improved, a new absence lingers. The absence of the bodies that have not yet returned. These Romanians send money home, vote, and call us, but their presence is missing in contemporary Romania. This performance is a participatory experience that tells the story of these absent bodies — their searches, joys, pains, and their distance. It is a story that can only be fully told with the presence of these bodies on stage. A story of an untranslatable word “dor” that Romanians hold in their hearts. A story about everything we cannot forget.
Text: Alexandru Ivănoiu
Director: Alin Uberti
Set Design and Video Design: Cosmin Stancu
Cast: Maria Moroșan, Vlad Pânzaru, Bogdan Iancu
Production: IOTA (Bucharest)
Duration: approx. 1h30
Language: Romanian, subtitled in English and Polish (translated by: Liuba Ilnytska)
The performance was developed in the framework of the Poduri (Bridges) project that connects the Romanian diaspora living in such cities as New York, Berlin, Madrid, Roma, Milano, Warsaw, Lisbon and Paris. It was premiered on 7 September 2024 in La Mama Experimental Theatre Club, and then performed at the Volksbühne in Berlin, Atelier Montez in Roma, Casa Cardinale Ildefonso Schuster in Milano, Teatro de los Aguas in Madrid and Théâtre de l’Opprimé in Paris.
The project is financed by the Administration of the National Cultural Fund. ANCF is not responsible for the results of the project, they are entirely the responsibility of the funding beneficiary.
