Tania El Khoury: AS FAR AS MY FINGERTIPS TAKE ME (LB,UK, PS)

August 19, August 20 and August 22
from 6.00 pm until 8.00 pm and from 10.00 pm until midnight, every 15 minutes
August 21
from 6.00 pm until 8.00 pm and from 9.00 until 11.pm, every 15 minutes

Tania El Khoury works in Beirut and London, creating interactive installations and performances in which the audience is an active collaborator. She is currently finishing a PhD on the political potential of interactivity. She particularly looks at live art after the Arab uprisings. Tania is a co-founder of the urban research and live art collective Dictaphone Group.
In As Far As My Fingertips Take Me, Tania commissioned artist Basel Zaraa to write a rap song inspired by his family’s history of displacement. During this One to One piece, Basel and one audience member will engage in a conversation through touch and sound.
We may be touched by the tragic fate of people caught in wars or displaced by them, but this “touch” remains a metaphor. These stories usually touch us through the medium of screens and print. But what if one story touched us for real, physically? If we reach out to Basel, do we allow ourselves to be touched at a deeper level? Certainly, we will not be able to immediately let go of this story. It stays with us, at least until we wash it away. In this piece, the artists critically reproduce an accurate situation: refugees are here, yet so far away.

Performance by: Tania El Khoury
Devised with and performed by: Basel Zaraa
Song by: Basel Zaraa (vocals, bass and keyboard), with Emily Churchill Zaraa (vocals), Pete Churchill (music production) and Katie Stevens (flute and clarinet)
Commissioned by: On the Move LIFT 2016 in partnership with Royal Court Theatre

Foto: Tania El Khoury

Reservation is mandatory.

Performance is in English.

15 minutes

Ivana Müller: PARTITUUR (FR, HR)

With her fourth appearance at the festival, we can really call Ivana Müller a Mladi levi artist. Every time, she succeeds in preserving her poetics, which is based on a dance‑theatre approach with a good sense of different narratives and humor, and with sophisticated ideas that often begin with a single thought, such as »how heavy are my thoughts«. At the same time, she is constantly reinventing herself and does not repeat. This time, she is visiting with a show for children.
The title of the play is suggestive, because the performance is indeed a score, though not a musical one. Using audio instructions, it guides the participating children (and occasionally an adult or two) through performing and at the same time watching the performance that they are creating themselves according to the »musical score«. All leitmotifs of children’s social games, which are almost absent from today’s courtyards, resonate in the play, as well as the emergence of certain statuses within groups; when groups are being formed, when common interests are being found, when it is necessary to make decisions: what are we, where do we belong and who is with us, whether we are scared of monsters or do not believe in them, what is our attitude towards the world – humor, cooperation, observation?

Author: Ivana Müller
In collaboration with: Jefta van Dinther, Sarah van Lamsweerde, Martin Kaffarnik
Design of the monster costume: Liza Witte
Monster: Teja Bitenc
Synchronization to Slovene: Daša Dobršek, Katarina Stegnar, Branko Jordan
Translation: Ana Radović
Performance coordinators: Albane Aubry, Sarah van Lamsweerde
Technicians on tour: Martin Kaffarnik, Ludovic Rivière, Jérémie Sananes
Local producer: Mojca Jug
Produced by: I’M’COMPANY (Matthieu Bajolet & Gerco de Vroeg)
Co-produced by: Tweetakt Festival
Supported by: Performing Arts Fund Netherlands
I’M’ COMPANY is supported by: DRAC Ile-de-France, Ministry of culture and communication

Foto: Liesbeth Bernaerts

Performance is in Slovene. For children 7+.

30 minutes

Nature Theater of Oklahoma & EnKnapGroup: PURSUIT OF HAPPINESS (US, SI)

EnKnapGroup is currently the only Slovenian permanent contemporary dance ensemble. It is skillfully led by the artistic director Iztok Kovač, a world‑renowned dancer, choreographer and founder of the EN‑KNAP Institute, who is shaping a topnotch collective by constantly choosing new choreographers and directors, making EnKnapGroup an ensemble capable of tackling not only dancing, but also acting and directing challenges. For the performance Pursuit of Happiness, the collective collaborated with Nature Theater of Oklahoma, the New York artistic duo Kelly Copper and Pavol Liška. Their works (for example, Life and Times cycle) are an interweaving of theatrical boldness, and at the same time communicativeness, capable of operating in different layers – engaged, but at the same time with humor.

Pursuit of Happiness almost feels like a Spaghetti Western: iconography of the Wild West, intense situations, long stares, cowboy dance, Morricone‑style music, a sea of corpses, and an endless pursuit for a single goal that drives the performance. It is a worn‑out saying that art is a mirror to society; in Pursuit of Happiness, the authors looked deep into the mirror and stuck their tongue out at it. Of course, problems of society that is constantly chasing goods, success, progress at the expense of others and itself are apparent in the performance, but more entertaining, full of taunting and depth, is an aspect of the play where it holds a mirror up to the art itself. The imperative of the American Dream is definitely changing the world, but can we say the same for art?

Authors: Pavol Liška, Kelly Copper
Performing: EnKnapGroup: Luke Thomas Dunne, Ida Hellsten, Bence Mezei, Ana Štefanec, Jeffrey Schoenaers, Lada Petrovski Ternovšek
Lighting design: Luka Curk
Costume design: Katarina Škaper
Making of costumes: Atelje d.o.o.
Rehearsals director: Tanja Skok
Translation of text: Stojan Pelko
Techical director: Luka Curk
Technical crew leader: Jaka Šimenc
Technicians: Leon Curk, Luka Curk, Gal Škrjanec Skaberne, Omar Ismail, Hotimir Knific, Aleksander Plut, Špela Škulj
Public relations: Nina Smerkol
Marketing: Goran Pakozdi
Executive producer: Karmen Keržar
Production manager: Marjeta Lavrič
Produced by: Zavod EN-KNAP
Co-produced by: Théâtre de la Ville, steirischer herbst
Supported by: Embassy of the United States in Slovenia

Foto: Andrej Lamut

Performance is in English with Slovene surtitles.

115 minutes

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