FPZ Z’borke: concert (SI)

In Slovenia, the phenomenon of choir singing is close to legendary; every school, every village has its own choir, and not a single school or state celebration, feast or funeral goes by without one. But in recent years, we’re experiencing a revival of choir singing – choirs are selling out the largest halls, exciting all generations, and new choirs are emerging in all areas: from entertainment wonders and renewed popularity of partisan choirs to this year’s guests of the Mladi levi festival: Feminist Choir Z’borke.

Z’borke are fighting with songs to make the voice of feminism more heard – to bring it on the right streets, in the right ears, and to make female artists heard. They sing a new feminist anthem, Brave Feminist and sometimes they change the lyrics of some popular song, transforming its patriarchic message. They are not only raising the morale of their female and male comrades in the fight, but also their own. A beautiful manifestation of channeling powerful messages into art, of the empowerment through art. True young lionesses!

Foto: Rebeka Bernetič

Daniel Wetzel (Rimini Protokoll): EVROS WALK WATER 1 & 2 (DE)

Daniel Wetzel is a member of the Rimini Protokoll, a well‑known art collective visiting us already with their fifth project. Wetzel, Stefan Kaegi, and Helgard Kim Haug founded the collective following their common experience at the Giessen Institute for Applied Theatre Studies. They are known as (co)founders of the reality theatre trend – using various innovative theatrical approaches, their works provide new perspectives of what we perceive as reality.

The title Evros Walk Water 1 & 2 combines two elements as the basis for the performance: a three-minute piece Water Walk by John Cage, where the musician creates music on the set that featured a bathtub, transistor radios, a pressure cooker, a plastic duck, etc.; and the name of he river which separates Greece from Turkey, a deadly border of “Europe” for those who tried to enter before it was closed with a massive fence – the Evros. In Athens, Wetzel cooperated with eight boys who arrived in Greece by boat from Iraq, Afghanistan, and Syria. They have not been permitted to travel in Europe, so what they share about their life, had to find another form. With audio recordings over headphones we listen to their stories and jokes, and to their instructions how to perform Water Walk. This way, it becomes a playground for the audience combining the stories with Cage’s playful piece, to play with them based on their instructions, making music in their and the author’s witty style. Part 2 beams the piece into the present. The boys have grown older, some of them have chosen to find other places to live in Europe, so the instruments change, and thus the sound of their concert to us, that we perform.

Cast: Abel, Aron, Ehsan, Jawad, Jined, Massoud, Moussa, Omer, Sowie
English version: Andreas, Dennis, Elektra, Maria, Nefeli, Orfeas, Thodoris
Concept and direction: Daniel Wetzel
Dramaturgy: Ioanna Valsamidou
Research: Konstantinos Kallivretakis, Ioanna Valsamidou, Nefeli Myrodia, Margarita Gerogianni
Set design: Adrianos Zacharias, Magda Plevraki, Maria Kakaroglou
Sound: Peter Breitenbach, Lampros Pigounis, Panos Tsagarakis
Lighting design: Guy Stephanou, Michalis Kloukinas, Martin Schwemin
Light objects: Guy Stephanou, Michalis Kloukinas
Video: Ehsan
Flute, caval: Dimitris Brendas
Translation: Bakar Albakar, Abbas Golbas
Producers: Violetta Gyra, Juliane Männel, Heirdun Schlegel, Charlotte Streck
Production assistant: Kostas Valsamidis
Production: Rimini Apparat, Onassis Cultural Centre / Fast Forward Festival
Co-produced by: HAU Hebbel am Ufer
Funded by: Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Europe – Department of Culture
Based on: Evros Walk Water – a coproduction by: TAK Liechtenstein, Schloßmediale Werdenberg, Rimini Apparat

Foto: Daniel Wetzel

The performance is in English.

90 minutes

Allan Sekula & Noël Burch: THE FORGOTTEN SPACE film (NL)

The Forgotten Space is the latest film project by Noël Burch, film theorist and filmmaker, and Allan Sekula, photographer, writer, critic, and filmmaker, whose creative and research opus is marked by “the imaginary and material geographies of the advanced capitalist world”.
If the performance Said to Contain captures transport, logistics and modern capitalism through the optics of container and by means of theatre, The Forgotten Space approaches the same topic by means of film. A poetic film essay, awarded the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival, that brings before our eyes the things that are not really hidden, but certainly distant from our view.

Directors: Allan Sekula & Noël Burch
Producers: Frank van Reemst, Joost Verheij
Co-producers: Vincent Lucassen, Ebba Sinzinger
Script: Allan Sekula & Noël Burch
Directors of photography: Attila Boa, Wolfgang Thaler
Sound engineers: Eckehard Braun & Joe Knauer
Sound design: Mark Glynne
Music: Riccardo Tesi & Louis Andriessen
Editor: Menno Boerema
Production company: Doc.Eye Film
Co-production company: WILDart FILM

Foto: The Forgotten Space

The film is in different languages with English subtitles.

113 minutes

Anton Pavlovič Čehov & Maruša Kink: THREE SISTERS (SI)

Meeting point: Parmova 23

Maruša Kink is finishing her master’s program of directing at Academy of theatre, radio, film and television; but she entered the theatre and theatre directing through acting. She works as a theatre director in Margareta Schwarzwald Institute which she co‑founded and where she works as Artistic Director. She is still acting and directing for youth and adults and cooperated with repertory theatres and the independent scene.
Chekhov represents a challenge to any author; how to stage this theatrical canon in a way that it becomes fresh and up‑to‑date again, and is not suffocated by the anon of all previous enactments. Three years ago, the Mladi levi festival was opened by the performance What if They Went to Moscow, a remake of Three Sisters by Christiane Jatahy, a play in a fresh format, with parallel and multi-layered film and theatre action, which was filled with yearning of Moscow, of something else, something different. The adaptation and staging by Maruša Kink is also bold, not afraid to intervene in the text. It transforms the protagonists to the present time, the actors switch between characters, and the play is moved outside of the theatre. It is performed in the premises next to the railway, close to the Railway Museum, which used to be one of the festival’s home places. In the performance about longing to leave, yearning for something else, the millieu of the play, marked both by the place and by the sounds of trains, may remind us that we are looking at life, here, in front of us, while trains are passing by.

Direction: Maruša Kink
Performing: Daša Doberšek, Jure Kopušar, Matija Vastl, Lucija Tratnik, Aja Kobe
Musician: Danijel Bogataj
Dramaturgy: Nika Leskovšek
Costumes and set design: Tina Bonča
Executive producer: Mija Špiler
Produced by: Zavod Margareta Schwarzwald, AGRFT

Foto: Željko Stevanić, Arhiv CTF UL AGRFT

Performance is in Slovene with English surtitles.

90 minutes

Laura Kalauz, Maja Leo, Bojan Djordjev, Christopher Kriese: SAID TO CONTAIN (RS, AR, CH)

Bojan Djordjev was a guest of the 2015 Mladi levi with Not Red, But Blood, a performance of partisan, revolutionary and communist poetry. This year, he is visiting with Laura Kalauz, Maja Leo and Christopher Kriese. As usually for Djordjev, the artistic team is interested in a specific phenomenon, which is not esthetized, but rather deconstructed and exposed to critical thought.

Said to Contain is a contractual term used by shipping companies to record the content of shipping containers, as they are not verifying their contents but instead trust what is written. The artistic team tries to penetrate this membrane of confidence, to pierce the non‑transparent nature of container logistics, the foundation for the organization of our world. In March and April, the team travelled on a container ship from Hamburg to Buenos Aires, and then installed a container in Zurich and staged a performance in and around it. This performance is now coming to Slovenia, a country with a sea port and thus part of global shipping logistics. The artists perceive the container as an anchor around which they create an artistic event, as well as debates and meetings with different local stakeholders.

Authors: Bojan Djordjev, Laura Kalauz, Maja Leo, Christopher Kriese, Lisa Schröter, Miriam Walther Kohn
Local production: Bunker, Ljubljana
Local producer: Alma R. Selimović
Technical director: Andrej Petrovčič
In collaboration with: Nada Especial Tanz, neue Dringlichkeit (nD), TKH-Walking Theory
Co-production: University of the Arts, Theater der Künste (Zurich),
Magacin Cultural Centre (Belgrade), Art Space La Darsena (Buenos Aires)

Foto: Ivan Hrkaš

The performance is in English.

120 minutes

Neja Tomšič: TEA FOR FIVE: OPIUM SHIPS (SI)

August 26 at 10.00 am (in Slovene), at 1.00 and 5.00 pm (in English)
 August 27 at 10.00 am, 1.00 and 3.00 pm (in Slovene)
➤ Sports society Tabor

Neja Tomšič is a visual artist of the younger generation. With her projects and academic research (documentary film in the gallery space), she is also active in the field of film, literature and theater.
Tea for Five: Opium Ships is a “visual essay”; the author combined visual art (painted ceramics) and tea ceremony, creating a micro‑performance in which she takes us for a journey with Opium ships, to the time when only Chinese knew how to grow tea, and only the British knew how to trade it. And since we are sitting, having tea in the present time, a new understanding of today’s post‑colonial world is revealed with every new Opium ship.

Conceptualized, devised and painted by: Neja Tomšič
Ceramics: Anja Slapničar
Produced by: MoTA – Muzeja tranzitornih umetnosti
Thanks to: Zisha – čajna hiša

Reservation is mandatory.

60 minutes

Pablo Fidalgo Lareo: YOU’LL HAVE TO GO TO WAR THAT STARTS TODAY (PT, ES)

Origamis, practically the only prop in the play, are a perfect metaphor for the performance itself, where a whole world emerges from paper, from the book. At the same time, origamis are a perfect illustration of the author, Pablo Fidalgo Lareo, a poet, playwright, director … A man who creates masterpieces from empty paper using only his imagination. A Spanish artist of the younger generation who entered the theatre through literature and is trying not to forget it. During creation of this performance, he felt more of a history researcher.

Every national history has blind spots – painful topics that are not being discussed or there is no agreement about their interpretation. In his performance, Pablo Fidalgo Lareo looks at one of the painful historical periods in Spain – Franco’s fascist regime – through the story of his grandfather’s uncle, who escaped from a fascist prison and fled to Buenos Aires. A play about wars that we are fighting for our own identities, about wars that we are fighting for true stories of history, identity of nations and states.

Written and directed by: Pablo Fidalgo Lareo
Performed by: Cláudio da Silva
Lighting design: José Álvaro Correia
Sound design: Coolgate (aka João Galante)
Production and touring: Amalia Area
Technician: Nuno Figueira
Music: Corrandes d’Exili, Lluis Llach, Alfonsina y el mar, Ane Brun, Mulemba Xangola, Bonga, Marisa Monte, Carlinhos Brown
Piano: Ásia Rosa
Co-produced by: Teatro Municipal Maria Matos, Festival TNT, Festival BAD, Festival de Otono a Primavera
Supported by: Espaço Alkantara, O Espaço do Tempo
Translation to Slovene: Sandra Lebar

Foto: Marta Pina

The performance is in Spanish with Slovene and English surtitles.

80 minutes

Christoph Wachter & Mathias Jud: TOOLS FOR THE NEXT REVOLUTION workshop

The workshop is a journey into possibilities of expression in the communication society and uncovers the narratives and power structures behind it. Participants will create their own Internet independent Wi-Fi communication network, learn how to use it and how to extend the range of Wi-Fi Networks with self-built antennas.

Co-production: Zavod Aksioma, Zavod Bunker
The workshop is related to the exhibition: “…” an archeology of silence in the digital age, presented at the Aksioma Project Space from August 30 until September 29 2017.
The exhibition and workshop are realized in the framework of State Machines – Art, Work, and Identity in an Age of Planetary-Scale Computation project.

Supported by: Evropska unija – program Ustvarjalna Evropa, Ministrstvo RS za kulturo, Mestna občina Ljubljana, Swiss Arts Council Pro Helvetia

Information and application (before August 23rd): sonjagrdina@gmail.com

David Weber-Krebs: TONIGHT, LIGHTS OUT! (BE, DE)

David Weber-Krebs is a visual and stage artist, a researcher and a writer. He lives and works In Brussels. In his creative process, he focuses on the relation between a work of art and the audience, therefore creating situations in theatre where the audience is involved in a “complex game between being absorbed by the performance or immersed in the work of art, and maintaining a critical distance.”
David Weber-Krebs begins his performance Tonight Lights Out with two stories: a true story about a campaign by German newspaper Bild, which invited people to turn off lights for five minutes on a certain evening and thus symbolically contribute to a better world; and another story, a legend of a Cairo boy who is persuaded by ghosts, arising from the confusion between Islamic and Coptic beliefs, to turn off lights, which triggers a miracle – a black cloud of pollution over Cairo disappears. Both stories are the basis for the author’s invitation to attempt a joint action – each member of the audience receives a light and a switch, and the experiment can begin. Will we end up in the dark, will we end up anywhere at all, and what follows after we succeed or fail to cooperate?

Concept, text, performance: David Weber-Krebs
Sound: Coordt Linke
Concept of installation: Hans Westendorp
Technician: Martin Kaffarnik
Production and assistance: Marie Urban
Producer: Elisabeth Hirner
Thanks to: Maarten Westra Hoekzema, Mathias Domahidy
Produced by: A Stichting Infinite Endings
Co-prodution: Frascati, STUK, Zeitraumexit, Theater Zeebelt
Translation to Slovene: Ana Radović

Foto: Kasia Chmura-Cegiełkowska

Performance is in English with Slovene surtitles.

100 minutes

Societat Doctor Alonso & Semolina Tomić: ANARCHY (ES)

Societat Doctor Alonso opened one of the Mladi levi festivals as General Electrica. This time, they are coming with a performance by Semolina Tomić, actress, dancer, former drummer in a punk band, and head of the nonprofit Antic Teater in Barcelona. She travelled the world with the theatre group La Fura dels Baus, which also visited Ljubljana. An Osijek native, she has lived in Barcelona since 1985.

Anarchy has had a bad reputation for centuries, even though it does not really mean the absence of order, but only the absence of hierarchy. In her performance, Semolina reminds us of the important 1936 anarchist revolution in Catalonia during the Spanish Civil War, when all land was effectively and successfully collectivized, as well as of the failed anarchist experiments. Perhaps the performance Anarchy represents a rehearsal for better attempts to undermine the existing order and to establish new relations that are not necessarily based on hierarchy? It is a participatory performance – the audience is greeted by Semolina and 40 plugged‑in electric guitars. Will we establish a new hierarchy together? Can a different hierarchy emerge from anarchy? Or, in Semolina’s words: “If you want silence, you have to reach an agreement.” And: “Do what you will.”

Direction: Sofia Asencio
Playwriting: Tomàs Aragay
Choreography: Sofia Asencio
Creation and interpretation: Semolina Tomić
Lighting and set design: CUBE
Sound space: Alfonso Ferri
Production: Imma Bové
Distribution: Societat Doctor Alonso
Co-production: Festival Terrassa’s TNT, Antic Teatre
In collaboration with: City of Bàscara
With the support of: ICEC, INAEM
Translation to Slovene: Sandra Lebar

Foto: Alessia Bombasí

The performance is in Spanish with Slovene and English surtitles.

60 minutes