Magazine 2023 CU_I

The lives of the others
European Theatres for Young Audience
in a Union of Diversity
Overview
of the work
2020–2023

ConnectUp
The Lives of the Others
\ European Theatres for Young
Audience in a Union of Diversity
ConnectUp is a successful larger scale cooperation
project supported by the European Commission under
their European Culture Funding Stream Creative Europe.
It consists of 14 partners from 10 countries – among
them a university, theatres and festivals.
ConnectUp sets in place an international cultural initiative
for the target group 12+ in order to counteract the
process of increasing social and cultural division across
Europe. To achieve the aim of cultural inclusion it is
essential to provide opportunities for young people to
actively engage with different nationalities, cultures and
social groups and to remain open to other people and
life experiences.
The partners, all working in the field of Theatre for Young
Audiences, combine their different skills in a European
“union of diversity” and plan a major investment in
Audience Development. Following Nelson Mandela’s
quote »No one is born hating another person because of
the color of his skin or his background or his religion …«
the theatres and festivals aim to reach the cross section
of society at least within their auditoriums by bringing
together existing middle-class audiences with audiences
from the margin of the society.
Under professional guidance young people of all social
classes, cultural backgrounds and abilities share experiences
in theatre processes under the theme “The Lives
of the Others”. Making professionalization a keyword,
ConnectUp offers a certified Dual Education “Theatre
Mediation” and mediators accompany all processes with
participation projects. That guarantees that the institutions
will turn into welcoming places for young people
of all social and cultural backgrounds.
· 2
3

Table
of
Content
Challenging times
for a new emerging
theatre network
Dirk Neldner, Artistic Director
of ConnectUp, at the Inaugural
Meeting in Vienna, January 2020
3.... ConnectUp – Short Info
4.... Table of Content
5.... About ConnectUp by Dirk Neldner
7.... About the Theatre Mediation Programme by Gunnar Horn
9.... ConnectUp activities
10.... Inaugural Meeting Vienna Austria
11.... Fair of Ideas at FITEI Porto Portugal
14.... Showcase at Segnali Festival Milano Italy
17.... Showcase at ASSITEJ Festival Čakovec Croatia
19.... ConnectUp partners and productions
20.... Universitetet i Agder Norway
21.... ASSITEJ Norway
22.... Dschungel Wien Austria
26.... Teatro O Bando Portugal
30.... FITEI Portugal
31.... Białostocki Teatr Lalek Poland
35.... Divadlo Alfa Czech Republic
38.... Derby Theatre Great Britain
42.... Kazališna družina PINKLEC Croatia
46.... Ich bin O.K. Austria
49.... Landesbühnen Sachsen Germany
53.... Lutkovno gledališče Ljubljana Slovenia
57.... Elsinor Centro Di Produzione Teatrale Italy
60.... Theatr Genedlaethol Cymru Great Britain
61.... ConnectUp Outlook
63.... Management – Imprint
64.... Partners – Addresses
It has been a crazy and multi-layered story that we have
experienced with ConnectUp since 2015. We needed a
total of three attempts to get European funding. For very
different reasons, we narrowly failed each time, but the
consortium stayed together, remained convinced that
this effort of new submissions would be worthwhile.
The joy was all the greater when we received the positive
decision from the EU in summer 2019 and met for
the first time in Vienna for the inaugural meeting the
following January.
The 14 European institutions were prepared to make a
great effort to achieve the stated goals and thus to make
their audiences more diverse and to make it easier for
new communities in their cities and regions to access
culture. The institutions saw themselves in a position
to do this not only because they were convinced of the
necessity, but also because they were acting from a position
of economic strength.
To make our vision become reality,
we agreed on four project objectives:
\ 1. We want to diversify our audience and to include
young people from the margin of the society (cultural
& social inclusion). As the final goal of the project,
we want to have them permanently bound to
our organisations as part of a new mixed audience
on an equal level.
\ 2. To achieve this, we need to develop a varied artistic
offer for the new assembled audience: We will
work on over 29 new theatre productions based on
newly developed plays in close cooperation with
the audience (research). The productions will be
presented in our repertoires and at 11 international
festival showcases throughout Europe.
\ 3. To bind the new audience groups long term, they
need to be actively involved in our processes.
Therefore, our audience development strategy
consists of three parts (mediation, involvement,
outreach) and requires the active and reciprocal
participation of the young people.
\ 4. To ensure effective communication with the hardto-reach
groups and their sustainable involvement
in the participation work we need newly trained
professionals. In the dual education “Theatre
Mediation” we will train more than 50 theatre / festival
employees and teachers from key schools to
become Theatre Mediators in two 18-month runs.
Then COVID came into the world and not just only sent
theatres into crisis and threatened to separate them from
their audiences. Also, the emerging ConnectUp network
threatened to become marginal.
· 4
5

But neither can the creativity of artists be turned off, nor
can the audience’s desire to be stimulated, provoked by
art be stopped. Most theatres quickly found new (digital)
channels to stay connected with their audiences – and
ConnectUp also developed new formats to revitalise the
exchange between artists.
More than 20 participants of the Theatre Mediation
Programme (TMP) gathered at countless Zoom meetings
in a disciplined and curious manner. A positive energy
developed among the participants, so that the first real
meeting in Porto in autumn 2021 was like a reunion of old
acquaintances and quickly developed into a productive
closeness among the participants.
The artists of the theatres also got to know each other on
zoom – differently than actually planned. Each theatre introduced
itself with a production, a link to a performance
stream was exchanged in advance. Although we all agree
that recorded theatre has a different intensity, what we
saw provided enough starting points for a lively virtual exchange.
And it at least made it easier to get into the real
(analogue) artistic conversations that followed later.
This rather positive-sounding view of the pandemic
period should not, however, obscure the lasting, negative
consequences. Many of our partner theatres have fallen
on hard times economically, and have had to fight hard to
get their audiences to return. It is even more remarkable
that the will of all ConnectUp institutions has not been
weakened by the past years to make a substantial contribution
so that their audiences will be broader and more
diverse in the future.
Just as fire doesn’t extinguish fire,
evil can’t suffocate evil.
Only good, when it encounters evil
and isn’t infected by it, defeats evil.
Leo Tolstoy
This quote by Leo Tolstoy introduced our meeting at the
Segnali Festival in Milan in May 2022. Russia’s horrific
war of aggression naturally dominated our conversations
and we wondered how we were challenged by it. The
Polish ConnectUp partner, the theatre in Bialystok, told
us about the many refugee children who have since been
welcomed into Polish classes. It was clear to all of us
that we would like to invite young people from such a
Polish-Ukrainian class for Tomorrowland, the final workshop
of the participants of Theatre Mediation run.
Preparation Meeting for the Youth Encounter Tomorrowland
at Teatro O Bando March 2023
It is therefore all the more enjoyable to accompany all
those artistic processes in which the ConnectUp idea is
being worked on across borders. I would like to mention
just three examples of the numerous, diverse and exciting
artistic processes. The creation of a theatre text about
the life of a Roma girl, the development of a play about taboos
of young people by two very different directors and
the respective working visits of the Theatre Mediators.
They mirror the artists’ great interest in going beyond
their own demanding working world and developing new
artistic formats in an intensive and honest exchange with
their European partners. Formats that enable more young
people in Europe to recognise themselves and their
concerns in theatre.
With ConnectUp, the theatres are initiating a development
that will enable their young audiences to participate
as co-creators in many artistic processes. These interactions
on eye level will change the institutions in the long
term and thus follows our main concern: to promote high
quality theatre for, with and by young people.
The fact that we seem to be succeeding particularly
in these challenging times is a very remarkable result,
which is documented in this magazine in all its diversity.
Dirk Neldner
Artistic Director of ConnectUp
Theatre Mediation
Programme
A study programme
within ConnectUp.
The Theatre Mediation Programme (TMP) is at the core
of ConnectUp, as it helps to bring new knowledge to
artists and teachers interested in the lives of young and
often marginalized people through the development of
theory and practice in TYA. The TMP provides a meeting
place for people working with cultural expression, both
for and with young people. We want to provide participants
with a practical and theoretical understanding
of the work of a theatre mediator and knowledge about
different target groups and the involvement of young
people in drama and theatre work. Theatre mediation
(also known as theatre education, theatre pedagogy and
engagement work) can effectively connect the three
involved parties (artists, teachers, and young people)
and unite them as equal partners in the theatre process.
Participants in the TMP include a variety of teachers and
theatre workers from participating institutions and collaborating
schools. Before starting the programme, we hold
personal zoom meetings with each participant to learn
about their backgrounds and levels of competence. The
wide variety of skill levels has been a challenge, but also
an asset to the program as we’ve adapted it over time.
This are the different parts of TMP:
\ A kick-off workshop week.
\ A series of e-learning modules focusing
on different themes.
\ Co-creation projects.
\ Masterclass at a festival.
Teaching methods
The TMP is organized and supervised by TMP mentors,
which include ConnectUp project managers and leaders
from the University of Agder and the University of
Derby. The zoom e-learning modules have used lectures,
discussions, break-out groups, text materials, videos, and
best practice examples. The workshops include lectures,
seminars, and hands-on activities. The co-creation
projects have been organized with young people in close
connection with the producing theatres.
Workshops
Due to the pandemic, our initial plan to start with an on-site
workshop was not possible. So, we started with the e-learning
programme, later on we had two workshop meetings:
one in Porto, and one in Milan.
The workshops were a mixture of practical drama and
theatre work, performances for young audiences, meetings
with artists, conversations, and general discussions.
In general, the workshops were well received.
Quotes:
Exhausting week, but very, very cool. Learned much,
tried many methods, talked to my co-production
partners, and had a good time.
Being able to interact face-to-face was of great value
in finding common pathways for collaboration. There
were just a lot of overlapping activities (i.e., workshop
and meeting), which I think the whole group would
have appreciated if we could have attended both.
A bit too busy schedule, but the organization and
time management were very effective.
The e-learning programme
The e-learning section included nine zoom meetings
over six modules.
In the first module, we aimed to establish a common
language in the group and discuss different perspectives
on art and theatre work.
The second module covered the specific needs of our
target groups.
In the module about pre- and post-performance
activities, we wanted to highlight the totality in which
a performance exists.
The next module addressed drama and theatre education
in schools. It introduced the use of drama and theater
with youth as a teaching method with a broader
perspective, both for learning and personal development.
One module dealt with Participatory Theatre with Young
People. It introduced participants to making theatre with
young people.
Community-based theatre is well developed in many
regions and countries. This module considered how
to build relationships with whole communities.
Gunnar Horn,
Head of TMP,
at the Inaugural
Meeting in
Vienna,
January 2020
· 6
7

From the feedback:
You delivered us a good mixture of all components.
It was never too much or too little of any part.
Some of the reading material was too hard for me to
understand.
I’m happy that we have integrated some creative activities
at the beginning of the class. But how could we integrate
more creative exercises during the programme?
I appreciate the reading materials and videos sent to
us. I also appreciate how properly organized the team
was.
I am thankful for the opportunity to learn with
this community. Hope to see you soon.
Canvas
We had chosen Canvas Open as our Learning Management
System. We used Zoom as our platform for meetings.
Canvas could have been used as an interactive part
of the programme.
I would hope that we could have used the Canvas
more extensively to our advantage. It is a Learning
platform, and we could have done so much more
with it in terms of curriculum design.
A co-creation performance project
Participants were encouraged to use the information
provided by TMP to co-develop projects with the
ConnectUp theatres for diverse audience groups.
\ Our collaboration with young people
has been very extensive.
\ Today I learned how hard acting can be.
I didn’t expect acting to be so interesting.
\ I found it very interesting how it looks in the theatre …
The games were cool, too. For the most part, you need
courage for the games. I can’t wait to see what it’s like
tomorrow. (Alina R., 7a)
Adjustments for the second TMP round.
A four-day workshop prior to the start of the e-learning
programme is designed to facilitate online communication
and create a better understanding within the group.
The co-creation performance projects connected to the
4th co-production will be better integrated in the TMP.
They will now take place parallel with the TMP period.
A hub was established in Vancouver, Canada, with a
start-up workshop in Canada and participants from
overseas. These participants will later on take part in the
common e-learning programme.
We have pinpointed three main aspects of theatre work
to be equally covered in the course:
\ Theatre FOR young Audiences: Establish a common
language about making theatre for young audiences.
\ Theatre WITH Young People: Explore drama and theatre
techniques and approaches to create theatre with
young people.
\ Theatre BY Young People: How to support young
people to make theatre, in response to professional
productions, and how to develop a relationship with
a whole community.
Feedback from participants
Participants evaluated the overall value of the e-learning
modules and the workshops as very good, scoring them
on average 8.5 out of 10, with variations across different
sections.
“After following the TMP, so far, do you feel encouraged
to do something different/change your methods?“:
\ It’s inspiring to work with other marginalized sectors
and create WITH them. I haven’t tried working with
people with disabilities.
\ I have new ideas, how to work with children.
The whole group inspired me so much.
We also asked about the biggest value in one word:
\ Openness. Connections. Differences. Community.
\ Meetings
\ Festivals
\ Workshops
\ Masterclasses
\ Seminars
ACTIVI
TIES
Further work
After the project period, University of Agder aims to
develop TMP into a permanent international study
programme for theatre workers and others interested
in the topic.
Gunnar Horn
Head of Theatre Mediation Programme
(University of Agder, NO)
· 8
9

Inaugural
Meeting
at Dschungel Wien
in Vienna Austria
January 28 – February 1, 2020
Fair of Ideas
at FITEI
Porto | Portugal
October 29 – November 2, 2021
Representatives of the leadership from all 14 partner
institutions came to Vienna for the kick-off meeting
of ConnectUp. From January 28 – February 1, 2020,
Dschungel Wien, centrally located in the beautiful
museum district, was the host for more than 40 theatre
makers from all over Europe.
On the first day, Merete Elnan from the leading organization,
the University of Agder (NO) and Corinne Eckenstein,
Artistic Director of the hosting company, welcomed the
guests. Dirk Neldner, Artistic Director of the project, gave
a detailed overview of the complex project structure.
The next day, Gunnar Horn from the University of Agder,
introduced the partners to the concept of the Theatre
Mediation Programme, which is central to ConnectUp.
The importance of Audience Development in today’s
times was emphasized by Ava Hunt and Caroline Barth
(Theatre Derby, UK) with their lecture “New Voices, new
communities” and by Jonathan Goodacre, external guest
from “The Audience Agency” (UK), speaking about
“The rules of engagement “.
ConnectUp brings together institutions with different
orientations to combine their expertise aiming for a
new mixed audience in their auditoriums. For working
together successfully, it’s essential, that the theatre
makers from all over Europe get to know each other. In
interviews, conducted by Odette Bereska, ConnectUp’s
literary adviser and Merete Elnan, the partners gave an
insight into their expertise, work and plans.
Being in Vienna, the participants of the meeting used
the chance to see a show at the host’s venue, Dschungel
Wien, “Beyond real” by Theatre foXXfire!
The other Austrian partner, company “Ich bin O.K.”, had
prepared an introduction to their extraordinary inclusive
work with the participation of their young dancers
especially for that occasion.
After more than 1,5 years the leadership and selected
artists from all 14 partner institutions met for the 2nd
time. In Porto, FITEI Festival was the host for more than
50 theatre makers from all over Europe to continue the
artistic endeavor of ConnectUp in reality.
The first two days were dedicated to the TMP. Since
June 2021, the artists and teachers participating in the
programme have met once a month online to work on the
6 modules of further education. The first joint analogue
encounter was very inspiring for everyone. Four lectures
and workshops, a joint theatre visit during the FITEI
Festival and especially the time spent together resulted in
an intensive exchange that will now be continued online
again.
Gonçalo Amorim,
Artistic Director FITEI (PT)
· 10
A Caminhada dos Elefantes – Formiga Atómica (PT)
11

\ Transcultural theatre work with
young people and young adults
with migration background
by Corinne Eckenstein (Dschungel Vienna)
The realities of young people with a migration- or refugee
background are more complex than the often stigmatising
and stereotypical depiction suggests. Muslim
masculinity in particular is predominantly portrayed in
public and media discourses as patriarchal, sexist and
violent. Often these young men fight against patriarchal
structures and expectations themselves. The aim of
this masterclass is to use the means of theatre to start
a dialogue, to reduce fears and prejudices and to show
ways into conversation on taboo topics such as religion,
sexuality and gender with writing exercises, improvisation
and games.
\ Actor’s Awareness on Stage
Masterclass
by Teatro O Bando
This actor’s working system is based on the perspective
of the beholder, the spectator. It is a theatrical glossary
created from the exploratory work of the actor. In this
Masterclass, through talks and exercises that started
from the concrete perception, the idea of fiction and
representation in theatre was developed and shared.
\ Co-creation evaluation methods:
Warwick-Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing
Scale and others
by Ava Hunt, Derby University
One of the main approaches of ConnectUp is to contribute
that different groups of society actively (artistically)
meet and gain a better understanding of the “Life of the
Others“. Thereby outcome categories are addressed like:
Enjoyment, Intensity, Respect, Acceptance, Empathy,
New People or Confidence. The generic term for these
categories is “wellbeing”. To measure this, ConnectUp
refers to the proven method of WEMWBS, which each
partner will conduct on selected groups for their productions,
workshops and co-creations and determines
whether the “wellbeing score” changes during the process.
The WEMWBS are to be completed online
and available in different languages.
\ Target Group as a resource
by Anne Mette Liene (University of Agder)
Anne Mette introduced the TMP participants to one of
her own performances, using the target group as a resource.
She gave examples how to include this exploration
and the generated material in the development of the
scenic expression, as well as for pre- and post-work.
In the 2nd part of the meeting, the Artistic Directors
presented their productions of the first project phase #2,
in which the theatres made an effort to find a suitable
access to the new target groups. Then the theatres found
out about their first ideas for production # 3, which is
planned as a cooperation of at least 2 ConnectUp-partners.
A meeting of the Advisory Board, the further project-planning
and the timing changed by the pandemic
were decided.
The opportunity to see several stimulating productions
within the festival and to spend time together intensively
in a picturesque city was a great benefit for all participants
and will have a lasting influence on further work.
· 12
13

\ Theatre Mediation – Workshops
EQUAL / UNEQUAL – IN/EQUALITY
(Idea: Attila Zanin)
By Ich bin O.K. (AT)
Filled with games and exercises, these workshops aim to
nurture and enrich each participant’s imagination. It aims
to inspire individuals to have self-confidence, self-appreciation
and appreciation of others, nature and culture
while fostering critical thinking and collaboration.
Mediating social media and drama/theatre
practice with young people.
by Kristian Nødtvedt Knudsen
(Associate professor in Theatre at University of Agder).
Showcase Segnali
With Hana Zanin, Maria Dinold and Eva Török
Specially featuring the cooperative work with DANCE
ASSISTS (with learning disability)
Dance Assists: Alex Stuchlik, Sophie Waldstein and
Niklas Kern
Milano | Italy
May 1 – 5, 2022
\ Masterclasses
The Intention of the workshop was to give an introduction
into an approach for inclusive dance- and theatre
pedagogy.
ConnectUp partners met in beautiful Milano for the first
project showcase. At the invitation of Teatro Elsinor,
the TMP participants and the artistic directors of the
theatres were able to take part in the festival Segnali and
come together in workshops and round tables.
After the Fair of ideas in Porto, it was the second opportunity
for the TMP participants to meet live. After
completing the online seminars in February, they were
able to gain practical experience on very different topics
in masterclasses and workshops. The participants will
be able to apply the suggestions and inspirations from
this when working on the co-creations with young people
that accompany the professional co-productions of their
companies.
Izabela Wilczewska, artist from BTL (PL) spoke
about her many years of experiences “Working with
Deaf People”.
Emina Petzner, teacher from Vienna, presented the
project “transformation chains”, which is about reacting
to an artistic impulse in a creative way. The aim is to
show with a short digital contribution how cultural
education in schools can work.
The artists of the inclusive dance theatre group Ich
bin ok. gave supportive instructions how to deal with
heterogeneous groups of individuals with and without
disabilities when improvising and/or choreographing a
piece as well as raising the interest of a young audience
for participation in such performances; theoretical background
and practical skills.
PETA’s Integrated Theatre Arts Approach
by Ada Marie S. Tayao and Norberto Portales
(PETA, Philippines)
PETA’s Integrated Theatre Arts Approach combines
group dynamics, creative dance and movement, creative
sound and music, visual arts, creative writing, and creative
drama into one fun-filled workshop.
The Integrated Theatre Arts is the company’s creative
approach in all its workshops and training for children,
young people, and adults from different sectors tackling
different advocacies and issues surrounding them.
Being able to perform and express oneself in social media
and to reflect in diverse and varied ways are crucial
in today’s media-dominated culture. However, engaging
with social media requires the user to handle a high level
of communicative complexity, which can be challenging
to master. The war in Ukraine has also shown, how
communication on social media platforms is a crucial
part of creating and communicating the narratives of the
different parties.
This workshop set out to explore the crossover between
social media and drama/theatre in education. With a particular
focus on, how to implement strategies from social
media into working with drama/theatre and young people,
and thereby creating platforms for critical reflection.
· 14
15

\ CROSS THE LINE
Line. Limit. Border. Conflict.
by compagnia rodisio (IT)
directed by Manuela Capece and Davide Doro
dramaturg Elisa Zaninotto
compagnia rodisio proposed a moment of work, sharing
and exploration around the biennial project Cross the
Line, which will develop between 2022 and 2023. Cross
the Line is a research, education and theatrical project
for teens and young people. It is a shared creative
process between Theatre and Architecture.
The artistic directors came primarily together to coordinate
further steps in the development of the co-productions
(#3). Together with colleagues from the respective
partner theatres, they had the opportunity to meet the
artists and teachers who completed the dual education last
year and who are now, as Theatre Mediators, responsible
for the participatory projects in the context of the co-production.
First exciting binational project ideas were born,
which will come to life in the coming months with the
participation of numerous young Europeans.
Showcase at
ASSITEJ Festival
After show talk Kalashnikow
Čakovec | Croatia
Line. Limit. Border. Conflict.
Go beyond. Go over. Cross. Language
Religion.
Skin.
Gender. Origin.
Family.
Age.
Social identity. Expectation. Chance.
When does a line become a limit? What does mean
crossing that limit? What does mean crossing that
line? Can the line be a protection? Can we see the limits
around us?
Are the external constructions reflected within us?
The walls outside are repeated inside?
But we were guests at one of the most important children’s
and youth theatre festivals in Italy, at Segnali, and
of course we took the opportunity to see as many performances
as possible. The festival was opened by Frogs, a
politically highly charged adaptation after Aristophanes
by the host Teatro Elsinor, which was created as part of
ConnectUp. Dschungel Vienna presented Kalashnikow –
mon amour, an impressive dance piece on the subject of
flight, expulsion and male role models. The dance theatre
group Ich bin O.K. from Vienna, whose goal is the active,
equal participation of people with and without disabilities
in social and cultural life, could not show their production
due to illness, but we were able to gain experience in
inclusive work in a workshop conducted by members of
the company.
October 12–15, 2022
In October 2022 a meeting of the ConnectUp Advisory
Board took place in Čakovec, Croatia at the partner
theatre Pinklec.
In several encounters, the artistic directors of the companies
reported on the work processes and results of the
first ConnectUp co-production (#3) aimed at a specific
target group. The meeting of partly very different working
methods and artistic focuses was described by everyone
as very challenging, but also as a great professional and
personal enrichment.
There were intensive discussions about the working
process of the first ConnectUp co-production (#3). What
was new for several theatres was the close cooperation
with the theatre educators who took part in the 1st run of
the ConnectUp Theatre Mediation Programme. The fact
that, in addition to the professional production, intensive
research among the target groups and a co-creation with
young people also took place under the direction of the
theatre mediators (artists and teachers), was unusual
for several companies and sometimes logistically not
easy to embed in everyday theatre life. Yet all described
these processes as a valuable experience; they will also
accompany new productions in the future. Above all, the
intensive cooperation with individual schools and teachers
will be continued and intensified.
· 16
17

A second central topic were the considerations for the
second ConnectUp co-production (#4): A bi-national production
with a theatre outside the project. The majority of
theatres are already in close contact with their respective
partners, interesting and leading international companies,
and very different artistic concepts and Theatre
Mediation projects are being developed.
PART-
NERS
At the same time as the Advisory Board meeting, the
national annual ASSITEJ festival, organized by the host,
took place at the Pinklec theatre. The European guests
had the opportunity to see several Croatian performances,
including the Pinklec production “A Blue Sun on a Yellow
Sky” for viewers 4+.
After show talk “Petty One-Way”
The solo “Petty One-Way” (age 10+) was invited from
the Landesbuehnen Sachsen (DE), a production that is
exemplary in terms of sustainability and environmental
awareness. Here there was the opportunity to use the
translation options of the ConnectAPP, so that a wordy
production was understandable for everyone.
· 18
19

Our experience is that professional theatre for children
and young people is on par with other contemporary
theatre, and several of our employees have extensive
experience in Theatre for Young Audiences (TYA): performing
arts for children, by youth, theatre with children,
or theatre discussing childhood.
ASSITEJ
Universitetet
i Agder
Kristiansand | Norway
The University of Agder (UiA) is situated on the southern
tip of Norway and is located on two campuses, in
Kristiansand and Grimstad. Research is the foundation
of all teaching activities at UiA and covers a wide variety
of subjects and departments. It is a public university
with state-of-the-art buildings on both campuses. The
university consists of six faculties, a Teacher Education
Unit and one museum.
The Faculty of Fine Arts provides teaching, research and
artistic development of high national and international
quality. The faculty is organized into three departments.
Staff and students from the Department of Visual Arts
and Drama are engaged in ConnectUp.
In addition to the coordination of the project, developing
and running the TMP-programme, members of our
academic artistic staff have been running workshops,
both online and in some of the few “live” meetings during
the project.
Writing the application, we imagined that we could involve
our students in a wide range of activities in ConnectUp,
but due to the pandemic we had to postpone that. This
year we invited the Norwegian director Aslak Moe as a
guest teacher on our Bachelor’s programme in Contemporary
Theatre. He gave lectures, masterclasses and
workshops focusing on how to devise theatre based on
interviews and personal stories. Now it is up to the students
if and how they adapt this approach in their artistic
projects this spring. The study programme combines
artistic, scientific and didactic practice. The education
is rooted in contemporary professional theatre practice,
which is characterised by productive interplay between
production, critical reflection, and didactic strategies. We
work extensively with arts- and cultural institutions and
other areas of practice such as kindergartens, schools
and cultural schools.
As a contribution to ConnectUp we are doing a
co-production with Agder Nye Teater. The ensemble will
primarily consist of students at the BA in Contemporary
Theatre, and Magnus Sparsaas (Agder Nye Teater) will be
directing.
In addition to a bachelor’s programme in contemporary
theatre, a one-year study in drama, an interdisciplinary
master’s programme in fine arts and doctoral fellowships in
the performing arts, we offer drama and theatre subjects in
teacher and kindergarten teacher education in addition to
individual continuing and further education courses.
Norway
Strengthening Performing Arts
for Young Audiences – Worldwide!
International Norwegian
ASSITEJ Festival (INAF)
September 12–16, 2023
ASSITEJ is the world’s largest network for TYA and
unites theatres, organisations and individuals throughout
the world who are creating performing arts for children
and young people. ASSITEJ is dedicated to the artistic,
cultural and educational rights of children and young
people across the globe and advocates on behalf of all
children regardless of nationality, cultural identity,
ethnicity, or religion.
ASSITEJ Norway is one of about 100 national centers in
the global ASSITEJ-network. Every other year you can
visit us at the International Norwegian ASSITEJ Festival
(INAF). Here you can experience both Norwegian and
international cutting-edge productions, and enjoy our innovative
professional programme with workshops, talks
and artistic encounters. At our next festival, which will
take place from 12th to 16th September 2023 in
Kristiansand and which will be called What Matters Most,
we will also be hosting the festival hub for ConnectUp.
ASSITEJ Norway is however much more than a festival!
In Oslo we organize TheatreSaturday for Kids – a project
that focuses on reaching low-income families by making
high-quality performances accessible to everyone.
For Norwegian TYA-professionals we hold workshops
nationwide, and we present performing artists and best
practices from Norway internationally. ASSITEJ Norway
works towards ensuring cultural exchange between
artists in TYA. We host residencies for international
artists in Norway, and we send Norwegian artists abroad
to participate in international events. We are currently
partner in two EEA-funded projects, and in the EU-project
ConnectUp. We are part of the Nordic-Baltic ASSITEJ
Network, and we also work closely with ASSITEJ’s other
networks, particularly the ASSITEJ International Inclusive
Arts Network (IIAN). The past two years diversity and
inclusion have been some of ASSITEJ Norway’s main
focus areas.
Monster in magen Signe Fulgested Luksengard
ASSITEJ brings people together world-wide so that they
can share knowledge and practice within the field of TYA,
to deepen understanding, develop practice, create new
opportunities, and strengthen the global sector, on behalf
of all children everywhere. To this end, ASSITEJ endorses
Article13 and 31 of the 1989 United Nations’ Convention
of the Rights of the Child that affirms the right of children
to leisure time and the enjoyment of arts and cultural activities
and the right to freedom of expression. ASSITEJ
Norway brings this into every aspect of our work, and
thus our participation in the ConnectUp-project is in line
with our mission.
You can visit ASSITEJ Norway on www.assitej.no and on
SoMe by the tag @assitejnorway. We hope to see you at
our festival in September 2023, but also at the ASSITEJ
Artistic Gathering in Serbia in November 2023 where
you can find us in the Nordic-Baltic House hosted by the
Nordic-Baltic Assitej Network.
· 20
21

2022/23
\ TABU 12+
Teatro O Bando & Dschungel Wien
Opening September 22, 2022
DSCHUNGEL WIEN
Vienna | Austria
What is actually a taboo? For whom is what a taboo? And
why? We have collected taboo terms from young people
of different backgrounds and want to talk about them.
Let’s look them in the eye and make a decision on how to
deal with them.
Dschungel Wien is a theatre house for young audiences
(children, adolescents and young adults). Dschungel
Wien has a vision of a theatre that is dealing with young
peoples’ issues and current social developments. This
theatre is meant to be an authentic and bold platform for
the views, interests and living realities of children and
adolescents. It desires to be a place where young people
are stimulated to reflect on the society they live in, to
express their desires, fears and visions.
The choice on the topic was made right at the beginning
of the first meeting between the director Juliana and
the choreographer Corinne. First, a lot of material was
collected in a workshop in Portugal with two 6th grades -
texts, drawings and photos around the word taboo. In this
first phase, the actors from Portugal were also involved in
order to immerse themselves in the youthful imagination.
In the second phase a first research with the actors from
Portugal and Elif from Austria took place.
DIVERSITY
Diversity has always been strongly emphasised in
Dschungel Wien. Artists from more than 20 nations living
and working in Vienna bring in their visions, thoughts
and images, and reach out through different forms of art
to the young audience. In 2021 /2022 we put a stronger
focus on the issue of diversity, working together with
different refugee and Muslim communities. This was
very successful as it brought up a lot of attention to
issues as well to the artists themselves.
OUTREACH
Since March 2021, we employed 2 cultural workers:
Özlem Yarin and Elif Bilici. They connect the theatre with
youth facilities, social institutions and other community
centers. The focus lies on the quality of the relationship
that they build with the social workers and youth workers.
These are the keys to get in contact with marginalized
communities. By inviting them to Dschungel Wien and
giving workshops they started to relate to theatre and got
interested in the different topics they were exposed to.
But most important was being represented on stage by
artists of performances such as “Medeas Daughters*”,
“Kalaschnikow mon amour” and “TABU”.
\ CONNECT UP SKIN FESTIVAL
October 10 – 14, 2023
All bodies on stage
Especially for young people, it is important to convey
different views of the body than the images of perfect
bodies on social media. Fears and prejudices should be
reduced and other images and attitudes towards people
with different disabilities, bodies and origins should be
made possible. This also exposes wounds and these
wounds imprint themselves deeply into the body and
soul. It takes time to heal and to draw a new strength
from it, which also requires empathy and patience. The
festival gives an insight into different lives of people who
are repeatedly affected by exclusion and marginalization.
In addition to the productions from Croatia, Great Britain,
Slovenia, the Czech Republic, Germany and Austria, workshops
and talks will be held on the topic of performers
with mixed abilities in the field of theatre for young
audiences. For this purpose, national and international
experts will be invited.
\ KINGS & QUEENS 12+
Co-production of Dschungel Wien &
UNUSUAL BEINGS & Dance Revolution East Africa
Opening October 6, 2022
What is a perfect life, a perfect body, a perfect origin?
Joseph may not be able to walk without his crutches,
but when he dances, he literally seems to fly. Maartje, on
the other hand, is rather small and delicate but has the
strength to climb the tallest trees, and Future has little
money but a voice that makes the world around him ring.
They are all the descendants of kings and queens. We go
back to the old times when spirits were still connected to
people and each:r was given a life task on the way – a gift
and a burden – and it was the task of each:r individual to
use it for his:her true happiness. For each and every one,
like a king or queen, wears his:her crown in life.
A powerful dance piece for young people that explores
boundaries.
Concept & Choreography: Corinne Eckenstein
Music: Karrar Alsaedi
Set Design: Hannes Röbisch und Corinne Eckenstein
Costume: Kareem Aladhami
Assistance: Sophie Freimüller
Dancers: Maartje Pasman, Futurelove Sibanda,
Joseph Tebandeke
Starting with letters from the young people, they improvised
to find the first theatrical images. This material and
also the many drawings of the young people served as a
basis for Rui’s first ideas for the stage design and Catarina’s
costumes. To express the individuality of each character,
she used transparent, golden and black fabrics, playing
with the idea of showing and hiding. Since the team has
very different experiences and backgrounds, this process
of creation required a lot of dedication, dialogue and
listening to find a place to work together. Our cast was
made up of artists from different backgrounds. They
spoke different languages, which also changed again
and again in the piece, so Elif spoke sometimes Turkish,
sometimes German or English and Rafael Portuguese
and English and a few bits of German. Nerika spoke
Portuguese, English and German because she spent a
few years in Germany as a teenager. This was like an own
composition, so that the audience in Vienna could follow
the content despite the many languages.
In the third phase we rehearsed for 4 weeks in Palmela
in Portugal at Teatro O Bando. There, the choreographer
Corinne Eckenstein joined us, who dealt strongly with
the space and its formal structure through the barrier
tapes. This created a kind of game that the actors had to
follow in order to free themselves from their taboos. We
used jump ropes for this and developed a very stringent
choreographed sequence. It required a lot of training and
physical fitness to learn this choreography exactly. Between
Juliana and Corinne, the scenic and choreographic
sequences were divided to develop different dynamics. It
was sometimes confusing where one ends and the other
begins until we ourselves understood the game.
· 22
23

Juliana and her team mainly took care of the text and
dramaturgy, while Corinne led the training and rehearsed
the choreography. For the final phase the whole team
came to Vienna, where in the last 2 ½ weeks all parts
were put together and the texts of the young people from
Vienna were incorporated. The premiere took place on
22.09.2022 with 5 performances at the Dschungel Wien.
The feedback was very different. The young people felt
very heard and meant, while the adults partly had a
different concept of taboo.
“Warum lachst du? (Why are you laughing?)
Masks put limits on our pathways.
São nossos antolhos para seguirmos em frente.
When I tried to take off the mask, it was stuck to my face.
Warum schaust du mich an?
Me? There is an elephant in the room, but let’s not talk about it.
Ja lasst uns nicht darüber sprechen.”
Concept & Director: Juliana Pinho
Choreography: Corinne Eckenstein
Dramaturgy: Amarílis Anchietta, Susana Mateus,
Juliana Pinho
Set Design: Rui Francisco
Costume: Catarina Fernandes
Actors: Elif Bilici, Nèrika Amaral, Rafael Barreto
Music: Maria Taborda
\ Theatre Mediation Work on TABU
Especially in the pandemic, the topic of taboo has gained
greater importance among young people. What they
understand by it has a lot to do with shame, which has
been extremely intensified by isolation and the use of Instagram
and Tik Tok. This was very clear in our research
and workshops with the young people. So the concept of
taboo has related to very personal experiences based on
religious, family and patriarchal structures.
The workshop week at Dschungel Wien lasted 5 hours
per day. In advance, Emina Petzer, teacher of the MS
Kinzerplatz, and the dancer Almut Wregg sensitized
the students: inside for the topic by playing the taboo
game with the class. Emina also created cross-curricular
connections with the other teachers. There was a taboo
exchange with content moderators, movie scenes were
highlighted and “own” taboos were marked or different
behavior patterns were recognized and analyzed. Behavioral
patterns of different times and cultures were
staged, for example greeting (kissing hands, 3 kisses on
the cheek, hugging, shaking hands, bowing, men do not
touch women). With photos and texts, a picture story and
a manifesto on one’s own values and one’s own handling
of taboos (the silence about certain topics and the resulting
repressions (death, sexuality, gender, religion)) as well
as a taboo song were created.
Through the artistic examination, the topic was illuminated
and reflected on various levels. The extensive discussion
resulted in a consolidation of one’s own values and
the handling of taboos, while also showing empathy and
consideration for deviations of others.
It was not easy to gain trust at first, but thanks to the
strong commitment on the part of the TMPs, the young
people were able to open up and talk openly about their
fears and desires, but also about what taboo means to
them. Their self-written texts were used as part of the
performance and they recorded them on tape. This was
very exciting for them and they were proud to be really
involved in the artistic process as well. It really strengthened
the class community. It was a very touching journey
that started with absolute closed-mindedness and unwillingness
to open up to this topic, and ended with the joy
of seeing the young people put aside their fears and see
themselves and each other differently.
Sentences of the young people from the working group
in Vienna on the subject of FEAR:
1. when I am alone, it is forbidden to make me afraid
2. I am afraid of losing my favorite people
3. I am afraid of death
4. farsi – GOD
5. i am afraid of god
6. it is forbidden to scream when I am alone
Season 2021/22
\ KALASCHNIKOW – MON AMOUR 14+
A co-creatives Dance performance about
dreams and trauma
Opening September 23, 2021
Is a very personal piece by six young Afghan men. Some
people see the Kalashnikov as a symbol of freedom and
even hope. At the same time, this is the weapon that took
away their future, reminding them of the war they fled.
This piece is about the desire to live in peace with oneself
and others.
“Kalashnikov – mon amour” was created as a community
project during the 2020-2021 lockdown with open dance
workshops for young refugee men. From this, a group of
7 young men emerged who, together with choreographer
Corinne Eckenstein, developed images and choreography
that were composed into a stringent emotional journey of
the young men. In parallel, visual artist and set designer
Hawy Rahman and 15 young artists from Afghanistan,
Syria, Iraq, Iran explored the theme of “masculinity” in
paintings and sculptures. The artworks were presented
as part of the exhibition “Männerwelt(en)”.
“The weapon raised to myth is never seen, but it is in
the heads of the six dancers […] Without many words,
the piece […] tells the inside of the strangers who have
left parents, brothers, sisters to live their youth in a new
homeland. Eckenstein’s stringent choreography, perfectly
executed by the dancers, offers a magnificent, meaningful
and impressive dance piece.” (Dance Review Sept.
2021, Ditta Rudle)
Corinne Eckenstein
Set Design: Hawy Rahman
Music: Karrar Al Saedi
Costume: Kareem Aladhami
Video: Osama Rasheed
Assistance: Sophie Freimüller
Dancers: Ali Reza Askari, Ahmad Hazara,
Iliya Hosseini, Jasir Karimi, Javid Hakim,
Morteza Mohammadi
Season 2020/21
\ MEDAS TÖCHTER* 14+
5 system relevant monologues
Opening June 17, 2020
Who are the descendants and cultural heirs of Medea?
They are us! We, who are not seen or heard because of
our origin, skin color, sexual orientation or political views.
We, Medea’s daughters*, continue to break new ground
today, making life more vibrant, diverse and dazzling! We
free ourselves from our ascribed function and for the
first time step out into the public uncompromising and
demanding. “No more niceness!”
Originally, a community project with a choir of over 30
young women and a performance in public space was
planned. Due to Corona, the texts created in workshops
with rapper Esra Özmen and slam poet Yasmo, as well as
Turkish-German author Tunay Önder, were published in
videos. With text fragments by Tunay Önder as well from
the actresses’ own texts, five characters in system-relevant
professions were created. The performance with
monologues, chorus moments and choreographies was
first shown on the street and in parcs, one year later an
indoor version was developed, which had its premiere on
16.09.2021 in the context of the SKIN PERFORMANCE
FESTIVAL on diversity and racism in Dschungel Wien.
Other guest performances followed at the CITY OF
WOMEN Festival in Ljubljana, the international women’s
festival in Frankfurt, in Innsbruck and at the Kultursommer
in Vienna.
Director & Concept: Corinne Eckenstein
Text: Tunay Önder, Elif Bilici, Cecilia Kukua,
Lilie Lin, Ines Miro, Ivana Nikolic
Systemrelevant Performers*: Elif Bilici, Cecilia Kukua,
Lilie Lin/Yarina Gurtner, Ines Miro, Ivana Nikolic
· 24
25

\ DOOR / PORTA
Teatro O Bando
Palmela | Portugal
Teatro O Bando is a Portuguese professional traveling
theatre company which began its activity in 1974. O Bando
is a collective which elects aesthetic transfiguration. It
has civic and community participation and it’s a Portuguese
National Entity of Public Utility and a Certified
Actor’s Training establishment.
Founded in 1974, and being one of the oldest cultural
cooperatives in the country, Teatro O Bando sees itself
as a group which elects transfiguration as the aesthetic
mode of civic participation and community. Street
theatre and activities for children in schools and cultural
associations, integrated in decentralized projects, are at
the origin of the group.
O Bando’s creations are defined by their plastic and
staging dimension, marked mainly by the Scene
Machines, polysemic objects carrying in themselves an
idea of action. O Bando’s scripts are devised mainly from
non-dramatic works by Portuguese authors, to which the
theatrical form, in its multiple languages, provides
a different communication.
Having created more than 100 performances, O Bando
has presented about 4500 shows to over 1,5 million
spectators. The company continues searching for the
singularity of their creations, aiming to achieve more
gash and unexpected artworks. This is only possible due
to a collective methodology in which an expanded artistic
direction demands the difference, the interference, the
collapse and the collision of points of view.
Rural or urban, adult or child, learned or popular, national
or universal, dramatic, narrative or poetic – such are the
borders Teatro O Bando have gotten used to transgressing.
Throughout the years the group has been linked to multiple
national and international projects and continues to present
several touring shows throughout the country.
\ BEFORE THE SEA / ANTES DO MAR
Imagine a group of people that walk. In the distance.
They cross the everything and the nothingness in front of
us. Do those feet dance?
They hope to arrive at the sea, but in our minds it is the
words we listen to: before this new creation from Teatro
O Bando, before the dramaturgy and staging of Miguel
Jesus, there was the novel “Um Bailarino na Batalha”
(“A dancer in the battle”) from Hélia Correia, winner of
Grande Prémio de Romance e Novela from the Writers
Portuguese Association in 2019. Imagine that those people
keep on walking. They were walking before us. Before
that time, they were already taking their place in other
journeys, another exodus. Don’t those feet ever get tired?
They hope to arrive at the sea to cross it but what we see
in the distance are tents, remains and oars.
It was summer and we could attend with all the distancing
measures to a play from Teatro O Bando. We had
headphones so we could listen to those conversations
that were taking place in the distance. Imagine that those
people, those characters, get closer. That we hear the
word Europe. That they look at us in the eyes. Wonder
if those feet give one more step, do they get inside us?
They hope to arrive at the sea and are coming in our
direction.
Premiere June 25th, 2020, in Teatro O Bando
Here I am, alone.
I ran away with my husband and my children, but he
immediately said that we were not walking far enough,
that we were lazy, weak in the legs, that to run away we
would have to be faster. Nobody runs away with childish
steps, that way we would be caught. I said that children
could only run away with childish steps, but he shrugged
his shoulders.
This show closes the trilogy of O Bando’s performances
about migrations based on novels by Portuguese
authors.
The trilogy started in 2019 with “FILHO?” (Son?) by Afonso
Cruz – a show directed by João Neca that tells us a story
of a family living in a city occupied by American troops in
the Middle East; the second part, in 2020, was “ANTES DO
MAR” (Before the sea). This third show ends the journey
with the arrival at a Door, a monologue staged by João
Brites, based on an unpublished text by Gonçalo M. Tavares.
PORTA tells the story of a woman, alone, who does not
know the whereabouts of her children and who talks
alone, in a dialogue with the door and with her own
visions, fears and expectations. On the scene this woman
was in an open air space, exposed, while the audience
was inside a heated room, observing through glass doors
what was happening outside. In this way, the notion of
SUBVERTED FREEDOMS is spatially realized, leading the
public to ask themselves who will be more free and more
protected, which way those doors actually open and what
price we pay for security in exchange for freedom.
\ TABOO / TABU
My secret … I am happy without anyone knowing.
I won’t tell anyone, but I want everyone to know.
Everyone and the world.
Everyone shall know.
It is important to know, to look, to recognize.
I am here and I breathe.
This becomes our secret.
It is so hard to be in our own skin.
The first step to finding a taboo is to be aware of its
existence, to realize that it already lives in our head, even
before it is named.
On stage, four strangers are challenged to find a nut.
To do so they will have to deal with their personal limits,
dive into a box full of secrets, and be able to dialogue in
several languages. What will it take for them to face the
vertigo of discovering who they really are?
TABOO is a co-production between Teatro O Bando and
Dschungel Wien (Austria). It premiered in Vienna on
September 22nd, 2022, and played in Palmela from
October 27th to November 20th, 2022.
This ConnectUp co-production brought together two
very different companies – one based in the middle of
the valley in Palmela, Portugal, and the other based in the
heart of Vienna, Austria. In order to better understand
how taboos, affect teenagers from both countries, we
developed a work with schools in Palmela and Vienna,
which was a cornerstone in the construction of the show.
O Bando occupies today a farm in Vale dos Barris,
Palmela, Portugal where an artistic programme is developed,
presenting shows, workshops, and other events,
having as a main guideline the acting methods developed
in the so-called Actor’s Conscience on Stage and presented
in this Manifesto.
There, O Bando awaits you and anyone that, in front of
the fireplace or under an olive tree, wants, to search
together for that always blinking happiness.
· 26
Text: Hélia Correia based on
“Um Bailarino na Batalha” (“A dancer in the battle”)
Dramaturgy and direction: Miguel Jesus
Music: Jorge Salgueiro
Landscape scenography: Rui Francisco and Clara Bento
Props and costumes assistant: Sara Rodrigues
Scenography assistant: Dora Sales
Sound design: Miguel Lima
Light design: Nicolas Manfredini
With: Dora Sales, João Neca, Laurinda Chiungue,
Maria do Ó, Nicolas Brites, Nylon Princeso, Paula Só,
Raul Atalaia, Rita Brito, André Mexia, Fabian Bravo
After the premiere at Teatro O Bando on April 19, 2021,
we left Vale dos Barris heading north to present PORTA in
Porto, as part of FITEI – Festival Internacional De Teatro
De Expressão Ibérica.
For the show we carried out a dramaturgical walk in
Text: Gonçalo M. Tavares
which the youngsters walked 5 km in the middle of the
Dramaturgy and Direction: João Brites
Arrábida Mountain, looking for clues that approached the
Music: Jorge Salgueiro
dramaturgical elements Scenography: of the Rui show. Francisco
Sound and light design: Philippe Domengie
Production: Inês Gregório
With: Juliana Pinho
For Teatro O Bando’s 3rd ConnectUp production, the target
group we chose to guide the research, in the process
of creating TABOO, was young people with a migration
history in their family.
27

The first option was to choose artists for the artistic
team and cast who also had a migrant background and
an artistic career of political and aesthetic resilience.
The goal was to create a culturally diverse team and that,
through their artistic gesture, we could dare to represent
an imaginary in which stereotypes and prejudices are
questioned and in which each spectator could review
themselves regardless of their experience, valuing the
imaginary and the artistic and cultural heritage. For this
goal to be achieved, it was important to avoid exposing
only cultural differences and to avoid an exoticization
of the other, but to find what is inherent to the human
condition: feeling. From this objective we designed a creation
process that integrated the school community and
migrant community groups as engines of the theatrical
research, together with a multicultural and multidisciplinary
artistic team.
However, it is still very difficult to mobilize an audience
that lives in peripheral areas, mainly due to mobility
issues. The lack of transportation that supports access
to art and culture is one of the structural difficulties we
face. Even with this difficulty, we were able to assess that
TABOO managed to reach a more diverse audience than
usual.
This journey begins with a box left in a school in Palmela
for a few weeks, so that the students could deposit their
taboos anonymously during the breaks. This box traveled
to many other places, inhabited by many collective
bodies from different countries and different ages. Our
process is part of a triangulation of these thoughts and
spaces. We worked to get closer to the target audience,
getting in touch with their anguish, understanding the
language they can use to express what they feel.
In Vienna the teenagers spent a week in activities at the
Dschungel Wien. They recorded their words and shared
their wishes; their voices filled the stage and served as
inspiration for us to understand what burns in their souls.
During the creation process at the Dschungel Wien, the
work of teacher Emina Petzer was very important. She
ensured that her class would spend a week at the theatre
and that the artistic team could also develop theatrical
approaches that could bridge the fact that we don’t
speak the same language, enhancing it both in its sound
and semantics.
In Palmela we worked closely with 2 different groups:
Movimento Zebra and two 6th grade classes from
Hermenegildo Capelo school.
Movimento Zebra, as a group representing the community,
was our scenic laboratory and space for theatrical and
conceptual experimentation. With them we were able to
build many of the dramaturgical proposals and provocations
that were later made to the actors.
While working for this show, the synergy with the teacher
Ana Rio Tinto was crucial. Besides being part of TMP
(Theatre Mediator Programme), she managed to integrate
for two years the participation of her students in
the artistic processes of the show. For the show TABOO
we held artistic residencies, in which the students,
besides exploring the theme through several artistic
approaches, lived around the campfire telling stories and
singing, slept on the stage where we would later present
the show, and presented their theatrical improvisations in
a final meeting with their families.
The school, as the test tube of the target audience,
provided us with written and pictorial material for the
construction of the show. Our main goal in working with
this school was to find the language and expression of
taboos in adolescence. Being in direct contact with the
target audience of the show, the idea was to produce
written and visual material to compose the text, costumes
and set. Likewise, the idea was also to provide a
moment of relaxation and learning for two classes, where
students could develop artistic and social expressions.
Having in mind the target audience of the show – teenagers
from 12 years old – and in the scope of the activities
developed by TMP, we carried out two artistic residencies
with 6th grade students from Hermenegildo Capelo
School in Palmela, entitled “The School sleeps in the
Theatre”. The teenagers spent two days at Teatro O Bando’s
farm where they did creative writing exercises, painted
walls, slept on stage where they created their own show,
gathered around a bonfire and discussed the forbidden,
shame, secrecy and desire.
This became one of the central axes of our work with the
school. Here we tried to create a space where students
could explore concepts associated with the notion of
taboo, whether by forbidden, shame, prejudice or secrecy.
Students were invited to create, write, draw and think
in a safe space where the idea of error was subverted.
We were not looking for a correct answer, and we kept
reminding them of that. There was no right way to think,
no right way to draw, no right way to write.
We developed a series of exercises to explore what is,
after all, a taboo. We highlight the creative writing exercise,
where students were asked to write uninterruptedly,
completing some sentences such as:
I can’t talk about … I am forbidden to … If I could …
Others make me feel … For me the important thing is…
I am afraid of … My secret is … I am a threat to…
I feel ashamed when …
They had to write without stopping and without planning
what they were to write, in order to allow their own hand
to guide the movement of their writing and therefore
their thinking. They were not to stop writing until the next
sentence was announced.
This work stirred their emotions. We tried to touch their
core, and many of the sentences they wrote in those days
at Teatro O Bando still echo in us.
Who said it was simple.
We opened a box full of words from others. Pages and
pages of cries, murmurs, silences. It wasn’t simple to
listen to these voices and feel the strength of loneliness,
of fear, of shame, of repressed desires, of living each day
inside a skin that doesn’t belong to us.
These texts remained in our skin, in our imagination. So
many words that were never said, and so many lives and
voices inside this box that we decided to open. Some
sentences were sewn to the characters of our story, but
so many others remain only in our thoughts.
With this show, we wanted that young people could feel
less alone and could feel accompanied in their pain, even
if only for a moment.
TABOO is a journey that reminds us that we need to
dream to survive, but that we also survive because we are
together. Here we sail on the silvery sea of calligraphies
and words. These are the fragments of our common
voice, the torrential rains of our feelings.
We drifted for a long time, but we reached a good port. It
was a path full of waves, of meetings and missed meetings,
of words spoken and hidden, whispered and shouted.
We sailed in a sea of memories, ours and others, and
we found in this show a common place, where we can
risk being who we are.
But one must have courage!
Created by Teatro O Bando/co-production
Dschungel Wien
Direction and staging: Juliana Pinho
Co-direction and choreography: Corinne Eckenstein
Direction assistance: Amarílis Anchieta
Dramaturgy: Amarílis Anchieta and Susana Mateus
Set design: Rui Francisco
Costumes: Catarina Fernandes
Music: Maria Taborda and Jason Macedo
Production: Inês Gregório, Anna Sonntag
and Annamaria Waliczky
Sound design: Miguel Lima
Light design: Michael Zweimüller, Hannes Röbisch
and Rita Louzeiro
With: Elif Bilici, Maria Taborda, Nérika Amaral
and Rafael Barreto
· 28
29

This is our most significant effort to reach this audience
that, at the main festival, is difficult to reach. It is also
here that ConnectUp presents itself as an asset in this
effort, not only because of the project’s target audience
but also because of its Theatre Mediation Programme
(TMP). The TMP is crucial as it allows the FITEI team to
be equipped with tools that can be used daily to bring this
public closer to our activities. The possibility of sharing
working methods and experiences with other partners is
also an excellent way to enrich our work, which is one of
the points we highlight in the project.
Białostocki
Teatr Lalek
Bialystok | Poland
FITEI
Porto | Portugal
FITEI is a cultural institution whose ambition is to promote
theatre and the performing arts, besides encouraging
artistic creation through the organization of an annual
festival with outstanding vision in the Iberian Peninsula.
As an institution, whose leading mission is to hold Theatre
Festivals, we have been developing a festival for over 45
years focused on performances from Iberian-speaking
countries. Recently, since 2020, we have created O Meu
Primeiro FITEI, a festival dedicated to children and
young people.
The TMP was very well organized and had different
approaches brought by distinct trainers, each with its
methods and ways of working. Another important aspect
is the possibility of debating with some performance
creators that supported the programme. Keeping in mind
that in a theatre mediation process in addition to working
with the audience, it is of course also crucial to work with
the companies.
The monthly sessions worked well and allowed continuous
and well-paced work, ideal for analyzing support
materials and gathering information. The existence of
face-to-face moments was also significant, not only because
of the possibility of having a practical component
that, online, is difficult to achieve but also because of the
contact with other colleagues in the programme who, in
a programme like this one that lives off the sharing, is
extremely important.
Bialystok Puppet Theatre (BTL) is one of the leading
puppet theatres in Poland. It has been active - as a professional
theatre – since 1953, when a group of puppeteers
was given a state grant. From then on, the theatre
has been working continuously, producing new performances
every season, using various puppet techniques
and different forms of visual, object, mask and drama
theatre.
Today`s BTL specialises in:
\ shows for children – stage adaptations of well-known
fables and popular literature for children;
\ shows for adults – continuous activity in the field is
an absolutely unique phenomenon;
\ experimental and thinking man`s shows – projects
carried out on the studio stage in cooperation with
the youngest generation of puppeteers affiliated with
The Aleksander Zelwerowicz National Academy
of Dramatic Art in Warsaw – Branch Campus in
Białystok.
Many of the productions are created with the cooperation
of international artists.
BTL organizes festivals like the International Festival of
Puppetry Schools in Białystok PUPPETNOPUPPET and
International Festival of Puppet Theatres for Adults
PUPPETS’ METAMORPHOSES.
BTL is open to international cooperation, theatre traineeships
for young artists, studio projects and workshop
meetings. Every year BTL takes part in dozens of festivals
in Poland and abroad.
What is more? BTL engages on a wide-scale in educational
activity’s, including workshops for children,
theatre lessons for primary school students, open public
readings of puppet theatre plays for children, and also
publishing exhibitions (exhibitions of fine artists connected
to theatre activities in ’BTL Gallery‘).
The artistic capital gathered in this place continues to
influence the entire world of Polish formal theatre to this
day. Thanks to BTL Bialystok has become “Puppeteers’
Mecca” and it was officially affiliated as a “City Promoting
Puppetry’’ through the membership in the “AVIAMA”
International Association of Puppet-friendly Cities and
POLUNIMA – Polish Puppetry Centre, being a Polish
section of the “UNIMA” Union Internationale de la
Marionnette.
FITEI will host, in O Meu Primeiro FITEI 2024, a showcase
of works created in the context of ConnectUp. It is with
enthusiasm that we prepare this moment of presentation
to the public of the work developed throughout the
project.
· 30
31

The International Festival
of Puppetry Schools PUPPETNOPUPPET
The International Festival of Puppetry Schools has been
organized every two years since 2002. Its main aim is
to initiate discussions about the tradition and the latest
artistic trends in puppetry, which in turn provide a unique
opportunity to meet people from the world of theatre
and strengthen existing contacts with other schools and
professional theatres. On one hand, the Festival gives
students the opportunity to present the results of their
artistic search, on the other hand it enriches the people
of the Bialystok and Podlasie region by offering them the
possibility to see interesting performances, little theatrical
plays and exhibitions. It is the time of experiments
and quests, but most of all the time of mutual inspiration.
Festival organizers are Aleksander Zelwerowicz National
Academy of Dramatic Art in Warsaw, Branch Campus in
Białystok and Bialystok Puppet Theatre.
BTL in ConnectUp
As part of the ConnectUp programme, the Bialystok
Puppet Theater staged three performances. The first
is “Andersen The Space Agent”. A show for the whole
family. It is a fairy tale written especially for the Bialystok
Puppet Theatre, whose authors try to explain where
H.Ch. Andersen… and it came from space, from the
distant future of 3333.
It turns out that humanity does not learn from mistakes
and pushes our beloved planet into the abyss of an
inevitable catastrophe. Only two cosmic agents, Wojtek
Pryszcz and Hans Christian Andersen, can prevent the
catastrophe, proving that man can not only destroy, but
also build, and that the greatest force in the cosmos,
capable of defeating every evil and all adversities, is love.
The spectacle is an extremely colorful adventure for the
whole family, full of special effects. We wanted to create
a family spectacle that would be informative and at the
same time attractive for both adults and children.
“Pręcik” (A filament) is a spectacle that forces you to
think deeply. The show is addressed to the whole family,
but we have noticed that primary schools are very eager
to use this offer. Rod is a story of a seriously ill girl shown
and told from the perspective of everyday objects accompanying
the girl: a teddy bear, an alarm clock, slippers …
Malina Prześluga, the author of the script, masterfully
avoided intrusive didactics and avoided causing traumatic
experiences. It is a spectacle that evokes strong
emotions, triggers empathy and teaches sensitivity.
The director was Jacek Malinowski,
the scenography was proposed by Michał Wyszkowski,
and the music was composed by Marcin Nagnajewicz
Starring: Grażyna Kozłowska, Iwona Szczęsna,
Izabela Maria Wilczewska, Mirosław Jańczuk,
Michał Jarmoszuk, Błażej Piotrowski,
Paweł S. Szymański
Our third production with the ConnectUp program is a
performance produced in cooperation with the Czech
Alfa Theater called “Simulator”. The show was based on
interviews with high school students. Director Tomsa
Legierski and playwright Petra Kosova conducted a series
of discussions with students aged twelve to sixteen
about what they experience when they feel betrayed,
what they perceive as injustice, what hurts them and
what they perceive as barriers to communication with
adults. They also met with teachers, school psychologists
and parents. And finally, together with Polish actors,
they revived their own memories and experiences and
searched for ways to understand teenagers – both Polish
and Czech.
The author of the script is Małgorzata Sikorska-Miszczuk,
the director is Ewa Piotrowska, the scenography was taken care
of by Michał Dracz, the stage movement by Marta Bury,
the music by Wojciech Błażejczyk
Starring: Magdalena Ołdziejewska,
Agata Stasiulewicz, Izabela Maria Wilczewska,
Ewa Żebrowska, Jacek Dojlidko, Mateusz Smaczny,
Piotr Wiktorko and Maciej Zalewski
Karel Czech was responsible for the scenography,
music was composed by Daniel Čámský,
animations by Martin Máj
Starring: Łucja Grzeszczyk, Agata Stasiulewicz,
Krzysztof Bitdorf, Michał Jarmoszuk and
Maciej Zalewski
· 32
33

Divadlo Alfa
Pilsen | Czech Republic
All three productions were accompanied by intensive
educational activities. Our target group was primarily
young people in the last grade of primary school and
young people from secondary schools. We had no
problems in establishing cooperation with young people.
It turns out that the willingness to cooperate with our
theater is huge, and the problems are only of organizational
nature. We managed to organize the work within
ConnectUp in such a way that all interested parties had
a chance and the opportunities to learn about theatre
work and get involved in the production process. In my
work with young people, I often use the maieutic method.
I have been using this tool for years and I know that it
brings excellent results. During conversations, talks and
so-called brainstorming, we came up with issues that
later appeared on the stage in the form of a finished performance.
For example, we discovered (for our purposes,
of course) the works of Marshall Rosenberg. His method
of non-violent communication not only made a great impression
on us, but also became an inspiration for further
work. I sincerely intend to get to know the Rosenberg
method much better and use it both in my private life and
at work. Our cooperation with young people was very
intensive.
We did not limit ourselves to conversations and surveys.
Schools such as, for example, the primary school in
Tołcze near Białystok cooperating with us under the
ConnectUp program sent groups of young people to
us for meetings about the history of theater - primarily
puppet theater. In the meetings they got to know
the theater from the inside - the work of acousticians,
lighting, art, tailoring and design studios. We looked at
the construction of theater puppets, elements of the
stage design. Thanks to these visits, young people also
had the opportunity to watch the performances that we
currently played on our stages. These shows were always
accompanied by discussions and short exercises for a
better understanding of the issues happening on stage.
Simultaneously with the work of professional artists,
young people learned some secrets of art. I sent preliminary
versions from the script of the play “Simulator” to
schools cooperating with the Bialystok Puppet Theatre.
The first version of the script was in English, which is
why it was an opportunity for English language teachers
to join the cooperation. In class, the script was read with
the distribution of roles. The young people designed their
own versions of stage characters and scenography for
the play.
At least four schools cooperate with us on a regular basis
as part of the ConnectUp programme. In each of them
there is a group of at least thirty people strongly involved
in a cooperation with our theatre. We have organized dozens
of classes, workshops and study visits for all these
young people. We hope that this cooperation will not only
bring benefits to those directly involved in the project,
but will also resonate widely among other schools in our
region, giving the theater and youth a chance for further
joint projects that will strengthen cooperation between us.
Theater education specialist
Tomasz Damulewicz
\ Connection is tricky, the most
important thing is empathy!
Connecting with audiences aged 13 to 17, an audience
that we as adults, parents or children’s theatre makers no
longer understand that much, that we are naturally distant
from, as it happens in life. We love this age group, whether
they are our own children, the children of our friends or our
audience. Our efforts have gone and continue to go hand
in hand with the normal generational cycle that everyone
experiences in life. We adults, when fortune favors us, still
feel young. However, our experiences are written into our
lives and gradually form our opinions. These experiences,
however, also form a barrier between us and our children.
Kids, as well as us, are already collecting their experiences,
forming their own opinions and, of course, do not want
to have this fresh intellectual experience polluted by the
worldview of the older generation.
Nevertheless, the experiences of parents and grandparents
have their own value and are useful for the future life
of a young generation. Our children are especially aware of
these values when they need advice. This is the moment
when we are able to overcome the generational barrier
mentioned above and turn lecturing or giving unwanted
advice into an exchange of opinions that benefits our children.
Adults are not infallible and we make many mistakes,
everyone does. Perhaps because we have already learned
from our personal experiences, we approached this
project with humility, looking for natural ways to connect
with our target audience and share ideas that our young
audience might find interesting, new, and enriching.
In the first case of Genovefe’s production, we chose to
interpret a tradition that has been handed down from
generation to generation, hundreds, maybe even thousands
of years. Legends are stories with such load-bearing
content that they have not disappeared and have survived
since the Middle Ages. At a certain age we cease to be
interested in these stories because we think of them as
fairy tales. And fairy tales, after all, are meant for children.
But if we keep our relationship with this genre,
we return to them later as adults and pass them on.
In our second project, we delved into the fate of our
modern history, the time before and during World War II.
As well, we took the young audience into the cosmopolitan
world of the first half of the 20th century, a time when Central
Europe was as interconnected as it is in the EU period
(both eras were interrupted by war and the Iron Curtain).
Genovefe
A pure historical excursion on the stage was not our
plan. That’s why we found a young hero of that time, a
peer who can communicate well with our target group.
Successfully.
A Good Hans Böhm’s Journey through Europe
Our third attempt to capture the attention of our adolescent
audience was set in the contemporary world of
young people, in the world of computer games, virtual
reality and hybrid threats, lies and fake-news. Orientation
in the contemporary world is the most complex because
it takes place in the here and now. We can only use
experience as a point of reference, we make decisions at
every moment. And here is the point of our connection
with the audience. We are experiencing similar situations
– young or adults, no one knows exactly how to do the
thing right and the decision is up to each one of us. But
we are united by our values, and we often discover these
values only at the moment of decision. And let’s believe
the values are based on humanity and mutuality.
For our last project (planned for 2023), we have chosen a
way of connecting that is uncharted for us yet. We will try
to create a performance with our young audience members
who were born with intellectual disabilities.
· 34
35

Snowball
\ Do teenagers enjoy fairy tales?
In our first ConnectUp production Genovefe, we wondered
whether we can still tell puppetry fairy tales to our
teenagers? And if so, in which way? We know that from
a certain age, children no longer want to just listen to
stories, but they are still interested in experiencing them
together. Our theatre focuses on puppets and puppetry.
We first explored in what form fairy tales are still engaging
to teenagers and how they are willing to perceive
them. The path naturally led us to film and computer
games, but also to fantasy books and board games. Fairy
tales are becoming adventure stories, imagination and
the element of surprise still play a big role.
We have turned our attention to historical legends, which
offer a world of fantasy, adventure and contemporary
and historical events, and traditional practices and ideas
that are valid from generation to generation. The world of
legends is somewhere between truth and fairy tale.
It can be engaging if it is interpreted in an attractive way.
But how can we get the puppet theatre into the project?
We found inspiration in old puppet plays. These are
not only based on legends, but thanks to their folkloric
character, there is a lot of fighting, heroism, symbolic
love, cruelty and medieval violence. But no one can
take that seriously because it is puppet theatre. And
there’s something that teenagers are very receptive to.
It’s humor, literal exaggeration and the ability to make
absurd fun of things that aren’t funny in reality – like
death, killing or sex. A puppet can survive anything and
still laugh at it. Teenagers who focus on breaking taboos
and crossing boundaries will easily connect with this
kind of humor. We have included a parody of traditional
Old Czech, breaking another taboo for our youngsters –
making fun of their native language, which is seriously
taught at school. But we still had to modify the design of
the puppets. Traditional folkloric marionettes would not
be accepted by the adolescent audience. So, the director
and artists constructed puppets from everyday objects.
The puppets were made from coat hangers, bicycle
seats, cookers, door hinges and many other things. We
were able to connect with the teenage audience through
this joke as well, they were surprised.
\ A common Europe as a point
of connection
A common Europe without geographical, social, political
or linguistic borders is a natural environment for our current
teenagers. Unlike their peers in Western Europe, Central
Europe citizens carry the stigma of the communist era.
This sad legacy is no longer visible; it lives hidden in the
mentality of parts of the population, especially in a
certain section of current parents and grandparents.
How do we connect our teenagers positively with the
history of the nation when there is a 50-year hole in
history with only a few bright moments? For our second
ConnectUp project, a production called A Good Hans
Böhm’s Journey through Europe, we were inspired by the
period between the two world wars. At that time, the new
Czechoslovak Republic started and the heart of Europe
was a cosmopolitan meeting point for different nations.
As we see today. This period was not easy to live in and
it was economically difficult for many people. But it was
also a time when people had their lives in their own hands
and could decide freely.
To connect today’s young audience with its history, we
found a real-life equivalent in the past – a young man of a
similar age, from a multi-national family, speaking several
languages – a young man for whom fate had prepared an
interesting destiny, many obstacles and an unpredictable
path. It led from life in western Bohemia, through Belgian,
German and Czech identity, to the hardships of World
War II, cooperation with the Wehrmacht and post-war
service in the American army, to then settle in the western
part of Germany. His life touched many of the significant
historical moments of the 20th century in Central Europe.
But he is not the archetype of the hero. Hans Böhm
(a fictional name) is an ordinary young man who has
to take a stand on world affairs during his journey, and
in doing so he finds his own values. The connection
between the young viewer and its literary counterpart
proves to be load-bearing.
The discovery of the fact that before the war international
schools were common in our territory (long monochrome
since 1948 till 1990), that neighbours in one village were
quietly representatives of three or four European nations
and that people spoke many languages, was surprising to
many young viewers. Through the perspective of a young
peer from the past, teenagers could connect the details
of history and the details of current reality, understand
the development and realize that the road to the current
liberal atmosphere in Europe had its own chapters and
stages.
In the first production, our aim was to connect the children
with their traditions, in this second one, the aim was
to find a connection between the contemporary life of
young people and the modern history of our territory.
AND WHO IS USELESS NOW?
\ Are teenagers interested in
the contemporary world? Are we?
Our latest project, ConnectUp’s Snowball, targets a
generational view of the contemporary world. We asked
a simple question. Can we find a connection between us
and a generation of teenagers in the search for sustainability
in the contemporary world? Is the free market economy
still an idol (as it was in the Czech Republic in the
1990s) or do young people already perceive this principle
more critically? And can we even understand our growing
children’s views on the future, carrying the experience of
‘early Eastern European capitalism’ on our backs?
We have put these themes into a production where the
world of computer games, the everyday life in a small
town and the naive adolescence of children in high
school intersect. As active players in our story, but
also as players of the computer game, there are young
students with their naivety, gullibility, stubbornness and
teenage search for their own place in the world. The
opposing players are representatives of their parents’
generation – pragmatic, instructed by life in the ruthless
world of free market mechanisms.
Our production was preceded by several weeks of consultations
with teenagers, our own children and students.
We received reflections after the premiere of the show as
well.
And there were interesting points. Teenagers have a
much deeper relationship with sustainability than our
generation. Our pragmatic thinking, based on the path to
obtaining funds or resources, is alien to them. They don’t
want to do sharp business, they prefer to protect the
environment. In fact, they don’t even need to drive smelly
diesel cars, not even any car; in their world it is natural to
walk or cycle or use anything self-propelled.
In this respect, we have received a clear message from
the world of teenagers. “Don’t bring your pragmatism
in life here. We have our own ideas. Our dreams are not
based on our bank account balance. We want to live in a
nice world.”
Well, we found a way to reach our teenagers, now we
must respect their opinions and help them to create such
a world. If we fail to do so, we will end up regretting it
later, lonely in our own pragmatism.
Even more interesting was the experience when, during
the theatrical production of Snowball, one of the characters
in the play – a representative of our generation with
a firm pragmatic attitude – tries to sneak into the world
of teenagers and tries to make contact. The result is
zero. Such a person is a stranger in the world of teenagers.
The society of teenagers gradually expelled him, just
as the body naturally expels a virus.
The production Snowball concludes our ConnectUp journey
from history to the present. We gained insights and
experience on how to connect with a discerning audience
of teenagers. But we also learned more about how to
have fun with our own kids. We’ve learned to embrace
their language, learned to filter our own opinions and look
at our values through the eyes of adolescent children.
Of course, that’s not enough. To master the language of
another generation is impossible.
Alfa Theatre has been organizing the Skupova Puppet
Theatre Festival since 1967. The 35th festival in 2024
(June 12-16) will be a showcase for ConnectUp
productions.
· 36
37

Derby
Theatre
Bold and brilliant performances. Shows that represent
our community. A platform for ground-breaking artists.
A pathway for learners of all ages. A guaranteed great
night out. We’re a theatre like no other.
We’re known for artistic excellence. We’re committed to
education. And we believe that theatre can change your
life.
Derby Theatre is the UK’s only professional Learning
Theatre. This means that our doors are open for everyone
to learn through and about theatre. The Learning
Theatre provides a unique opportunity for people to learn
their craft by working alongside both academics and
theatre professionals in the heart of a producing theatre.
Our work happens in our building, online and in Derby’s
diverse communities.
\ Abi
at Derby Theatre in co-production with
Queen’s Theatre Hornchurch as part of ConnectUp
For the first time ever… audiences could find out what
happened to the mysterious Abigail and meet her granddaughter
in a dynamic new play called Abi that showed
as a companion piece to Mike Leigh’s Abigail’s Party. Abi
was a contemporary response to Mike Leigh’s timeless
classic as part of Derby Theatre’s RETOLD programme.
RETOLD is a series of one-woman plays that crack open
classic tales and see the story from the perspective of a
female character.
Written by Atiha Sen Gupta, this production was informed
by the stories, language and ideas of young women in
Derby. The writer visited three schools with strong cultural
diversity, to explore the idea of what it means to be
a young person growing up today, with a particular focus
on social media.
The target group for this show was fairly broad but
included those from black and global majority communities
who could see themselves reflected in the story.
This was mainly achieved through the connections with
the schools where Atiha worked. It was also very particular
to the city of Derby and so had great local appeal.
\ Home Girl
at Derby Theatre, 2022 as part of ConnectUp
Home Girl was produced and presented at Derby Theatre
as part of ConnectUp during summer 2022.
Home Girl was a professional and young people’s unique
co-production of Alex Wheatle’s novel adapted for the
stage by Nathan Powell and Sarah ‘Rain Kolawole’ in
collaboration with care-experienced young people and
young theatremakers.
Home Girl was seen by over 1000 people over a 2-day period,
including 650 young people (looked-after children,
care leavers, young people from a wide range of communities
in and around Derby, Youth Theatre members,
students, artists and schools).
About Home Girl Future Creatives
Future Creatives sat at the heart of the Home Girl project,
an initiative which offered a range of hands-on opportunities
for young people aged 14-25 to be involved in
different stages of the creative and production process,
including set and costume design, lighting, production,
marketing, film and photography.
As part of the process, each young person was mentored
by a professional who worked and specialised in each
area, including Anisa Archer as the Future Creatives
Writer.
Future Derby Theatre Co-Productions
Derby Theatre has formed a partnership with two other
countries in the ConnectUp family – Italy and Croatia.
For our partnership with Elsinore Theatre in Milan, Italy,
we are delighted to be collaborating with an Italian set
designer, Frederico Biancalani, who will be in Derby working
on Pleasant Land. Jon Beney, movement director will
be representing Derby Theatre in Italy in Elsinor Theatre’s
production of Cross the Line.
Jon is a dancer, choreographer, teacher and mass movement
director who is also Co-Artistic Director and founder
of Tenfoot Dance Company. His performance work
includes works by Virtual Motion Dance Co, dans connect
for Swindon Dance, Ballet Lorent and Protein Dance. Jon
also works with public acts, the National Theatre and has
taught dance across the UK, working with Dance United
in criminal justice settings and with hard-to-reach young
people. Jon also works with the University of Central
Lancashire, Leeds Metropolitan University and at York St
John’s University.
“I think I’m going to be more open-minded towards
people, aware of other people’s journeys and their
lives, and be more accepting and kind towards other
people, because you never know what they’re going
through in their lives”
Future Creative Performer, Primrose
Atiha Sen Gupta, writer, at first day of rehearsals
· 38
39

Sarah Brigham, Artistic Director
and Director of “Footsteps in the Mud”
Emerging from this layered approach is an exploration of
migration and identity for 11-15 year olds. What makes
up our identity? How do the different cultures we inhabit
influence who we are and how we see the world. How
do we voluntarily or forcibly keep or give up parts of our
identity?
from both small and large, award-winning independent
touring companies. It’s the perfect theatrical vacation.
Trust us, at Departure Lounge, you will always be in good
company!
Highlights of this year’s festival include:
Theatre Mediation Programme 2 Launch
\ Footsteps in the Mud
A Derby Theatre and Theatre Company
Pinklec Production
as part of ConnectUp
For the third production within ConnectUp, Derby Theatre
is working with Pinklec Theatre in Croatia. For this partnership,
our Artistic Director, Sarah Brigham will be travelling
to Pinklec (with her dog, Bruce!) to direct Footsteps
in the Mud by Mateja Posedi, designed by Neno Kern.
This piece follows the story of a young girl who lives in
a Roma township and reflects her hopes and dreams for
her future, overturning the stereotypical portrayal of the
Roma community.
\ Pleasant Land
by Nathan Powell
part of Departure Lounge festival summer 2023
at Derby Theatre
Directed by Sarah Brigham
Pleasant Land has been co-created with young people
who are mostly from the Roma Community and who
attend Bemrose School in Derby city centre. A Roma musician,
a drama facilitator and the writer of this ConnectUp
piece, Nathan Powell have been working with the group to
explore their interests and unlock their ideas about where
they live, their families and sometimes their journeys here.
A research and development process with four actors
from a variety of cultural and social backgrounds have creatively
explored the ideas of the young people and further
developed these themes alongside the writer.
Pleasant Land will be told by four characters – each
from a different heritage who meet in a waiting room.
They want to tell their story to gain entry. We explore the
impact of being somewhere different and how they are
seen by others.
As at March 2023, Pleasant Land is still in the development
phase, but we imagine that there will be an element
of an interactive game show based around the citizenship
test to highlight the ludicrous nature of this way of
proving a right to belong somewhere.
Our target group again is quite broad, but it includes
culturally diverse young people, including those who may
have travelled to this “Pleasant Land” and made it their
home. They will see themselves, or their parents’ experiences,
reflected in this piece. Through the development
work that we are doing, we also hope to encourage those
from refugee and Roma communities. Conversely, we
will also target young people from areas with very little
cultural diversity, who may be able to see our diverse
population in a more positive light and to connect to their
stories on a personal level.
Departure Lounge Festival
Produced by In Good Company, Departure Lounge is THE
arts festival for ground-breaking work in the heart of the
UK. Every corner of Derby Theatre will be transformed
and brought to life through festival-style spaces, exciting
performances, workshops and discussion. This year,
we have a compelling mix of the best of the Midlands
blended with some of the UK’s most exciting artists and
companies, sharings and works-in-progress. We are committed
to supporting and playing host to a range of work
Sorry, I Disappeared
Part of the Walk This Play® series by ThickSkin,
commissioned by Derby Theatre.
Inspired by the experiences of new arrivals to Derby.
Walk This Play® is a new series of location-based audio
plays by ThickSkin, designed for listeners as they walk.
The plays are immersive and immediate, transporting you
inside the story. Each is unique to its location and invites
you to experience a familiar route from a new perspective.
Through narration and original music blended with
the sights and sounds around you, Walk This Play® takes
you on a journey of imagination and discovery.
Industry Panel Discussion
Each year we host a panel discussion bringing some
of the UK’s leading practitioners, artists and audiences
together for a fascinating and insightful discussion with
leaders from a range of inspirational arts organisations
in the UK. This year’s discussion will focus around giving
space to others in an artists practice and/or co-creation
process.
\ The ConnectUp shows
This year, Departure Lounge will also be hosting a range
of shows from the ConnectUp family from the Czech
Republic (with Alpha) and Elsinore (with Cross the Line).
Ava Hunt: Theatre Mediation Workshop in Porto October 2021
In addition to the wonderful array of shows, we will also
be launching the second round of ConnectUp’s Theatre
Mediation Programme (TMP) for artists and teachers
at this year’s festival. Theatre Mediation is not a term
that’s familiar to everyone but it’s the practice of enabling
the target audience to have the best and most active
experience of theatre. This might be through giving them
a chance to contribute their ideas to the actual making
of a professional show so that it can be as relevant and
authentic as possible. It may be about exploring the
themes before seeing the show so that the audience can
feel a real connection to it, or it could be about the target
audience creating a response piece to the professional
show, giving young people a platform to share their own
work.
We have focused the understanding of this practice into
three main areas: making theatre with, by and for young
people. We will be using this framework to launch phase
2 of the TMP programme and together the artists and
teachers will explore a range of shows for young audiences,
hear about other projects and approaches, learn from
each other and take part in some exciting practical workshops
in Derby as part of our special Departure Lounge
Festival this July.
Highlights of the TMP Programme will focus on co-creation
with a diverse range of communities including
refugee and learning disabled. For one evening of the
programme, even the food will be provided by the Community,
via a project from Derby CAN. They will be doing
a call out for food recipes that represent places/people
in Derby. A community panel will choose their favourite
dishes and a professional catering company will work
with them to make the dishes for the delegates! Each
course is served with local entertainment!
· 40
41

\ The Grasshopper and the Ants
(Cvrčak i Mravi)
\ A normal life
(Normalan život)
One of the most famous Aesop’s fables brings us a story
about a lazy grasshopper who spent his days by playing
music and trying to persuade the ants to follow his
example, and about the ants who were diligently standing
in rows in front of their house and staple the food for
wintertime.
Welcome to another episode of the competition show
“Normal Life“! This competition show is as old as the
state itself and our presenters are its extension. Go try
yourself in the games of knowledge, luck and dexterity
live on stage! And while you collect your victory points
according to instructions by the presenters, you shall
face your own prejudices and the mechanisms of their
origin! Where shall the “cut the corners”–principle lead
you and where shall you end with civil courage? How
Kazališna družina
PINKLEC,
Čakovec | Croatia
Theatre Company Pinklec is a children and youth theatre,
located at Čakovec Cultural Center since 1987. It’s founder
and artistic director is Romano Bogdan.It became
a professional theatre company in 2006 and has been
focusing on socially engaged theatre ever since. Many of
our theatre plays deal with current issues of the world we
live in. We have plays that talk about refugees, divorce,
democracy, the right to choose and also about death.
Some of these plays are puppetry, some are dramas
based on acting.
We pick Croatian and worldwide authors who honestly
and bravely talk about problems of children and young
people in their work. Through excellent directing techniques
we take care of artistic criteria which are extremely
important for a young audience. We keep in mind that
theatre raises children by its aesthetic and we want every
child’s future to have a memory of some theatre story
that formed their aesthetic by its magic. We participate
in several national and international festivals every year.
It is a great success for us that at most Croatian festivals
we have received the most important and significant
awards for our work.
Through the year we produce two to three performances,
some under our own direction and some in co-production
with other theatres. Most of our co-productions are with
Croatian theatres but we would also like to point out
some foreign co – productions.
\ Assitej Festival Croatia
Leading Umbrella Association of Theatres
for Children and Young People in Croatia
The Croatian Centre ASSITEJ was established in 1996 as
an equal member of the renowned theatre organization
ASSITEJ which gathers national theatres from across the
world. In Croatia, ASSITEJ has teamed 28 professional
theatres for children and young people, 16 professionally
managed drama studios and 9 individual members,
dramatic artists working at theatres for children and
youth. The goal of the Croatian Centre ASSITEJ is to be
the leading umbrella association of theatres for children
and youth. In cooperation with the Ministry of Culture
and the Ministry of Education, efforts have been made to
establish quality criteria for children and youth theatres.
HC ASSITEJ each year organizes the Meeting of its
members in the town of Čakovec, where the best plays
from preceding season are presented. It is an opportunity
for those interested in children and youth theatre to
meet, find out what their colleagues are doing, exchange
opinions, ideas and reward the most successful plays.
In addition to the Meeting of Professional Theatres,
Croatian Centre ASSITEJ organizes the Meetings of
Professionally Managed Theatres for Children and Youth
in Bjelovar, where members of professionally managed
drama studios meet up and present their annual theatrical
and pedagogical efforts.
Through a modern approach, questioning the consequences
of work and negligence, this play is asking some
of the always up-to-date social questions. Through a
contrast of ants as diligent people caring about securing
their material future, and a grasshopper as a certain sort
of a Bohemian enjoying the moment, the audience is
facing the opposition of material goods in lack of which
there is no progress and the art the importance of which
is also undisputable.
Will the grasshopper survive the wintertime when he
realizes that only his instruments are what is left, and will
all of the ants resist his song which haunts them from
day to day?
The play of four actors takes us into the world of small
workaholics and a bohemian, leaving us the space to
decide for ourselves who is negative and who is positive
in this story and whether such a division is even present
in the story. In addition to the main message, it also
traces the famous lesson that we are all different.
Director: Romano Bogdan
Text and dramaturgy: Ivona Marciuš
Scenography and stage costume design: Bruno Kontrec
Music: Igor Baksa
Lighting configuration: Neven Taradi
Graphic design: Bruno Kontrec
Cast: Mario Jakšić, Karolina Horvat, Davor Dokleja,
Bruno Kontrec Age: 4+
Duration: 40 min
Premiere: December, 20th, 2020
many learned patterns lead you to a great prize called
“Normal Life“ and what is exactly hiding behind that prize
with such a posh name? We shall not reveal it to you;
go play and you shall find out for yourself.
Great professional help with creating the show has been
provided by:
employees of the Police Administration of Medjimurje;
employees of the Centre for Social Welfare Čakovec;
Prof. Ph.D. Tamara Turza-Bogdan; educational workers
Aleksandra Pleh, Marijana Sabo, Nikola Švenda, Toni
Marušić and students Nina Oršuš and Sabina Oršuš.
Direction: Miran Kurspahić
Text and dramaturgy: Rona Žulj
Music: Nikša Marinović (vocal in the composition “A
normal Life“ sung by Igor Baksa)
Stage costume design: Domagoj Štimac Lighting configuration:
Neven Taradi Graphic design: Barbara Bjeliš
Executive producer: Romano Bogdan
Cast: Mata Kroata: Davor Dokleja,
Iva Ofenziva: Karolina Horvat,
Pero Leđero: Mario Jakšić,
Jura Procedura: Bruno Kontrec
Age: 14+ Duration: 90 min
· 42
43

Mateja Posedi at the
co-production talk in Milano
Two questions to Sarah Brigham, artistic
director of Derby Theatre (UK) and
director of “Footsteps in the mud”
Where is your (Theatre Derby) interest in a co-production
with the Croatian partner in ConnectUp?
\ Footsteps in the mud
For the third production within ConnectUp, Pinklec is
working with theatre Derby from Great Britain. The young
Croatian playwright Mateja Posedi was commissioned
to write a play, which will be staged by Sarah Brigham,
Artistic Director from Derby Theatre.
Two questions to Mateja Posedi, playwright
of “Footsteps in the mud”
The theatre director’s plan was that the production
should speak about young people from the Roma
community. How did you find your approach?
When I agreed to write a play about young Roma people,
I had no idea what it could be about. The artistic director,
Romano Bogdan, initially presented the idea of writing
about young Roma in foster families. And that was a
good topic for me at the time. However, after we talked
about Romani with the partners from England and
Germany at the ConnectUp meetings and later visited
the settlement with them, I realized that writing about
adopted Roma children cannot be written without writing
about life in the settlement. It is a big story, and several
novels and dramas could be written from their everyday
life. That topic somehow remained.
I didn’t know much about Roma life, except what I’ve
read in newspapers, seen on television or heard from
other people. That’s why I set myself the task to study as
much literature as possible about them. I watched some
films, even animated ones, YouTube videos, journalistic
research, books about Roma lives and so on.
In addition, visiting the settlement certainly helped. The
guide who showed us around in the settlement talked
about the problems they face, for example that they are
unable to connect to electricity or that they don’t have
water. It was raining that day and I noticed that the children
were outside and that the mud on the unpaved road
didn’t bother them. I remember the smoke in the distance
which was a sign that someone was burning something
there, I remember the music in the yard, I remember
many young Romani with cell phones in their hands and
children riding bicycles. Some of those things I put into
the drama.
Another important moment was the drama workshops
at the school attended by Roma children, led by Davor
Doklea, the Theatre Mediator of the theatre. At one point,
I called the girls to the side and asked them about things I
was interested in. They kindly answered all my questions
related to their family lives, what kind of music they listen
to, how they feel about the fact that young girls are getting
married early and so on. They really helped me a lot.
Writing about young Romani is not only about Roma life,
but also about young people. I had to do a lot of research
for that topic as well. The age difference between them
and me is 16 years, so even though I grew up on social
networks, I realized that they have changed so much that
it all became new to me at one point. E.g. I didn’t know
that they listen to podcasts so much.
Anyway, my main approach was to do a lot of research
and listen. I knew that the story would be found, and it
really was. When I wrote it, I sent it to the Romani teacher
from the school – Natalija Sklepić, who grew up in a similar
settlement. She read it and answered:
In many parts, I recognized myself and my life in the
settlement, as if someone had written about what I
went through and lived through (touches every person).
I believe that every Roma/Romani woman will recognize
themselves in this because we all share the same fate,
the same problems.
I think her words inspired the whole team working on the
theatre play.
What was the biggest challenge
in the writing process?
As for challenges, I don’t know where to start. One of
them was the decision on the form and plot of the drama.
When I thought about how to structure it, I could not
imagine it in the classic form of stage directions and
dialogue. Considering that the life of the Roma is somewhat
different, I thought that the drama must be different
as well. Also, during the meeting with the partners, we
talked about how it would be desirable if there was less
dialogue, if it ended positively and if the plot was simple.
But when discussing the life of the Roma, nothing is
simple. The relationship between the Roma community
and the majority population is extremely complex. If
the story was to describe a problem, some parameters
should be taken into account, the causes of the problem
should be found, the context should be described,
perhaps an explanation should be given. And that didn’t
seem like a story for children. I guess that’s why I decided
to write a simple family story about the relationship between
a sister and a brother, a story about dreams, about
the problems of young people, about love. I relied more
on the emotions of the characters than on any particular
problem. Then I wrote that story in monologue form with
individual episodes and scenes in the settlement that
show some typical situations in the settlement, but also
break some prejudices. My main thought was to show
that there are, for example, Roma who do bad things, that
there are situations where extremely young people get
married, or that there are Roma people who collect iron.
But I wanted to show that not everyone is like them.
So, this is a story about them.
We are delighted to be working with our Croatian partners
– the work they make is of high artistic quality and
we have a joint interest in platforming Roma voices. We
know that we come from very different experiences and
standpoints and so through this programme we are
genuinely mediating both our own understanding and
that of the audience.
What do you see as the biggest challenge
in that production?
we have had different approaches to representation but
through sensitive collaboration and conversation we have
come to understand each other’s viewpoints. For
us when we make work with a specific community representation
of that community both within the work, the
creation process and the creative team is important to
ensure authenticity and integrity. The challenge we have
had with our partners in Croatia is that the Roma people
from this specific part of the country are so oppressed
there are no appears to be no professional artists able
to work with us. The Roma community in Čakovec speak
a very specific dialect and are a small community, so it
feels like we cannot draw artists from other cities. We
have overcome this by involving the community in the
co-created process which led to the script.
A more aesthetic challenge is that we make theatre in
different forms from our partners and so the aesthetic
of presentation needs to be in keeping with Theatre
Pinklec’s style whilst still offering the English artist and
German Dramaturg an opportunity to express their own
artistry.
Have you been already surprised in that
working process? If yes, when/with what?
Our approaches are incredibly different – we would
normally have design concepts and ideas much earlier
from the creative team and the vision for the piece is
often a very collaborative process over the course of a
year whilst we are developing this piece over just the few
weeks before rehearsals begin.
Also, how we engage communities is very different but
we are learning from each other and we look forward to
beginning rehearsals.
· 44
Sarah Brigham, Director,
at the co-production meeting
in Čakovec
45

Flute Magic
\ IN/EQUALITY
„IN/equality“ is a socially critical play about equality and
inequality, which is intended to inspire young audiences
in particular to question themselves and their own
ideas. The staging focuses on the physical bodies of the
performers and their expression. Dynamic group images
are created with the help of the performers. Encounters
change over various constellations, the performers
execute various tasks, sometimes reaching their limits,
sometimes not recognizing themselves but then finding
themselves again. All performers are on stage throughout
the whole time.
What is it all about? Big Questions!
Ich bin O.K.
Vienna | Austria
\ Flute Magic
The entire “Ich bin O.K.” dance studio, together with
committed guest dancers from dance education and secondary
schools in Vienna, brought the production “Flute
Magic”, based on Mozart’s great opera “Die Zauberflöte”
(Magic Flute), on stage at Theatre Akzent in Vienna in
2019. In total, 140 dancers, a soprano and four musicians
on guitar, flute, viola and percussion took the audience on
an extraordinary journey.
Tobias and Paula, two young people living with disabilities,
are involved in the production of “Flute Magic” as
dancers. The two of them identified themselves particularly
with the roles of Prince Tamino and Princess Pamina.
They too often feel trapped, duped and have to show
courage. But through the power of love everything seems
to come to a happy end. Reality and play intertwine more
and more and the (flute) magic of the famous opera
spreads over the lives of the two protagonists.
The productions of the cultural and educational association
“Ich bin O.K.” almost always deal with socially critical
topics in an increasing way with the further development
of inclusive educational and cultural practices. It is our
intention to make the current conditions of society visible
through the means of dance, music and theatre.
In our dance studio, we try to give each dancer the time
necessary for their own (artistic) growth, encouraging
them to become independent, capable of action and
decision-making, and equipping them with the necessary
“tools” to do so.
At the same time, we wanted to create extracurricular
offers that could foster the creative and physical skills of
children and young people with and without disabilities
through dance, regular movement, and participation in
a full-length dance theatre production. Artists with a
disability become visible in dance on stage, and they
can express themselves authentically, while in the “real”
world they are often not perceived in their full size and
value. This can also show what people with disabilities
are capable of doing.
In order to enable the young people in the audience in
particular to engage sustainably with the relevant topics,
we sent working materials to the schools a few weeks
before the performance. This way we explained the
motivation for the play, as well as the staging approach
and the pedagogical approach in order to prepare them
for discussions.
Proofing big interest in the piece we welcomed around
54 school classes and members of sheltered workshops
in the audience, which means that there were a total of
around 1,300 children and young people as well as teachers
and accompanying staff at the school performances
in April and May 2019.
\ What would the world look like if we were all the
same, if we were all equal?
\ Otherwise, how can a society tolerate a lot of misfits?
\ Who am I really?
\ What makes me myself?
\ What makes me different?
\ What parts of my personality are socially
constructed and what is originally me?
Nine dancers with and without disabilities deal with big
questions on stage. The piece is using contemporary
dance theatre with urban styles and live rap. Costumes
play a supporting as well as natural role: starting in
flesh-colored underwear the dancers later change to
black-and-white-dresses.
Scenography/Choreography: Kirin España
Artistic direction/Choreography: Attila Zanin
Dramaturgic/Choreographic Assistance:
Hana Zanin Pauknerová
Dancers: Simon Couvreur, Farah Deen, Lina Hufnagl,
Raphael Kadrnoska, Niklas Kern, Maria Naber,
Marina Rützler, Alexander Stuchlik,
Sophie Waldstein
Live Rap: Markus Samek
It is our intention to create a socially critical piece encouraging
a broad audience to question themselves and
their own ideas. This shall be evoked by the rapper Markus
Samek who provides an interaction with the audience
at the beginning of the play – text example:
Everybody looks at me and immediately thinks
of disability.
They think he can’t do anything, is just a
burden for the family.
You feel excluded and not really understood.
Why don’t people open their eyes when they really should
…
· 46
47

\ The Target Group
Performers and one actor (rap) belong to the group
of people with disabilities. From observation of such
presentations it can be said that youth and young adults
in the public – be it that they belong to that group or not
– see these role models on stage. Such experience could
help this target group to get more interested in theatre
and dance. They might have come to a performance for
the first time. Later they might be curious to participate in
such activities as well.
The piece is showcased in festivals which are focusing
on our target group.
Co-Production and Workshops for
Co-Creation of Landesbühnen Sachsen
and “Ich bin O.K.”: Tabula Rasa
The Latin expression tabula rasa originally refers to a
wax-covered writing tablet that has been smoothed by
scraping off the writing and can be rewritten like a blank
page. In a figurative sense, tabula rasa means something
like “empty and receptive like a blank sheet”. In psychology
the question is asked whether the psyche or the brain
of the human being initially resembles a blank page that
is written on in the course of life. It can also refer to a
radical new beginning.
End of January Almut Wregg (cultural mediator) and Alex
Stuchlick (dancer with intellectual disability) provided a
one-week workshops with Realschule Kötzschenbroda/
Radebeul, D. In Vienna a similar event was organized with
“Hans-Radl Schule’’ in February 2023. The groups met
for creating something in an inclusive setting under the
same theme.
As the leading element of the workshop hours a sheet of
white paper was selected. This was chosen because of
an argument by Sigmund Freud who compared Tabula
Rasa with an empty sheet of paper. The participants experimented
with sheets in front of their faces, paper was
delineated, torn, beaten, airborne, and used as costumes.
During these five days of co-creation the participants
were invited to get to know the group and their own artistic
capabilities as well as sharing ideas with the group,
e.g., to deal with alternative possibilities such as how to
draw a portrait, to try to draw it in front of their own face.
Which sounds can you create with a sheet of paper?
On the last day the creation was performed for the
audience of parents, teachers and other classes of the
school. It was received with big applause!
As a result, generally speaking, the appearance of the
students had changed. They all felt more secure by
recognizing how important each member became for the
group. Some of them presented some activities which
they never did before and succeeded with bravery. Even
a participant who has difficulties moving – she learned
to move with pleasure and enjoyed it to the full.
A new look at things – for co-production #3
The choreographers’ interpretation of the co-production
“Tabula Rasa” is dealing with expressions like “Life has to
pay off!” “Only then it is worth it!” “No mistakes!” We have
to judge quickly, act and avoid going into the red. – Do
we? – Stop it! High performance or even earnings are left
out! A new look at things begins!
Within the EU project ConnectUp, the experience and
professional dance training of the dancers from Landesbühnen
Sachsen meet the passion and knowledge of the
dancers with and without trisomy 21 from “Ich bin O.K.”.
In an encounter at equal level, they exchange their styles
and dancing preferences and create a space of experience
that shows what new things are possible as soon
as the well-trodden tracks are left behind.
Choreography: Simon Wolant
Choreographic Assistant: Attila Zanin
Stage and Costume Design: Ralph Zeger
Dramaturgy: Dr. Ruth Heynen
Performers: Simon Couvreur, Raphael Kadrnoska,
Maria Naber, Sophie Waldstein,
Gavin Law, Marianne Reynaudi
Landesbühnen Sachsen
Radebeul | Germany
The Landesbühnen (LBS) are the professional travelling
repertory theatre of the German province of Saxony with
music theatre, dance, drama ensembles and theatre for
young audience. Over 200 employees are responsible
for organizing, preparing and performing more than 600
performances each year in Saxony (including the nature
stage “Felsenbühne Rathen), Middle Germany and other
European venues.
\ Bus 57 – A True Story
A play based on the novel by Dashka Slater
German by Ann Lecker
Sasha and Richard – two young people whose worlds
have nothing to do with each other. Sasha is white,
comes from a sheltered family, goes to a private school
and defines himself as agender.
Richard is African American, has just come out of a
residential group for supervised juvenile offenders and
is having trouble at school. Both are only connected by
the route with bus route 57. Until one day Richard sets
Sasha’s skirt on fire when he/she falls asleep on the bus.
Suddenly the two are linked by a whole destiny.
Schoolchildren in rural areas in particular find it difficult
to gain access to cultural education, they are often
confronted with the feeling of a lack of prospects and are
concerned with the question of how their future will be
shaped. It is therefore important to promote encounters
with people and their stories, especially in rural areas.
That is the task of the mobile theatre of the LBS: to
enable people to encounter the new, the unknown,
the different perspectives.
BUS 57 gives the opportunity to get to the bottom of
many questions through the encounter with two very
different people. To what extent does one’s origins influence
a person’s future or their decisions and the paths
they take? How do I want to meet other people? What
makes a change of perspective possible?
The question of the development of resilience is particularly
important in the current period of constant transformation.
And here, as part of cultural education, theatre
can provide space with its stories and the way they are
dealt with, to confront oneself and one‘s own reality of
life and to rethink the world.
Stage version by Kerstin Weiß – world-premiere
Director: Monique Hamelmann
Costumes and stage design: Stephanie Zurstegge
Choreography: Tuan Ly
Dramaturgy: Kerstin Weiß
Theatre pedagogy: Annekathrin Handschuh
Performers: Julia Rani, Justin V. John, Moritz Gabriel,
Tuan Ly, Kofi Dansu Wahlen
Premiere 13.11.2021
· 48
49

This “ConnectUp” production is inspired by young people.
From September 2021 to July 2022, 14 young people
between the ages of 11 and 13 researched the topic of
“Real Digital” in a weekly theatre workshop. A piece was
developed that was performed on July 8, 2022.
\ TABULA RASA
An inclusive dance project
Co-Production Landesbühnen Sachsen (DE)
and “Ich bin O.K.” (AU)
Life has to pay off! Only then it is worth it! Don’t get into
the red! No mistakes! We have to judge quickly, act and
avoid going into the red. – Do we?
Stop it! Now it’s a clean sweep. Let’s show what we do
not have and get to know each other from that side. Prior
knowledge, high performance or even earnings are left
out! A new look at things begins!
\ RAUSCHEN
A Research journey from Agata Kucińska
in cooperation with „Cloud Theatre“ and
„Wrocławski Teatr Lalek“ – world premiere
Outside, everything is booming. Family. Friends. School.
Inside only chaos. Overload. Uncertainty. The two worlds
seem incompatible. Life is energized. Under voltage. With
pressure on the ears. Noise on all channels. The sound
of too much information, messages and images. Fleeing
from overlapping tones and noises, we find ourselves in
a vacuum. A space of stillness, of standstill, of thoughts
in the form of lights. Brain waves and convolutions. An intertwined
network with its own rules and laws. Chased by
the shadow, chasing after the light, an energy is released
that is louder and more glaring than all the outside influences.
It drowns everything else and ends up being just
the reproduction of the outside world. How can harmony
arise from this? How do colors become a painting? A
form out of material? A projection out of light and music
out of sounds? An adolescent’s experimental search for
himself, told with characters, unique sound effects and
light painting.
The results of this research are now being used by the
artistic team to develop the professional puppet theatre
production entitled “Swoosh” [Rauschen]. Both the form,
the content and the means are inspired by the adolescents.
For example, the direct influence of the screens
that surround us – the dependency and the pressure –
should be clarified through the use of light projections
and sound collages. The emotions of the young people
return in colors and sounds. The inside of the feeling
comes out, and what is outside for the audience should
come inside.
The 12+ target group is not only involved in the process,
but should also be addressed directly and identify with
the protagonist. The staging should speak through
images and avoid detailed verbal explanations. There
is still room for interpretation, so that young people of
all genders, backgrounds and disabilities can take part
and empower themselves to initiate conversations and
engage in exchange. The infrastructure of the LBS makes
it possible to show the production on smaller stages in
rural areas and also to reach young people who otherwise
only get a limited cultural offer.
Director: Agata Kucińska a. G.
Puppets, costumes and stage design: Aleksandra Stawik
Music: Ignacy Wojciechowski
Dramaturgy and Theatre pedagogy: Franziska Till
Assistance: Elisa Günther
Puppetry: Wojciech Stachura, Konrad Bruno Till
Premiere: 24.03.2023
As part of the EU project ConnectUp, the experience and
professional dance training of the dancers from LBS
meet the passion and knowledge of the dancers with and
without trisomy 21 from “Ich bin O.K.”. In an encounter at
the same level, they exchange their styles and dancing
preferences and create a space of experience that shows
what new things are possible as soon as the well-trodden
tracks are left behind.
This production is recommended for people with disabilities
and uses subtitles via the app “ConnectAPP”.
Background Barrier-free production:
who is speaking?
One aim for LBS is the constant dismantling of barriers
for spectators and people on stage. The inclusion of
simple language, access for wheelchair users, low-barrier
performances or audio loops are techniques that form
an important basis. They are already being used and are
constantly being expanded.
An even bigger barrier is the representation of people
with disabilities or other marginalized groups ON the
stage. Here, too, “inclusion” means that the institutions,
the permanent buildings, have to move. Not only because
it is more difficult for non-normative artists to participate
in the production process: Anyone who needs longer
breaks than provided for in the collective agreement,
cannot climb the stairs to the rehearsal stage or does not
master the German stage pronunciation hardly has the
opportunity to take part in a professional theatre.
Institutions also have to change fundamentally because
the point of view of minority groups, for example people
with disabilities, hardly plays a role in the stories on
stage. If the stage plays with the image of society, then a
theatre must ensure that no part of society is forgotten.
The equal cooperation with Ich bin O.K. is another important
step for LBS to become more barrier-free. There is
no talk about a target group that we want to reach.
The choreography will be worked out together.
The content and the dramaturgy live from the perspective
that the dancers with trisomy 21 bring with them. They
don’t talk about each other, they speak for themselves.
Choreography: Simon Wolant
Stage and Costume Design: Ralph Zeger
Dramaturgy: Dr. Ruth Heynen
Performer: „Ich bin O.K.“: Simon Couvreur,
Raphael Kadrnoska, Maria Naber, Sophie Waldstein
LBS: Gavin Law, Marianne Reynaudi
Pre-Premiere: September 8, 2023
(Vienna, AU)
· 50
51

What was the support you got
from the LBS for your intensive week?
During this project week, we were able to get to know
the artistic process in a theatre (e.g.: guided tour in LBS,
rehearsal visit for the play “Eigenarten”) and received
artistic support and guidance in the creation of our
performance from Almut Wregg, a theatre pedagogue,
and Alex Stuchlik, a dancer from Vienna. In several workshops
and games, the two were able to set group and
movement impulses for us, which we could then implement
in our own play ideas on the topic.
The LGL is open for various European partnerships and
is successful in obtaining additional public funds from
the EU budget. As part of Creative Europe’s ConnectUp
project, the LGL is also involved in the co-creation of four
theatre productions. The first such production was
\ Yellow Moon
By David Greig
\ TABULA RASA
Mirko Israel
„We had the chance to grow together“ –
One week of New Beginnings
Johanna Jäger from LBS was asking Mirko Israel
about his Co-Creation „New Beginnings / Tabula Rasa“.
Mirko Israel is a teacher for German and Ethics in the
highschool „Oberschule Kötzschenbroda“ in Radebeul,
Saxony (DE). He is a participant of the Theatre Mediation
Programme.
Mirko, you created a project week with young
people, your own students. How were the
circumstances?
In an international co-production between Ich bin O.K.
and LBS, we – the class 7a of the Oberschule Kötzschenbroda-Radebeul
– approached the topic of “New Beginnings”
during a project week. We are an inclusive class
with 21 students, with five of them having their own
special educational needs: mental development, learning
support, physical impairment, social-emotional development,
special focus on hearing.
Was the class experienced with theatre?
None of us had any real theatre experience before,
except for small scenes in the classroom.
Did you find it successful?
The result was a varied theatre performance for the
numerous, colorful audience consisting of parents and
relatives of the students as well as interested visitors that
came in during the “open-door-day“ of our school. Our
play received a thunderous applause.
All in all, it was an unforgettable week. We had a lot of fun
and joy playing theatre. Not only did we have the opportunity
to gain a lot of new experiences, but we also had
the chance to grow together as a community. Previously
hidden talents were revealed, other sides of ourselves
were discovered, even fears were conquered. None of the
participants left this event without having learned something
in some way, or having grown beyond themselves.
Student quotes
I didn’t expect acting to be so interesting. (Alina)
Today I thought it was cool that we were allowed
to go “backstage” and learn how everything works.
I have to say that I was very nervous during the theatre
exercises. I dared to do a few things. It was fun! (Lilly)
The workshop was more strenuous than we thought, but
today we were allowed to create our own play. Nick, Kevin
and I created a very funny skit. We were also allowed to
watch a rehearsal. That was very cool to watch. I’m also
looking forward to tomorrow because we get to work on
our play more. (Jamie)
I thought it was very cool today. You can gain a lot of
experience through the play. I didn’t think that we would
get along so well in the group. I hope that we will continue
tomorrow and that the play will go well on Friday. (Leni)
Today definitely went better than yesterday! I hope
everything goes well tomorrow and we make the audience
laugh (in a positive sense). (Mia)
I liked the exercises this morning. I feel good in my role.
Lutkovno
gledališče
Ljubljana
Ljubljana | Slovenia
Lutkovno gledališče Ljubljana (LGL) is the main Slovenian
puppet theatre staging puppet and drama performances
for children, youngsters and adults. Its predominant target
audiences are children and young people. The public
institution was established in 1948 (as the City Puppet
Theatre) and has been based in Mestni dom in Krekov
Square since 1984. In its work, the theatre builds on the
hundred-year tradition of Slovenian puppetry. With the
establishment of the Museum of Puppetry at the Ljubljana
Castle, the LGL officially became the caretaker of this
precious, century-old heritage. The theatre manages five
regular and several smaller, occasional venues. At these
venues, which offer seating for approximately a thousand
people, it produces fifteen premieres a year and is visited
by around 110,000 spectators.
LGL also pays special attention to cultural and artistic
education in all its dimensions and at a national level
cooperates in the endeavors to strengthen the standards
and systematically include quality cultural content in the
programmes of educational institutions.
We organise the International Puppet Festival LUTKE,
which takes place every even-numbered year. This
festival brings the best foreign puppet productions
to Slovenia and promotes all kinds of contemporary
interdisciplinary and genre developments.
Translation: Tina Mahkota
For this production, the theatre invited four young people
who had already worked in previous productions to
participate again, and by creating a cast of three professional
actors from the ensemble and the young people.
This decision marked a step forward in the development
of teen productions, where the teens did not create their
own content but engaged with the dramatic text and
performed in dramatic roles alongside the professional
actors. Above all, it was a powerful statement about how
much participation is possible for teenagers in texts and
performances about teenagers for teenagers. Their participation
in the show meant that LGL gave teenagers interested
in theatre acting the opportunity to play teenage
characters normally played by adult actors and to add
their own, more honest interpretation to the characters,
while at the same time giving them the chance to experience
working in a professional theatre production that
is not based on devised theatre practises but is closer to
the traditional rehearsal process in the theatre.
Director: Primož Ekart
Dramaturgy: Ana Duša
Cast: Rok Kunaver, Jan Bučar, Alenka Tetičkovič,
Neža Dvorščak, Ronja Matijevec Jerman,
Tibor Anželj,Maks Mihajlović
Set design: Damir Leventić
Costumography: Vasilija Fišer
Music: Koala Voice
Music design: Darja Hlavka Godina
Choreography: Rosana Hribar
Lighting design: Andrej Hajdinjak
Language consultant: Maja Cerar
In collaboration with the Planina Residential
and Counselling Centre
Co-produced by LBS and Ljubljana Secondary
School for Preschool Education, Secondary
and Art Secondary School
The next year LGL returned to working with teenagers
and – as part of ConnectUp – co-produced
· 52
(Maximilian)
53

\ Everything is Alright
\ Shame on You
with “The City of Women”, but this time with a choreographer
instead of a theatre director as the leader of the
group. The team of 11 teenagers were curious about the
education system and the role it plays in the maturation
process, especially the issue of what behaviors are acceptable
in the classroom and which are not. What other
lessons does the system teach us beyond the stated
goals? What other activities are there outside of those
required by the school?
The performance raised the question of the hidden curriculum,
and with it the question of the hidden curriculum
in theatre education. Kornelija Špoljar writes in her article
“Novi pristopi k vzgojnoizobraževalnim programom v
sodobnih konceptih predšolske vzgoje” that the hidden
curriculum highlights unintended but effective factors
such as the equipment of the institutions, the organisation
of the space and the number of students in a group
that determine the educational process, the role of the
participants in it and the interaction between teachers,
educators, and students. Eva D. Bahovec and Zdenko
Kodelja in Vrtci za današnji čas additionally point out
that the hidden curriculum “is not only about more or
less ideologically coloured content and curricula, but
also, and sometimes above all, about the organisation of
daily life and the way communication takes place in the
kindergarten … This includes everything that is taken for
granted in the kindergarten and about which the children
often have no choice: the daily routine and the organisation,
the eating and sleeping routines, the way activities
are organised and chosen, and much more”.
This is because the hidden curriculum is the set of implicit
or unspoken rules that govern behaviour in a particular
social setting. It is often contrasted with the explicit or
written curriculum. In this production it became clear that
theatre can help young people to critically engage with
norms and prejudices in an artistic, expressive way.
Author, director and choreographer:
Nataša Živković
Concept and assistance:
Tea Hvala, Teja Reba
Scenography: Urša Vidic
Co-author and artistic, pedagogic
and dramaturgic assistant:
Sara Šabec
Co-authored and performed by:
Pika Kovač, Sinja Smokvina, Dominik
Križ, Tara Klemenčič Belšak, Petja
Golec Horvat, Laura Penšek Kozmelj,
Žak Može, Ela Romih, Neža Ana
Goričar, Filip Perpar, Špela Čekada
Artistic and pedagogic assistant:
Benjamin Zajc
Lighting designer: Urška Vohar
Music: Lovekovski (Neža Dobrovoljc,
Niki Lapovski)
Song authors: Sinja Smokvina,
Pika Kovač
Video: Filip Jembrih, Veronika
Francesca
Štefančič, Ivana Vogrinc Vidal
Language consultant: Kovačič Klasja
In 2022 LGL made another casting call, this time inviting
young people who have no desire to act but still want
to get involved in theatre. As a result, the target group
changed – the final group of teenagers included fewer
who are already involved in theatre and more who have
never had the opportunity, because until now almost all
Slovenian participatory teen productions were aimed at
those who want to perform. This is an important realisation,
because the key to theatre education should never
be based on performance alone, as this means that it
loses a large part of its target audience and thus does
not realise its full potential. Working with young people
who are not engaged with the performance can therefore
be more productive. Of course, we cannot imagine
theatre without performance, but it makes a big difference
whether that performance takes place in a closed
workshop process or in a public theatre production.
The creative team therefore consisted of professional
actors and theatre makers who invited young people to
design the content, think about the presentation and give
them general advice, especially on how to present these
issues to the target audience. The team began designing
the show with a lengthy workshop process in which they
tried to address the issue of shame, the deep-rooted feelings
of shame, and the pervasive feelings of shame and
shamelessness with the teenagers in different ways.
Using original material from the young creative team,
they explored when and how shame arises, the ways in
which it is reproduced and whether it can be overcome
at all. After the workshops, the team began to design
the production with the material – initially in a closed
process. As soon as the material was finalised, dramaturgically
clear and complete, they began to invite young
people to the rehearsals, who became important interlocutors
in portraying the issues of shame. This proves to be
especially fruitful when dealing with the topic, because
adult generations quickly get caught up in discussing
their own shame and forget that the younger generations
have a different perspective on the topic or that the
pillars of shame are in a different place.
Author of concept and script: Varja Hrvatin
Authors: Lea Culetto, Varja Hrvatin, Nejc Jezernik,
Farah Sara Kurnik, Vid Merlak, Daniel Petković,
Mia Skrbinac, Jurij Smrke
Cast: Nejc Jezernik, Daniel Petković, Mia Skrbinac
Graphic-, Video- and Set Designer: Farah Sara Kurnik
App Developer: Jurij Smrke
Music: Vid Merlak
Animation and Video Editing: Pavel Enderle
Choreographer: Sebastijan Geč
Language Consultant: Irena Androjna Mencinger
Consultant: Benjamin Zajc
Assistants: Nina Koritnik, Sofija Lavrač Črnivec
In cooperation with Dschungel Wien (AT)
and in co-production with Theatre Alfa (CZ)
Throughout the process, the teenagers advised the
creative team on interpretation, judging what seemed
appropriate and what did not, where the themes were
well set, which were outdated and so on. They entered
the process as equal interlocutors whose opinions became
important.
· 54
55

\ There are Only Four of Us Left
The teenagers involved in Shame on You started their
process with workshops. The workshops (which took
place once a month on weekends from February to
June2022) explored different approaches to staging and
included different formats of performance writing and
bespoke staging strategies. As part of the workshops,
participants also worked with guest artists and attended
various arts events that offered insights into the intersection
of the performing arts with other media. In April,
the workshop was led by Corinne Eckenstein, the artistic
director of Dschungel Wien (AT). The workshops ended
with a public presentation.
The first part of the workshops focused on getting to
know each other and making contacts, starting from
the idea of shame in our neighborhood. As shame is the
general idea of the whole project, all exercises, including
the getting-to-know-you exercises, were conducted
through the prism of this theme. Later, the exercises
and tasks were increasingly expanded from cognitive to
artistic, theatrical and performative exercises. One of the
most important exercises and the one that have borne
the most fruit was the “Museum of Shame”, in which the
young people had to prepare their own installation on the
theme of shame, whether as a universal phenomenon or
in a narrower sense, such as guilty pleasures.
When the young people first brought their ideas to the
workshops, it seemed as if they did not really dare to go
deeper into the topic, because all the installations dealt
with the topic of shame in a relatively superficial way.
This was also a problem the group struggled with during
most of the first part of the workshop process. Later, as
the relationships between the participants deepened and
more trust was built, the theme of shame also began to
deepen and their museums developed more and more
depth. It was important not to destroy the playfulness
that these teenagers brought with them and not to take
the topic “too seriously”. Therefore, some ideas and
installations that were made more for fun than in reality
were not discarded but developed further.
In the middle of the workshop process, Corinne came
to us as a guest mentor who introduced her working
principle to the young people in a two-day intensive
workshop. During this weekend, new materials emerged
that could be used for the final co-creation, the so-called
dysmorphic bodies, which the young people created from
various materials such as foam, nylon and glitter.
The last half of the workshop process focused on preparing
the final presentation or co-creation. We started
to collect all the materials created during the workshops,
chose our favourites and built on them. Just before the
end of the preparations for the co-creation, we visited
Vienna, where the young people saw two productions of
Dschungel Wien and took part in various workshops in a
public setting that Varja Hrvatin and I had prepared for
them. One of the most successful was the “series shoot
at Ikea”, where the teenagers secretly filmed their own mini-series
based on the principle of IKEA Heights (2009).
Upon our return from Vienna, we began the installation of
an audiovisual-performative installation that took up the
entire theatre space of the Kulturnica, which is managed
by the LGL. The event took place on 22 June 2022.
Elsinor Centro
Di Produzione
Teatrale
Forlì, Milano, Florence | Italy
The Festival Segnali, directed and organized by Elsinor
and Teatro del Buratto, is a historical and fundamental
event for Italian theatre for young audiences. Segnali
offers the opportunity to see all kinds of productions and
distributions from all over the country, to compare and
get to know the different poetic and artistic paths. A privileged
place to come together with international openings,
as well as an occasion of promotion and visibility
for professional companies. A crossroads that, over the
years, has allowed a direct knowledge of the programs
in progress, resulting in a more conscious and efficient
programming, and is an important aid to dissemination
throughout the country.
Elsinor is a Centre for theatrical productions. Elsinor is
based in Milan, at the Teatro Fontana, but it is composed
of two other local units, such as Teatro Cantiere Florida
in Florence and Teatro Testori in Forlì. The three venues
share the same commitment in exploring the new contemporary
theatrical prose; they have created a synergy
that lets them exchange their experiences inspired by
traditional and new approaches. Besides shows, Elsinor
offers the audience presentation meetings, special
events, post-show discussions, lectures, workshops and
seminars for students, amateurs and professionals.
Since the beginning of the project, Elsinor has activated
various projects aimed at increasing cultural participation
with the aim of recreating a receptive and sensitive
community around its theatres. Theatre and drama
workshops, participatory shows, theatrical forays into
unconventional places and creative ateliers. The “6
di scena!” project involved high school students who
created augmented reality promotional materials for a
participatory exhibition, and professional artists who created
a traveling exhibition of 5 works that were distributed
throughout the neighborhood and could be used free
of charge. Prove del 9 created a path of social inclusion
and cultural promotion thanks to the direct involvement
of the inhabitants and visitors of Zona 9, giving birth
to a participatory theatrical production. „The Club of
scripts“ gathers an audience of young people and adults
around contemporary dramaturgy, while „The place of
the gaze“ accompanies younger spectators who are far
from the theatre in accessing the shows of the theatre
programme. Giving this new audience the possibility of
engaging with the artistic creation was crucial in order to
establish a strong connection with them and to make it
last in time. The positive effect is only just beginning, but
it already confirms very clearly that this is the right way
to go.
\ Festen
By Thomas Vinterberg, Mogens Rukov &
Bo Hr. Hansen adaptation by David Eldridge
directed by Marco Lorenzi production Elsinor Centro
di Produzione Teatrale, TPE– Teatro Piemonte
Europa, Teatro Stabile del Friuli Venezia Giulia,
Solares Fondazione delle Arti in collaboration with
Mulino di Amleto
Based on the 1998 cult film written and directed by
Thomas Vinterberg, Festen is the tale of an abyss. A
birthday party for the forefather of a rich Danish family
turns into a game of massacre aimed at challenging, in
a crescendo of tension. The precarious family balance
based on hypocritical relationships, unspeakable secrets,
unhealthy power relationships. Festen is a challenge
in search for the impossible: looking at this world with
different eyes, exploring spaces not yet traveled. Making
a revolution.
· 56
57

The Frogs
by Aristofane
translation Maddalena Giovannelli, Martina Treu
project and direction Marco Cacciola;
production Elsinor Centro di Produzione Teatrale,
Teatri di Bari, Solares Fondazione delle Arti
I came down here as a poet. For what purpose?
So that the city is saved and can perform its choirs
Staged for the first time in 405 BC, „The Frogs“ is an
on the road comedy, the story of a journey in search of
poetry. A large working group, which includes professional
and non-professional actors, aims to create a joyful
and participatory event, in an attempt to re-establish that
ancient amphitheatre atmosphere in which audience
and actors could look into each other’s eyes and share a
common experience. Thus, the protagonists’ journey will
involve the whole choir and the other half of the circle –
the audience – in order to loosen the boundary between
witnesses and protagonists.
“In a time of profound political and cultural uncertainty, of
large virtual realities in which we are immersed, theatre
can still be helpful in creating community. It is possible to
express today’s world through the theatre, only as long as
it is described as a world that can be changed. Therefore,
today staging the choirs in the middle of the scene, becomes
a political matter, to re-establish the ancient blood
bound between society and its representation. Because
theatre, such as politics, is a poem that cannot be written
just by yourself. It is a story that is made with others.”
(Marco Cacciola, director)
The call for the workshops held by Marco Cacciola for
Le Rane received many applications from people of all
origins, in all the cities touched by the show. Le Rane has
therefore become a collective show in all respects, also
built together with the contribution of simple citizens of
different ages, often far away from the theatrical world.
CROSS
THE LINE
written and directed by Manuela Capece and Davide
Doro compagnia rodisio production Elsinor Centro di
Produzione Teatrale / Derby Theatre and in collaboration
with Teatro delle Briciole Solares Fondazione delle
arti and Teatro Comunale di Casalmaggiore
Architecture is the great book of the human race.
Victor Hugo
The garden of the world has no limits,
except in your mind.
Rumi
Line. Limit. Border. Conflict.
When does a line become a limit?
What does crossing that limit mean?
What does crossing that line mean?
Can the line be a protection?
Can we see the limits around us?
Are the external constructions reflected within us?
The walls outside are repeated inside?
Go beyond. Go over. Cross.
Language
Religion
Skin
Gender
Origin
Family
Age
Identity
Dreams
Chance
There is always a line close to us. We walk alongside it
and we often cross it, it tells us when to stop and reminds
us where we are going.
There are new and old architectures which draw up our
cities like natural borders which unite and separate since
always.
There are physical lines, visible and clear to everyone,
and there’s the imaginary ones, which nobody has ever
seen, but which are just as clear.
There are lines which move in space and those which
travel in time.
There are interior lines, limits more or less surmountable
hidden inside ourselves.
There is always Here and Beyond. There’s always Me and
You.
On this side there’s my world.
My space, my things, my way of being and acting.
Beyond the line it’s You.
The line is the expression of a conflict.
A conflict that separates the superficial self to the interior
one.
It is the complex distance between the real and the
virtual.
It’s a wall that cuts through a country, it’s the horizon
sitting between a center and periphery.
We always have a limit to overcome.
Inside and outside of us.
Crossing the Line means to choose.
(Manuela Capece, Davide Doro)
“Cross the line” sounds like a challenge. How many possible
different meanings has it got?
Martina and I, with two other teachers, have been
working on this idea with a group of students. To avoid influencing
them, we decided not to tell much beforehand;
during our first meetings we simply stretched some tape
across the floor, dividing the room in two halves, with no
further explanation.
The response of the group was surprising: when we
asked what that tape represented to them, we got several
answers: “it’s a wall”; “A border”; “A limit” “An opportunity”;
“It’s barbed wire”.
We decided that would be our starting point and hence
we began exploring the students’ proposals.
In later meetings, based on the response we got from the
group, we moved to consider imaginary lines alongside
real ones: ‘borders’ between our present and our future or
the ‘walls’ we build around ourselves to feel safe.
Our work is still going on and posing questions: Which
of the ‘lines’ around us are real barriers? What does it
mean to cross them? Should we? Can we imagine a world
without them?
(Laura Tombini, teacher and TMP participant)
Laura Tombini, left
· 58
59

Anfamol
Theatr
Genedlaethol
Cymru
The aim is for ConnectApp to be a practical and
user-friendly tool which achieves the following:
Carmarthen | Wales (UK)
Theatr Genedlaethol Cymru’s vision is to place Welsh-language
theatre at the heart of the Welsh nation. As the
Welsh-language national theatre of Wales, their mission
is to present a variety of Welsh language theatre experiences
with a broad appeal that enrich the lives of people
across Wales. The company also provide development
opportunities that nurture and inspire the next generation
of Welsh-speaking theatre artists and offer creative
opportunities for people across Wales to experience the
transformative impact of the arts.
Theatr Gen have developed their own language access
app, named “Sibrwd” (Welsh for “whisper”). Currently in
its beta stage, Sibrwd is easily downloadable onto audience
members’ smartphones and provides translations
of the play into English or any other required language
(spoken and as written text). ConnectUp wants to build
on the experiences of its technical partner Theatr Gen
with Sibrwd and develop it into ConnectApp.
\ spoken or written text on stage can be followed in the
respective translations either spoken (via earphones)
or written text
\ makes productions in different languages understandable
for young people and reduces prejudices
among teachers (internationalisation of festivals
as a new business model)
\ provides innovative solutions to existing barriers
such as people who are visually impaired or blind
and deafness or living with hearing loss (strengthens
the “missionary approach”)
\ allows young people to engage with theatre on an
immediate, personal level in their social media groups
(marketing support) and to give direct feedback such
as smiley-based evaluation.
\ allows direct communication with young people
(without any detour via teachers)
\ provides theatres with a reliable evaluation module
(which will also be used for research purposes by the
two universities).
Through practical experimentation, research and trialling,
ConnectApp will lead to an international market readiness
during the project period. As ConnectApp, it will be
internet-based and thus be expanded as a marketing and
research tool. For sure theatre makers from the whole of
Europe will discover new ways to use the full potential of
the app and make it an integral part of new productions.
ConnectApp was used within ConnectUp in Porto (PT),
during the FITEI festival (November 2021) for the Portuguese
production “Doors” and at the Assitej-festival in
Čakovec at theatre Pinklec (October 2022) for the show
“Petty One-way” from Landesbuehnen Sachsen (DE).
The app will be further developed for the upcoming
ConnectUp festival showcases and used for several
invited performances.
· 60
61
PijinPigeon

Outlook
ConnectUp
Our project is entering its final phase. The theatres have
already produced three shows within ConnectUp, one of
them as a co-production with one of the partner theatres.
The last show within the project will also be a co-production.
In order to spread the audience development
strategy beyond the participating theatres, ConnectUp
opens up to 9 new theatres in the last year. In search of
extended artistic inspiration and sustainability production
4 will be produced in collaboration with a professional
theatre company outside the current group. All
ConnectUp theatres are already in the active preparation
process for these challenging co-productions, some of
them again within European, others with companies from
different continents.
So, this production 4 is also the start of the transition to
enlarge and further establish ConnectUp for the future.
With the productions we take up the red thread of the
project, “The Lives of the Others”. We want to tell stories
from the living worlds (realities) of our audience. To do
this, we - the artists - first have to be curious and find
out what the “life of our audience” is really like? What is
important to them, what moves them? That is why each
of our productions is preceded by a “research process”
among young people and accompanied by a co-creation.
Under the guidance of the Theatre Mediator, we bring
artists and audience together.
With co-creations as a participatory activity, led by the
Theatre Mediators, we will not only fulfil our goal of a
diversified audience, but also come a step closer to our
vision of countering the drifting apart of society. The
young people who work on the co-creations over several
months will have learned a lot about the “the lives of the
others”. When they are performing, the auditorium will be
mixed with their parents’ and grand parents’ generation
and people will meet and share stories of “the lives of the
others”.
In order to ensure a stronger connection between artists
and the audience, the Theatre Mediation Programme
(TMP) is at the centre of ConnectUp. After the successful
completion of the first run, the second will start in
early summer. But this time, in addition to the European
participants, interested artists from Canada and the USA
will also take part. And unlike the start of the first TMP
(due to Covid), there can be an analogue workshop week
at the beginning of this round.
In April 2023, a first group of interested North-American
theatre makers will meet at the Presentation House Theatre
in Vancouver, Canada, for an introductory week to
TMP 2, led by the experts from the Universities of Agder
and Derby. The collaboration of the Canadian theatre with
Indigenous theatre groups adds a valuable dimension to
the meeting.
At the Theatre Derby (UK) in July 2023, the European
participants of the TMP 2 will meet for the first time and,
in addition to the workshops, will have the opportunity to
discuss practical theatre work at the Departure Lounge
Festival.
The experiences and the exchange with the participants
of TMP 1 will continue to accompany the project work.
Preparations are currently underway for the Youth Encounter
“Tomorrowland” in Palmela at Teatro O Bando in
June 2023.
Odette Bereska
Literary Adviser ConnectUp
· 62
63

Tomorrowland
Youth Encounter
Preparation Meeting Palmela (PT) March 2023
To enable that, the artistic directors came together with
the TMP learners to outline the basic structure, to explore
the site, to listen to fresh perspectives and to celebrate
the skills within the group. This team is now back at
home creating resources, imagery and stories which will
feed into the meeting in June.
Management Team
of ConnectUp
Dirk Neldner
Artistic Director (DE)
The planning for the Tomorrowland event in June 2023
is well underway, with ideas on both specific content
and overarching concept having been developed by the
co-artistic directors Andrew Siddall and Chloe Osborne in
conversation with the Connect-Up production team over
a period of several months. But the real planning and development
took place over a weekend in March with the
involvement of the learners from the Theatre Mediation
Programme.
At the beginning of June, 65 young people from 8 European
centres arrive in the beautiful countryside outside
of Palmela, to be hosted by the very wonderful team
at Teatro O Bando – and in 8 days will create a unique
theatrical response to the landscape around the theme of
Tomorrowland. This is a feat of preparation, planning and
logistics, of thinking big and dealing with detail – our task
is to create a framework in which everyone feels safe and
valued, where each has a creative freedom to find the
best version of themselves, and to work individually and
collectively towards a common vision.
Tomorrowland imagines an International Summit where
Profits and their delegates gather to discuss a vision
for our future – but it is one based on past and present
ideals of profit and greed, of consumerism and consumption,
of taking and not giving. They will be usurped – but
by who and by what?
This is not a question we can answer just now – but our
hope is that in June, 65 young people can, and will, and
we will see a vision of their future.
Andrew Siddall
Co-Artistic Director
Merete Elnan
Gunnar Horn
Odette Bereska
Sven Laude
Inês Gregório
Francesca Tissano
Head of the Department Visual Arts and Drama, University of Agder (NO)
Head of Theatre Mediation Programme (NO)
Literary Advisor (DE)
Artistic Advisor, Coordinator (DE)
Producer (PT)
Marketing Assistant (IT)
· 64
The delegates’ room
65

Imprint
\ ConnectUp The Lives of the Others
European Theatres for Young Audience
in a Union of Diversity, Magazine #1
Publisher
Editor
Layout & Design
Printed at
Dirk Neldner
Odette Bereska
sign-berlin.de
FLYERALARM GmbH (DE)
\ Picture Index:
University of Agder Jon-Petter Thorsen-Aptum,
Morten Torjussen
Assitej NO
Ingvild Lien
Dschungel Wien
Rainer Berson
Teatro O Bando
Rita Santana, Reiner Berson
FITEI
Jose Caldeira
Bialystok Puppet Theatre Michał Obrycki
Theatre Alfa
Mr. Chalupa, Jan SchÏbal,
Filip Nekola, Magdaléna
Součková, Tomáš Holomíček,
Václav Čtvrtník
Derby Theatre
Chris Webb
Ich bin O.K.
InTakt-Festival, Hesky
Puschner (UNgleich),
Markus Herdin
Landesbühnen Sachsen René Jungnickel,
Lisa Illgen (Workshop)
Pinklec
Žan Novosel, Davor Dokleja,
Tasjenka Žnidar
Ljubljana Puppet Theatre Mankica Kranjec,
Nada Žgank, Miha Fras
Teatro Elsinor
Giuseppe Distefano,
Luca Del Pia,
Manuela Capece
Theatr Genedlaethol Cymru Kirsten McTernan,
Kristina Banholzer
ConnectUp
Elisa Braun,
Johanna Malchow
My Notes
©ConnectUp ConnectUp is a European Theatre Network
supported by the European Commission. The views
expressed in this publication are only the views of the
authors. The Commission cannot be held responsible
for any use, which may be made of the information
contained therein.
Contact:
Odette Bereska
odette@connect-up.eu
· 66
67

Partners of ConnectUp
Universitet i Agder | NO
Landesbühnen Sachsen | DE
Lutkovno gledališče Ljubljana | SI
CZK Pinklec, Čakovec | HR
Białostocki Teatr Lalek | PL
Divadlo Alfa | CZ
Elsinor Centro Di Produzione Teatrale | IT
University / Theatre Derby | UK
Teatro O Bando I PT
Dschungel Wien | AT
Ich bin O.K. | AT
FITEI I PT
ASSITEJ Norge | NO
Theatr Genedlaethol Cymru | UK
www.uia.no
www.landesbuehnen-sachsen.de
www.lgl.si
www.czk-cakovec.hr
www.btl.bialystok.pl
www.divadloalfa.cz
www.elsinor.net
www.derbytheatre.co.uk
www.obando.pt
www.dschungelwien.at
www.ichbinok.at
www.fitei.com
www.assitej.no
www.theatr.cymru
www.connect-up.eu