Faustin Linyekula / Mamu Tshi (RDC/CH)

dance | duration 50 min
in French with Italian subtitles

c/o ZONA K, admission allowed upon 2024 membership

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Amandine Ngindu, a renowned krump dancer from Lausanne who goes by the stage name Mamu Tshi, met her Congolese compatriot Faustin Linyekula at Vidy. Together they traveled to the Kasai region to meet her grandmother, with whom she has no common language. In this danced portrait composed together upon their return, Mamu Tshi expresses herself through words and the restrained power of krump, reaching across the borders of her history.

With Mamu Tshi (Amandine Tshijanu Ngindu) Concept and choreography Faustin Linyekula, Mamu Tshi (Amandine Tshijanu Ngindu) Assistant director Angélique Tahé Music Twin Traxamus, Groupe folklorique Atandele (Kananga, DRC) Recorded voices Kaku Musambi Papa Ngindu Papa Mako Griot Tshimina Video Faustin Linyekula Zima Tukala Thanks to Aunt Pauline Bibomba and all the family in Kanyuka, DRC, Zima Tukala (yo moko oyebi), Victor Bafuafua, Sylvie Makela and the Salon Tribus Urbaines General director Veronique Kespi Lighting director Farid Deghou Boussad Sound director Luc Grandjean Stage director Christian Wilmart Production Anouk Luthier Production Théâtre Vidy-Lausanne with support from Studios Kabako (Kisangani, DRC) Support Arts and Humanities Division, New York University Abu Dhabi

photo by Sarah Imsand

Mamu Tshi Mamu Tshi was born in Congo, which she left at birth for Lausanne, where she lives and works today. Very early attracted to urban dance, she is today part of the world krump elite: in 2020 and 2021, she received the title of “dancer of the year” in this discipline. Freestyle dancing, powerful, expressive and liberating, is part of the street dance movement and is considered, among other things, as an artistic response to the systematic oppression of certain groups and the frustration that results from it. The battles, influenced by hip-hop and full of energy, are generally contested in public spaces by different crews. Mamu Tshi frequented urban dances for a long time before performing for the first time in 2019 at the Théâtre Sévelin 36 as part of the “Quarts d’Heure” – a platform for young choreographers. The same theater then invited her to develop her soloWomb: Entrailles as an “associated artist” for a creation in spring 2023. With her playL’Héritière, Mamu Tshi also completes the international trio Portraits in Otherness commissioned by Akram Khan Company for the tour in Switzerland (Steps festival). In parallel and with the collective “Swiss Krump Movement” and the Warriorz, pioneers of krump in Switzerland, she transmits this culture by organizing training and other community events. The lack of resources led her to initiate a project to include cultures and artistic practices from urban and underground environments in the Swiss cultural landscape, CAaUSE, entre d’Arts Alternatif et Urbain Suisse Émergent. At Vidy, she is a choreography assistant and performer in Sous influence by Nina Negri in 2021, and in 2024 she performs Mamu Tshi, Portrait pour Amandine in collaboration with Faustin Linyekula.

Dancer, choreographer and director, Faustin Linyekula lives and works in Kisangani (Democratic Republic of Congo). After literary and theatrical training in Kisangani, he moved to Nairobi in 1993 and in 1997 co-founded the first contemporary dance company in Kenya, the Gàara company. Returning to Kinshasa in June 2001, he set up a structure for dance and visual theater, a place for exchange, research and creation: Studios Kabako. With his company, Linyekula is the author of more than fifteen plays which have been presented on the biggest stages and festivals in Europe, North and South America, Australia and Africa. Among his collaborations are a production for the Comédie Française (Bérénice, 2009), a creation for the Ballet de Lorraine (La Création du monde 1923-2012, 2012), a solo for a dancer from the National Ballet of Portugal. Linyekula has also imagined performances for museums: the MOMA in New York (2012), the MUCEM in Marseille (2016), the Metropolitan Museum (2017) or the Royal Museum for Central Africa in Tervuren (2018). He teaches regularly in Africa and the United States. Linyekula received the Grand Prize from the Prince Claus Foundation for Culture and Development in 2007. Since 2007, Linyekula’s work and approach have been based in the city of Kisangani, where Kabako Studios supports the training, production and dissemination of young Congolese artists in the field of performing arts, but also video and music. In 2014, Linyekula and Kabako Studios received the first prize from the American CurryStone foundation for the work developed in Kisangani and in particular in the commune of Lubunga with the different communities. In 2016, as part of the Artista Na Cidade biennial, Linyekula was an associated artist of the city of Lisbon, from which he received the medal for artistic merit. From September 2018 and for three seasons, he was associated with the Manège – Scène nationale de Reims in France. In 2019 he was an associate artist of the Holland Festival in Amsterdam. At Vidy, he presented Congo, a trio for singer, actor and dancer based on the eponymous book by Éric Vuillard in 2019. The series of films by young African artists Lettres du continent, which he designed with Virginie Dupray during the pandemic in 2020, was presented by Vidy in the fall of 2020. In 21/22, he led the Imaginaires des futurs possibles cycle with the playwright Claire de Ribaupierre, an initiative bringing together artists, scientists and spectators proposed by Vidy and the Sustainability Center of the University of Lausanne. In 2024 he presents Mamu Tshi, Portrait pour Amandine.

source https://vidy.ch/en/

10 – Stagione Teatrale

10 – Theatrical Season
multidisciplinary season

Present / International / Participatory / Urban / Political / Game / Civic / Multimedia / Project / Device

10 keywords. 10 ways. 10 actions. 10 shows.

10 is round and double figure, the one of big occasions to be celebrated and balances to evaluated. These have been years of races, chases, discussions and question marks. Years in which we have experimented and dared. We assumed our liberties and shared them. We have met and gotten to know the neighbours of the district first and then the rest of the world. We have listened and translated different languages. We have gained confidence with new the technologies, the multimedia and the digital, conversed with computers and programmed smartphones, composed playlists and conceived new formats. We have invaded squares, streets and metro stops,  walked through peripheral streets and paths as well as looked at the world from above. We have seen dawns and sunrises just outside the city, played with kids and children and chased elderly in tights who believed themselves Superman. We have danced to German pop, the Catalan pasodoble and English rock. We almost founded a party. We fell in love numerous of times like all free girls.

The wish to understand, enter the issues, imagine and discover new ways of doing remains the same to what it was ten years ago. The world for us is yet to leaf, many urgencies to explore, many questions to verify even is often the answers fail to satisfy. And so we continue, always more confident that putting the people and their actions at the center of the projects is a way to listen to a thousand different perspectives and open new outlooks on the world which surrounds us. We are interested in the future. The next ten years. We have always liked challenges. We believe in the purity of the public and the coherence of our work, of which the vision is founded on the belief that artistic creation is an active lever and activator for the reflection and collective action on the social dynamics of contemporary life.  

The shows that we present are born and tell lived lives, experiences perhaps extreme, often far from the narration yelled from media and socials. At the base of the artistic research on the shows in programme we can always find a real date, a witness or a historical/scientific document, an urgency to recount. Because they are a set of small stories, daring gestures and controversial choices which make history. And this will continue to be our direction. 

10 – double and round figure – it opens already with a +1 to imagine a new decade, depict other worlds, every time more confident the the power of artistic pieces can transform into political action and impact our closest future.

RAZIONE K – BOX 2

The events of the second part of the 2021 RAZIONE K Emergency food kit for theatre addicts season

From 8 September 2021
THE WALKS
Rimini Protokoll (DE)
a Rimini Apparat production co-produced by ZONA K
[smartphone app]

21 September – 3 October 2021 h. 15.00 – 18.00  every 10′ [closed on Mondays]
FASE NOVE // Assolo Urbano
Ekin Bozkurt, Chiara Campara, Giulia Oglialoro, Riccardo Tabilio, Francesco Venturi (IT)
with Rimini Protokoll (DE)
a project by ZONA K and Casa degli Artisti
[urban walk] with departure from Casa degli Artisti

2 October 2021 h. 16.30
RADIO OLIMPIA, BOMBA LIBERA TUTT!
Collettivo MMM (IT)
[team performance game] c/o open square in Via Toce

20 – 31 October 2021
Vernissage 20 October h. 19.00
Tuesday – Sunday from h. 10.00 to 13.00 and from h. 15.00. to 20.00 [closed on Mondays]
GREETINGS FROM …
Marilyne Grimmer (FR)
[photographic exhibition]

5 – 7 November 2021 h. 20.00
#NUOVIPOVERI
Guinea Pigs (IT)
[show]

22 – 28 November 2021
LA SETTIMANA DELLE RESIDENZE DIGITALI
[shows and performances online]

26 November h. 20.00
27 November 2021 h. 17.00 and 20.00
THE OTHERS لخرین
Corps Citoyen (IT/TN)
[performance]

10 – 12 December 2021 h 20.00
CURVA CIECA
Muna Mussie (IT)
[performance]

RAZIONE K – BOX 1

The events of the first part of the 2021 RAZIONE K season

– Preview –
21 – 23 April 2021 h. 16.30
PROJECT AND DEVICE – traces of a multimedia theatre
for the HUMAN RIGHTS FESTIVAL
[digital column]

19 – 22 May 2021 TURIN / 15 – 19 June 2021 MILAN
PLAY ME (ORIGINS PROJECT)
a production ZONA K, creation CODICEFIONDA (IT)
dramaturgical advice Agrupación Señor Serrano (ES)
Turin c/o Palazzo del ‘900
Milan c/o ZONA K

13 – 14 July 2021 h. 21.45
THE MOUNTAIN
Agrupación Señor Serrano (ES)
presented in collaboration with and c/o Olida/Da vicino nessuno è normale

20 – 21 July 2021 h. 21.00
A CERTAIN VALUE
Anna Rispoli / Martina Angelotti (IT)
presented in collaboration with and c/o BASE

RAZIONE K
Emergency food kit for theatre addicted

Razione K was the food ration of American soldiers during World War II.

For us, the RAZIONE K is almost like a small but substantial survival ration, “light and compact”. It is about doing and giving what is necessary to stay alive but dosing resources and energy. It is calibrating our strengths and weights, to be really ready to start again in the light of the changes that every event of this magnitude brings with it.

It is a change of pace with respect to the past, the sign of an intermediate year between a before, very clear and defined, and an after still to be written. On the one hand, it is a transitional year that brings to a close projects that have already begun but have not yet been presented to the public. On the other hand, it presents new ideas, following up on the peculiarities that have distinguished us over the years: audience participation, urban performance, attention to the present and research into new languages in the field of live performance.

There are no more focuses but a part 1 and a part 2. Continuing the metaphor of Razione K: a lunch and a dinner, a first course and a second course, a box 1 and a box 2. A first part that is concentrated from April to July and a second part that starts again in September and includes the autumn/winter until the end of 2021.

The desire to reiterate the importance of sharing projects and ideas with other realities of the artistic and cultural scene in Milan remains firm. Never as in the past year and in the current one has the need for relations, perspective exchanges and comparison on the future been so important.This confirms the collaboration with DANAE/Teatro delle Moire, Olinda/Da vicino nessuno è normale, IntercettAzioni, BASE, Stratagemmi, the Cooperativa Sociale Stripes, Terzo Paesaggio.

On a national level, ZONA K is a partner of In-Situ Italia, a cultural consortium for art in public space created together with Indisciplinarte of Terni in collaboration with BASE Milan, Sardegna Teatro of Cagliari and Pergine Festival in Trentino. “In-Situ Italia” gathers the Italian partners of “In-Situ”, the European platform created in 2003 and which today counts 19 partners from 13 countries. In the four-year period 2020-2024, the Italian consortium will promote the networking of skills and resources, collaborating within the European project “(Un)Common Spaces”.

Moreover, from this year ZONA K is among the new partners who have joined the Call for Digital Residencies conceived and promoted by Centro di Residenza della Toscana (Armunia – CapoTrave/Kilowatt), in partnership with Associazione Marchigiana Attività Teatrali AMAT, the Cooperative Anghiari Dance Hub, ATCL Lazio for Spazio Rossellini, the Centre of Residency Emilia-Romagna (L’Arboreto Teatro Dimora di Mondaino – La Corte Ospitale), the Luzzati Foundation Teatro della Tosse in Genoa.

 

         

BOX 1 APRIL – JULY 2021                             BOX 2 SEPTEMBER – DECEMBER 2021

REALITY?

In the presentation of the Reality 2020 season we told our vision of reality that did not want to translate into a philosophical disquisition or a flattening on the spectacularization of contemporary media. It was a title that wanted to close a three-year period where ample space was given to artists who have done their research and art from the Theater of Reality. A three-year period that started with Power and continued with Economy in which we felt the need to analyze and interpret the present, always keeping an eye on the so-called reality data as a rudder that keeps the course despite the brazen and unrepentant political propaganda that does not fear neither the self-contradiction nor the explicit lie.

Of that season – which should have been structured in the Global, Human and Virtual focuses – we just had time to present the special event that went beyond the focus but which for us had the symbolic flavor of a first show that ZONA K brought into Casa degli Artisti.

Then everything, as for everyone, stopped. The companies were first warned, then put on stand by, and finally the shows were canceled. Suddenly our strength, our distinctive trait, our identity and consistency in design choices and consolidated international relationships have become our boomerang. How to keep up a season that would have included numerous European artists? How to reopen a space where the distancing measures force to have no more than 20 spectators? How to look beyond the obstacle to imagine and build a new reality?

The word “new” was enough to re-tune us and to start again from where we left off. If it is a new reality that we have to live, then our season can be called REALITY ?. The question mark not only closes a questioning sentence, but also summarizes the amazement, perplexity and ultimately the hope that this is not really a new world to be invented, but a phase, a parenthesis not to be archived and from which to start again.

We therefore start from the desire to find a new meaning to reality, new perspectives, new ways of enjoying culture thanks to a continuous comparison with some of the artists who have accompanied us most in recent years. Thus the new autumn season that has emerged continues the path started where possible and leaves much more space for those distinctive features that have characterized our work in past years: complex projects, urban performances, shows for a few spectators at a time, collaboration with theaters larger to accommodate artists who need the stage. The most important novelty is the desire to give more space and time to the shows in the season with, on our part, an important productive effort: many of the shows we offer are real productions and co-productions. It is a choice that was already in the making and that found a boost in the pandemic: to continue working on an annual season, but with even more our projects that are able to sustain a long life and that do not run out in the space of a few reruns. 

Events:

15 – 24 September 2020
UNDER COVID
Gianmarco Maraviglia
curated by Chiara Oggioni Tiepolo
[photographic exhibition]

FOCUS HUMAN

Last focus of the season, HUMAN offers performances that address the times of today by placing man and his rights, his strengths, his contradictions and sufferings at the centre. After the short century, which showed the brutality of humanity and also the ability to get involved again, what have we become? Who do we want to be?

Hobsbawn said that the 1900s had ended in a global disorder of an unclear nature and without a clear mechanism to end or control it. Are we facing the new twenties, with the naïve and glitzy consciousness of what is happening around us?

Will the homo sapiens, well defined and described by Harari, be able to make sense of the world he created? And understand global developments and distinguish the mistake from what is correct?

 

These, the shows of FOCUS VIRTUAL.

October – November
RIMINI PROTOKOLL (DE)
NIGHT SHIFT
[Travelling show]
A ZONA K production in collaboration with Casa degli Artisti

c/o places in the city

 

22 – 23 October
BABILONIA TEATRI (IT)
GIULIO
[show]

c/o ZONA K

 

12 – 13 November
M. Anderson, I. Kralj THEATRE GIGANTE – A. Renda TEATRO DELLE ALBE /RAVENNA TEATRO (U.S.A/IT)
IN THE BELLY OF THE BEAST
[show]

c/o ZONA K

 

28 – 29November
AGRUPACIÓN SEÑOR SERRANO (ES)
THE MOUNTAIN
[multimedia show]
A ZONA K co-production presented in collaboration with Olinda Onlus

c/o TeatroLaCucina

 

26 – 29 novembre

CONVENTION
At the end of not only the year but also of the three-year period and of a path that until today has led us to invite the most representative names of that genre defined Theatre of reality, we will dedicate two days to a convention of reflection and comparison on what future prospects they are outlined in the relationship and in the action of the theatre on reality.
An important opportunity to take stock of the current situation in Europe but also to open up new questions and questions. For the occasion, some of the artists hosted over the years and the operators and critics most sensitive to the topic will be invited.

c/o ZONA K and other places in the city

 

Discover the entire programme of the Theatre Season 2020 REALITY

 

Photo ©Rocco Rorandelli / TerraProject

FOCUS VIRTUAL

In the present, increasingly built on virtual reality, augmented reality, reality shows and fake news, a reflection dedicated to virtual reality could not miss. How much does the immersive experience, now increasingly rampant, allow us to deepen our reality or is it reduced to a simple act of gamification?

Some studies argue that virtual reality can be interpreted as a machine of empathy capable of making us experience different and difficult situations. Is there a difference between policemen who wear VR to imagine themselves as criminals and spectators who virtually experience the violence suffered by migrants? Is there a precise boundary between reality and fiction?

 

These, the shows of FOCUS VIRTUAL.

cancelled
SILKE HUYSMANS & HANNES DEREERE | CAMPO (BE)
PLEASANT ISLAND
[multidisciplinary documentary theatre]
presented in collaboration with Fattoria Vittadini

c/o Fattoria Vittadini

 

postposed
MAMMALIAN DIVING REFLEX (Canada)
THE LAST MINUTES BEFORE MARS
[multimedia perfomance]
A project of ZONA K and FOG Triennale Milano Performing Arts

c/o ZONA K

 

13 + 14 and 16 + 17, and from 20 to 24 May
CODICEFIONDA (IT)
PLAY ME (Origins Project)
A ZONA K production
[one-to-one performance]

c/o ZONA K

 

Discover the complete programme of Theatre Season 2020 REALITY

 

pic. by © Michele Borzoni / TerraProject

FOCUS GLOBAL

The FOCUS is canceled, according to the regional ordinance of 04/03/20.
All the shows are postponed.

Reality tells us that we live in the era of globalisation, made up of incredible potential and ease, despite the economic, political and social distortions that always accompany the great passages. The difficulty of finding new ethical codes, different ways of living together and distributing wealth is answered with closure, anachronistic nationalisms, fear. Is there a possible way?

If globalisation implies the development of different transnational lifestyles, is Ulrich Beck right when he says that “to survive you need a cosmopolitan realism”?

These, the shows of FOCUS GLOBAL.

 

postponed
VALTERS SĪLIS (LT)
BEING A NATIONALIST
[show]

c/o ZONA K

 

postponed
GUINEA PIGS (IT)
#NUOVIPOVERI
[show]

c/o ZONA K

 

postponed
ROGER BERNAT / FFF (ES)
NO CONVERSATIONS OF INTEREST ARE RECORDED
[show]

c/o ZONA K

 

Discover the program of the theatre season 2020 REALITY.

 

photo  ©Simone Donati / TerraProject

 

ROGER BERNAT/FFF (ES)

The show is canceled, according to the regional ordinance of 04/03/20 and will be rescheduled.

FOCUS: GLOBAL

Catalan director Roger Bernat returns to ZONA K for the 2020 REALITY Theatre Season with a show that is about a highly topical theme.

In 2012, some inhabitants of Ceuta left their families to go to Syria. During the weeks that they were in Turkey and Damascus, they called their relatives regularly. The police tapped their phones and all recorded conversations were subsequently included in the dossier of the trial that took place in Madrid. The verdict was the conviction of eleven people for participation in the recruitment network of the Islamic State. It was the first trial in Spain against the collaborators of the Islamic State. The dossier is the heart of this show: an immersion not only in words of the suicide bombers but also of the people close to them, the translators, the police and the judges who followed the interceptions.

Three actresses read or repeat the telephone conversations of Samra, Sanae and Nayua, wives of three jihadists who immolated themselves in Syria during summer 2012. Their conversations are simultaneous. The audience, equipped with a 3-channel wireless headphone, must navigate through words to reconstruct the facts, as did the secret services a few years earlier. At the end of the show, no two spectators will have listened to the same conversation.

 

________________________
c/o ZONA K

To participate you must send a request for the annual membership within the day before the show, click HERE to do it NOW

Info: show • duration 60 min. • in Italian

Standard ticket: 15€ – Students/under 26/over 65/gruppi: 10€

Part of the subscription shows
________________________

 

Performers: Silvia Calderoni, Matilde Facheris, Woody Neri and Giulia Salvarani, video design, technical direction and assistant director: Txalo Toloza, sound: Cristóbal Saavedra Vial, graphics: Marie-Klara González, general coordination: Helena Febrés Fraylich, coordination in Morocco: Arts I Love and Ahmed Hammoud, thanks to: DABATEATR (Rabat), Daha-Wassa (Rabat), Laura Gutiérrez, Toni Serra, JMBerenguer and Txiki Berraondo, show produced by Elèctrica Produccions (Barcelona), MUCEM (Marseille), Marche Teatro (Ancona ), Triennale Teatro dell’Arte (Milan), Festival Grec 2017 (Barcelona) and Temporada Alta (Girona), with the help of Les Bancs Publics / Les Rencontres à l’échelle (Marseille)

 

Roger Bernat, a Catalan artist and director, after having started his architecture and painting studies, studied dramaturgy and direction at the Institut del Teatre in Barcelona where he graduated in 1996, winning the extraordinary recognition. In the early years he worked as a director, playwright and performer with the General Elèctrica company which he directs together with Tomás Aragay. In 2008 he founded Roger Bernat/FFF and begins to create performances in which the audience takes the stage and becomes the protagonist. “Spectators are immersed in a device that invites them to obey or conspire, and in any case to pay with their own bodies and commitment.” The first participatory performance is Domini Públic (2008), followed by Pura Coincidencia (2009), La consagración de la Primavera (2010), Please continue (Hamlet) (2011), Pendiente de voto (2012), RE-presentation: Numax (2013), Desplazamiento del Palacio de la Moneda (2014), Numax-Fagor-plus (2014), We need to talk (2015), No se registran conversaciones de interés (2016-17) and The place of the Thing (2017 ).

 

 

FOCUS GLOBAL

VALTERS SĪLIS (LV)

The show is canceled, according to the regional ordinance of 23/02/20 and will be rescheduled.

FOCUS: GLOBAL

In the 2020 Theatre Season REALITY comes the new creation of the Latvian director Valter Sīlis, Being a nationalist. It was written by the dramaturg Matīss Gricmanis. It is inspired by Gricmanis’ personal experience as an assistant to a well-known nationalist member of the Latvian Parliament.

What and who is part of the world of a nationalist today? Do the interests of the state or their own interests win? How do you measure friends and who are the patriots?

In the world of a nationalist, the interests of the state are more important than its own. Friends are like-minded people, and they don’t care about small everyday problems or world affairs. The enemies are many, but they are well known. True values ​​are about to rise once again, despite the fact that in today’s materialistic world they have lost their value. But Sīlis tells us that to live in this world full of challenges, one must first wake up in order to change one’s reality.

________________________
c/o ZONA K
To participate you must send a request for the annual membership within the day before the show, click HERE to do it NOW

Info: show • duration 90 min. • in Latvian with subtitles in Italian

Standard tickets: 15 € – Students/under 26/over 65/groups: 10 €

Part of the subscription shows

________________________

 

Written by: Matīss Gricmanis, direction: Valters Sīlis with: Jānis Kronis, Āris Matesovičs, Ance Strazda, scene: Uģis Bērziņs; light: Lauris Johansons, production: Dirty Deal Teatro

 

Matīss Gricmanis is a writer and a playwright who writes for theatre, cinema and television. From a young age he worked in politics, later conveying his experience in stage writing. In 2018 he won the contest of the new Versmė drama festival of the Lithuanian National Drama Theatre with his show “Narrow Margins of a Normative Lifestyle”, based on the diaries of a homosexual who lived during the Latvian Soviet regime. Valters Sīlis is one of the most important directors of the Baltic scene. In his work he always pays particular attention to the complexity of the human experience, bringing the most marginal and vulnerable individuals in the foreground.

FOCUS GLOBAL

REALITY

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The season REALITY as it was planned and presented in February 2020 has been cancelled as per the regional order of 04/03/20. The season has been rescheduled as REALITY?.

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You don’t want to do a philosophical analysis of realism, neo-realism, modernity and post-modernism.
Neither simplify an English word that by now has entered the common Italian vocabulary and sees Reality only and solely linked to show.

For us, Reality is simply, and perhaps trivially, the reality. That reality which keeps us anchored to the present day, to its observation, to its analysis, to its interpretation. It is the reality of the facts, the matter of reality, which we believe to exist despite the disorientation caused by the overload of information, despite the spread of “fake news”, despite shameless political propaganda that fears neither self-contradiction nor the explicit lie.

It is that reality that in 2018, with the rise of populist movements and a new form of power that disdained knowledge but was built on communication, made us think of Power. That same reality that the following year with Economy led us to turn our gaze to the economic world, its excesses and its distortions.

And it is always the reality that, at the end of the three-year period with Reality, takes the place of honour and, after two years of glossy and metaphorical images, invade with its power, as a quick overview of global reality. An overview that questions the meaning of the world and would like to be “cosmopolitan” following the thought of the German sociologist Ulrich Beck who spoke of the need for a “daily look, vigilant at history, reflective, which arises in an environment in which borders, differences and cultural contradictions vanish […] “.

GLOBAL, VIRTUAL and HUMAN are the three focuses that accompany the season, keys of interpretation to explore the current framework of contemporary society. Three focuses and not four as in previous years, to give more unity and coherence to the autumn programme and to allow a longer holding of some shows.

At the closing, not only of the year but also of the three-year period and of a path that until today has led us to invite the most representative names of that genre defined Theatre of reality, we will dedicate two days to a convention of reflection and discussion on how we view the future of the theatre in relation to the reality.

An important opportunity to take stock of the current situation in Europe but also to bring up new issues and questions. For the occasion, we’ll invite some of the artists we hosted over the years, and the representatives and critics that are the most sensitive to this topic.

 

SPECIAL EVENT
15 February 2020
WIM VANDEKEYBUS/ULTIMA VEZ (BE)
GO FIGURE OUT YOURSELF
[dance performance]
presented in collaboration with and c/o Casa degli Artisti

 

FOCUS GLOBAL 27 February – 22 March 2020

27 – 28 February 2020
VALTERS SĪLIS (LV)
BEING A NATIONALIST
[show]

14 – 15 March 2020
GUINEA PIGS (IT)
#NUOVIPOVERI
[show]

21 – 22 March 2020
ROGER BERNAT / FFF (ES)
NESSUNA CONVERSAZIONE DEGNA DI RILIEVO
[show with headset]

 

FOCUS VIRTUAL 2 APRIL – 17 May 2020

2 – 3 April 2020
SILKE HUYSMANS & HANNES DEREERE | CAMPO (BE)
PLEASANT ISLAND
[multidisciplinary theatre documentary]
presented in collaboration with Fattoria Vittadini c/o Spazio Fattoria

22 – 24 May 2020
MAMMALIAN DIVING REFLEX (Canada)
THE LAST MINUTES BEFORE MARS
[multimedia performance]
a ZONA K and FOG Triennale Milano Performing Arts project

13 – 14 and 16 – 17 May 2020
CODICEFIONDA (IT)
PLAY ME (Origins Project)
[multimedia performance]
A ZONA K project

 

FOCUS HUMAN Octobre – Novembre 2020

start October – end November 2020
RIMINI PROTOKOLL (DE)
TURNO DI NOTTE
[travelling urban performance]
A  ZONA K project in collaboration with Casa degli Artisti
c/o places in the city

22 – 23 October 2020
BABILONIA TEATRI (IT)
GIULIO
[show]

12 – 13 Novembre 2020
M. Anderson, I. Kralj THEATRE GIGANTE (USA) and
A. Renda TEATRO DELLE ALBE /RAVENNA TEATRO (IT)
IN THE BELLY OF THE BEAST
[show]

28 – 29 Novembre 2020
AGRUPACIÓN SEÑOR SERRANO (ES)
THE MOUNTAIN
[multimedia show]
A ZONA K co-production presented in collaboration with Olinda Onlus
c/o TeatroLaCucina

Novembre 2020
CONVENTION

 

The artists in residence during 2020 are:
Anna Serlenga (IT)
Guinea Pigs (IT)
Muna Mussie (IT)
Yan Duyvendak (CH)
Mats Staub (DE)
Michele Losi (IT)
+ the winner of the IntercettAzioni contest 2020

 

photo ©Michele Borzoni / TerraProject

 

The season REALITY is a ZONA K project – Subject of regional relevance of the Lombardy region – With support of MIBACT Ministero dei beni e delle attività culturali e del turismo, ORA! Compagnia di San Paolo – With the patronage of the Comune di Milano, the Belgian embassy in Rome, Istituto Cervantes Milano, Goethe Institut, Italian embassy in Canada – In collaboration with Casa degli Artisti, Fattoria Vittadini, Triennale Milano, Olinda, Stratagemmi, Mare culturale urbano, Claps Circuito Lombardia Arti Performative, Industria Scenica, Teatro delle Moire, Milano Musica – Communication partner: Profili, Neo Studio

 

Claudio Tolcachir (AR)

For the first time in Italy, Próximo, the latest creation by Claudio Tolcachir, founder of the Timbre4 Company of Buenos Aires, considered the most interesting director and playwright in contemporary theatre.

Próximo tells the story of a long-distance love affair experienced by two young people who in reality never meet, but only talk to each other and see each other through PCs and smartphones. One is Spanish, from Madrid; the other Argentinean, from Australia. The audience becomes witnesses of the birth and construction of this love, made of words, silences and emotions filtered through a technological device. The show therefore recounts the experience of being far from everything but, at the same time, that of living the most intense emotions of a life without a physical presence, births, deaths, love, sex. And it investigates all the possibilities and limits of a relationship built on skype connection in times of hyper-communication where talking about love seems to be an act of resistance.

On Friday 22nd November, after the performance, Claudio Tolcachir and the company meet the audience in a chat moderated by Sara Chiappori (La Repubblica).

A ZONA K and Teatro Franco Parenti project

 

Theatrical performance in Spanish with Italian subtitles
c/o Franco Parenti Theatre, via Pierlombardo 14 Milan

 

text and direction Claudio Tolcachir with Santi Marín, Lautaro Perotti lights Ricardo Sica scenes Sofia Vicini costumes Cinthia Guerra organisation Teatro TIMBRe 4 production Jonathan Zak, Maxime Seuge

 

Go to INTERPRETATION WORKSHOP FOR PROFESSIONAL ACTORS with Claudio Tolcachir

EUROPA! EUROPA!

EUROPA! EUROPA! is the common thread running through the season. We must talk about Europe today. We feel it is more essential than ever to devote an entire year to a theme that affects us all closely and is redefining new political, economic, social and cultural geographies. We, who were born in Europe, who grew up with the idea, with the ideal of Europe, think it is right to talk about it again, and again, despite or precisely because it is at a fragile and complex moment. And we want to talk about that Europe which was born from the war, which grew up with the ideals of democracy, which is immobilized in the face of new scenarios that are difficult to predict, in the language that belongs to us.

We want to follow the flow of celebrations, anniversaries and commemorations – the so-called English re-enactments – that mark our time and our memory, but also imagine and invent possible scenarios. Because from Europe we have internalized the open borders, the cultural routes, the possible networks, and we can no longer do without them.

WAR, DEMOCRACY, URBAN and NOW will be the focuses that will decline our idea of Europe, today that Brexit is a reality, that populism is at the gates and with it thousands of people. The challenge is open, with all the risks that this entails.

With the 2017 edition, ZONA K’s theatre and multidisciplinary season reaches its 5th year of activity. An important anniversary for an activity that has grown fast, so fast that every now and then it overwhelms and surprises even us. An anniversary that we are happy to celebrate also thanks to the Sandra Angelini Prize awarded by Retecritica for the Best Organizational Project 2016.And thanks to the collaborations with old and new friends that this year allow us to realize a truly extraordinary season: C.L.A.P.Spettacolodalvivo, Danae Festival, la Casa della Memoria, Olinda, Stanze and Triennale Teatro dell’Arte.

 

 

 

 

ECONOMY

This is the era of the “globalization of the world”, with a single worldwide market. The capitalization success on a global scale affirms that such a big economic revolution never existed.

However this system needs to take in consideration the three problematic phenomena that it may bring: inequity, instability and the environmental cost. These consequently may bring to an ecology crisis, globalization, consumes and social inequality.

According to the capacity or incapacity to get to a solution of the three critical factors, however, it seems incontrovertible that economic growth is a prerequisite to reach a more equal income distribution, given a stability to the system and a full respect for the environment.

“How would you then favor an economic growth that is both durable and sustainable?”

In 2018 the Nobel Prize for the Economy was assigned to Nordhaus and Romer, for their studies that highlight a strong relationship between macroeconomic trends, climate change and new technology. They also bring to the light the contradictions in the capitalism paradigm, underlining the necessity of political decisions in the long hall.

In 2019, with our seasonal theater, we decided to aim our goal into the economic world, to all access and distortion caused by money, to the society influenced by it, to the rebellious and victimized environment, to the technological innovation producing both economic development and social implosions.

ECONOMY is our answer to a complicated science of development models we superficially know and to a present moving so fast we can’t keep up with.

Four focuses, MONEY, SOCIETY, ECOLOGY and TECHNOLOGY. These are four aspects that we retain to be closely related to the interpretation of international artists and Italians that, like us, do not stop questioning the present.

In addition, the year 2019 strengthens the collaborations with numerous urban realities. A further confirmation of the strong necessity for a shared cultural economy. Therefore, the relationships between Teatro delle Moire/Danae Festival, Triennale Teatro dell’Arte, Teatro Franco Parenti, Stanze – esperienze di teatro d’appartamento, Olinda/TeatroLaCucina, Stratagemmi/Prospettive Teatrali, Laboratorio Lapsus, mare culturale urbano e Fattoria Vittadini are confirmed.

 

 

 

FOCUS MONEY

The cost of money, rating, interest taxes, inflation, deflation, investments, stock market trading, bitcoin …

Financial inclusion passes also from literacy. In Nepal – where approximately 18% of the population is completely excluded from the banking system – Prakash Koirala provides financial education services to inform, involve, motivate and promote responsibility among consumers towards financial independence and discipline.

Would it be necessary to do this elsewhere too?

Today the most recent statistics state that 62% of the wealthiest individuals in the world possess the same wealth as the poorest half of the planet and the global economy gurus imagine a “globalization” 4.0 in favor of a more human-centric growth, more sustainable, more inclusive.

With what means and instruments?

A focus MONEY and four shows that discuss money are our answer. Four different ways to tackle a complex theme from different perspectives.

 

22 – 23 February 2019
KALEIDER (UK)
The Money
[performance]

5 March 2019
Money makes happiness
curated by Q Code Mag
[meeting]

15 – 16 March 2019
MAURO PESCIO (IT)
Mio cugino (limited edition)
[show]

22 – 23 March 2019
ONTROEREND GOED (BE)
£¥€$ (Lies)
[performance]

31 March 2019
CHRISTOPHE MEIERHANS (CH/BE)
Trials of Money (preliminary hearing)
[performance]

 

 

 

Christophe Meierhans (CH/BE)

Can the money we use on a daily basis be held responsible for the bleak state of the world today? What would it mean to hold it accountable for its actions? Trials of Money challenges the idea that money is just a tool or a means, and treats it as a complex being, a “semi-human” entity that has acquired an autonomous operation and escapes the control of the men who use it.

This new version of the performance is based on the collected testimonies of nine witnesses: an ex-banker, a Suisse National Bank employee, a homeless man, a wealthy philanthropist, a Native American, an economics professor, a kibbutz resident, and a criminologist. It invites the public to take part in the actions of a fictitious court, conducted as a collective exercise where all present freely assume the position of prosecution or defense, based on their beliefs and influenced by the proceedings.

Can money actually be tried before a human tribunal? And if the defendant is ultimately found guilty, what should be the appropriate sentence?

WORLD PREMIERE
Conference Show – in Italian

A project ZONA K and Stanze
“Show realized within the project Teen Time.”

 

Concept and direction: Christophe Meierhans Performer: Christophe Meierhans, Luca Mattei Dramaturgy: Bart Capelle With the participation of: Shila Anaraki, Jochen Dehn, Adva Zakai Set design: Decoratelier Jozef Wouters Decor: Giammarco Falcone Light saber microphones: Alexis Pawlak, Gaia Carabillo Costumes: Sofie Durnez, Valerie Le Roy Lighting design: Luc Schaltin Monetary consultant: Olivier Auber Production: HIROS, Elisa Demarré Co-production: AUAwirleben (Bern), BIT Teatergarasjen (Bergen), BUDA (Kortrijk), FAR° (Nyon), Kaaitheater (Brussels), Nouveau Théâtre de Montreuil (Paris), Teatro Maria Matos (Lisbon), Vooruit (Gent), ZONA K (Milan) With the support of: Vlaamse Gemeenschap, ProHelvetia

 

Christophe Meierhans (Geneva; Brussels) works with and through performance, public space, installation, sound, music and video. His work consists mainly in developing strategies of intervention in everyday life, through the manipulation of accepted conventions, social habits or simple customs. Fragments of reality become the frame for artistic operations that can redirect banality in order to make it reappear under unexpected angles. His work raises questions about norms and conventions, confusing a random context with different ones, and confronting the viewer with something else, with the strangeness of being in the “wrong” place, or the possibility that the place may become something else.

FOCUS SOCIETY

Already in the 1930s, Keyens sustained that the true challenge that needs to be overcome is the reconnection of economy and society in an intelligent and non regressive manner.

After a century and another devastating economic crisis, it is understandable to wonder if a mediation between the modernizing push of progress and the needs of society is still possible.

The populist movements of today – whether guided from above or born spontaneously from the bottom – embody a diffused indisposition that contests blocked social hierarchies, as well as stationary social elevators, concentration of richness that is increasingly evident and that no longer allows for the possibility of the acquisition of well being and security in the same way it was assured in the past.

Nonetheless in a panorama so desolating and confused, the voices of those reclaiming the humanistic side of the economy, a social science that needs to occupy itself with the wellbeing of man in the “interest of stability and social justice”, are not missing.

The focus crosses various visions – ironic, disillusioned, worried – of today’s society, that is founded on economy and in which you’ll drown.

 

5 May 2019
KTO THEATRE (PL)
Peregrinus
[itinerant performance]

21 – 22 May 2019
BABILONIA TEATRI (IT)
Calcinculo
[show]

24 – 25 May2019
ANNIE DORSEN (USA)
Spokaoke
[performance]

28 – 29 May 2019
LA BALLATA DEI LENNA (IT)
Human animal. Liberamente tratto da “il re e pallido” di D.F. Wallace
[show]

 

 

 

FOCUS TECHNOLOGY

On the date of December 31, 1982, Isaac Asimov wrote in the Toronto Star newspaper. He narrated about how the world would have been in 2019. The focus being on if humanity will have survived a nuclear war, or how technology and IT innovation would have radically changed our way of living and working. The people of 2019 would have just been working on developing and studying implications of Artificial Intelligence and its applications.

Surely, for so many aspects he was right. Nowadays, AI is already part of our reality: domotic or home automation, siri, autonomous vehicles, robots. Are all of these simply tools that can guarantee people more free time and freedom or could they become dangerous antagonists of humankind in a near future? Is it possible that a machine develops wishes and could be looking for its own power or to substitute its own creator?

Scientists and experts are divided, some see such dangers as very probable, while others as not possible. We are not taking a position on this, but we are focusing on how smart technologies are already significantly affecting our life and how we interface with the world.

Is it all just about economic benefits, simplifications, working opportunities not possible before? Or should we also account for the fact that, under the surface of the friendly AI, there are hidden algorithms that already control the vast majority of the global financial transactions……social networks, news credibility, our world vision, as well as the mood – positive or negative – of billions of human beings, that can forecast human behavior and, based on such data, send out personalized promotional ads, manipulate minds, suggest actions to humans unaware of it all” (Luca De Biase)?

 

8 – 10 November 2019
ZONA K, CODICEFIONDA + AGRUPACIÓN SEÑOR SERRANO
PLAY ME (ORIGINS PROJECT)
[performance]

22 – 24 November 2019
CLAUDIO TOLCACHIR (AR)
PRÓXIMO
A ZONA K and Teatro Franco Parenti project
[show] c/o Teatro Franco Parenti

SPECIAL RESIDENCES TECH

• 21 – 22 November 2019
  CINZIA PIETRIBIASI (IT)
  PADRE D’AMORE PADRE DI FANGO
  [show]
• 29 – 30 November 2019
  KOKOSCHKA REVIVAL (IT)
  YOU FIGHT!
  [show]
• 6 – 10 December 2019
  IMAGINOMETRIC SOCIETY(IT)
  THE MILAN EXPERIMENT
  [performance] c/o Sala delle adunanze dell’Istituto Lombardo, via Brera 28 

 

FOCUS CITIES

What role do cities play today? Open, cosmopolitan, incubators of better tomorrows, memories of past cultures, grounds for ecological and social challenges? Or chaotic, closed, provincial even if European, an example of non-integration, uniform and without poetry? The roads are different, they overlap, they run parallel to remind us that it is we who determine the places we live.

And so we are returning to focus on cities, not only as symbols of economic and political power but above all as examples of the richness of Italy’s cultural heritage and the diversity of its urban fabric. And we want to re-appropriate this heritage: by invading spaces, marking landscape maps, building connections, and inhabiting places that are often unknown. Let us once again come out into the open in an unusual and necessary way.

 

Events:

5 – 7 October 2018 h. 20.00
OHT (IT)
PROJECT MERCURY – Performance n°3
[performance]

9 October 2018 h. 18.30
Biscardini, Pertot, Rollo and Scirocco
MILAN BETWEEN PAST AND FUTURE
[meeting with projection]

14 October 2018 h. 20.00
ELEONORA PIPPO (IT)
GIRLS IN MILAN ARE LOSING CONTROL. Society fears them. The end is blue.
[performance]

20 – 21 and 24 – 28 October 2018 h. 16.00
DOM – (IT)
THE MAN WHO WALKS
[urban walk]
A project ZONA K and Danae Festival

24 – 25 November 2018 h. 11.30 and h. 15.00
DANCE MAKERS (IT)
LONG-LASTING LANDSCAPES – Itineraries of urban choreography
[performance]
A project ZONA K and Stanze

 

 

FOCUS DEMOCRACY

In 1988, Gorbachev saw in the Great European House, founded on democratic values even before economic values, the idea and the direction to be followed for the construction of a great European continent.

Thirty years later, the great expectations seem to have imploded and the new ‘great sickness’ is increasingly the victim of populist attacks.

How many ‘exits’ await us? Is this then the result of democracy?

There are those who say that voting no longer leads to anything, that power now lies elsewhere, in the upper echelons of the economic powers. There are those who believe, instead, that it is still possible to make a difference. Demographic and sociological analyses show that the categories most at risk (the poor, the unemployed, the elderly) are the most distant from the ballot box, and that the spread of democracy is leading to an ever-widening economic gap in society.

So where does democracy lie? In complex bureaucratic institutions with no direct relationship with the citizens, but who nonetheless adorn themselves with the name of representatives of the people, or in the voice of new nationalist and revanchist barkers with no vision of the future?

“Tocqueville said: “To go forward, one must learn to look far. We want to try to look far ahead, with the disruptive force that only the artistic imagination can have. We want to seek affinities, accept changes, broaden our view by testing alternatives that are more or less possible in view of the future, not only the immediate future, but also the more distant future.

 

 

The events:

17 – 18 March 2017 h. 20.30
SOME USE FOR YOUR BROKEN CLAY POTS
Christophe Meierhans (CH/BE)
[performance]

17 – 30 March 2017 h. 10.00 – 19.00 (Mon – Fri)
Poster(s) from pro-EU/anti-Brexit campaing!
Wolfgang Tillmans
[photo exhibition]

19 March 2017 h. 18.30
LA POLITICA E’ REALE?
[incontro con aperitivo ]

19 March 2017 h. 20.30
NO55 ASH AND MONEY di NO99 (EE)
[film]

from 23 March every Thursday until 15 June 2017 h. 20.30
EUROPA A DOMICILIO/HOME VISIT EUROPE
di Rimini Protokoll (DE/CH)
[theatrical board game for 15 spectators c/o private houses]
In collaboration with STANZE .

29 – 30 March 2017 h. 20.30
INTIME FREMDE di Welcome Project (DE)
[show]

 

 

Eventi KIDS

19 March 2017 h. 11.00
THE MOVIE BAND La democrazia si fa musica
organised by ZONA K with Francesca Badalini and Monica Galassi
[workshop 4 – 7 years]

26 March 2017 at 17.00
EUROPA A DOMICILIO/HOME VISIT EUROPE
by Rimini Protokoll (Haug/Kaegi/Wetzel) (DE/CH)
[theatrical board game for 15 people – 11<14 years + adults c/o private houses]
In collaboration with STANZE 

 

 

STAGIONE
Archivio

Tutte le compagnie ospitate durante le prime tre edizioni di PLAY-K(ei)
le trovi cliccando QUI

ZONA K thanks you!

We would like to thank everyone who took part in the 2013/2014 PLAY-K(ei) season.

The 2013/2014 edition was even more extended and richer in events, marked by synergies with similar external realities, generating definitions such as “crossing over”.  ZONA K, with PLAY-K(ei) 13/14, has collaborated with Danae Festival and with the nearby Teatro del Buratto/TerzoPaesaggio; with Apache/Teatro Litta it has shared the care of two companies that have tackled the stages of both theatres. PLAY-K(ei) 13/14 also hosted a stage of the Festival Play With Food, by Cuochivolanti from Turin, as well as performances by the Qui e Ora and delleAli companies with whom ZONA K shares the important project on new audiences Coltivare Cultura, supported by the CARIPLO Foundation.

PLAY-K(ei) has chosen the motto WHERE ARE YOU? A question that makes concrete the horizon we are looking at: in which historical moment are we? What is happening far away from us, and not only within our borders?
The season was also marked by the building of bridges across borders: within PLAY-K(ei) there was a path dedicated to Europe and the current historical moment, this year all focused on the Balkans on the occasion of the entry of Croatia into the EU.

These are the guest companies in the second interdisciplinary season of PLAY-K(ei): Mala Kline, Oliver Frljic, Codice Ivan, inQuanto teatro, Dehors/Audelà, Cascina Barà, Luca Camilletti, Roberto Capaldo, Anna Serlenga, Sonenalé and La Ballata dei Lenna, Tommaso Arosio/Fedra Boscaro, Silvia Girardi, Cesare Malfatti, Tiziano Popoli and Vincenzo Vasi, Michel Donedà and the Takla Improvising Group, Qui e Ora and delleAli.

PLAY-K(ei) 13/14 has obtained the patronage of the Consulate General of the Republic of Slovenia in Milan and the Consulate General of the Republic of Croatia. It also requested the patronage of the Municipality of Milan and the Lombardy Region.
The Coltivare Cultura project, realised in collaboration with the Qui e Ora and delleAli theatrical residencies, was selected for the CARIPLO Foundation’s call for proposals for new audiences.

Mala Kline’s show was presented in collaboration with Danae Festival.

PLAY-K(ei) is a project by ZONA K, with the artistic direction of Valentina Kastlunger, Valentina Picariello, Sabrina Sinatti.

Media partner: Vivi Milano