ekscene INTERNATIONAL AND INTERDISCIPLINARY DISTRIBUTION AND PRODUCTION COLLABORATION CYCLE
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TRANSWARP GO OUT AND PLAY
2011-2013 PLATFORM FOR PRESENTING ARTWORKS BY CROATIAN AND INTERNATIONAL PERFORMING ARTISTS
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Experimental Free Scene | Trpimirova 15 | 10 000 Zagreb, Croatia | www.ekscena.hr | ekscena@gmail.com
ekscene
ekscene is an independent organization founded in 2001, with the aim of promoting and affirming contemporary dance and other forms of performing arts. Our open organizational model and our working mode, which presupposes horizontal decision making and sharing responsibility, aims at motivating artists to create new themes according to their own interests and needs. Through its Working Platform, ekscene organizes workshops, residencies, auditions, lectures, and presentations, supports the realization of artistic projects, and creates and coordinates various projects, be it alone or in collaboration with other artists, associations, and organizations in the field of culture. By initiating its own programmes and projects, or collaborating in others, ekscene seeks to emphasize the importance of developing the performing arts, both within the cultural context and within the civil society in general. By defining its working model as an open, self-service platform, and by offering the necessary working conditions and the right setting for a smooth circulation of information between the performing artists, ekscene has largely shaped the independent dance scene in Croatia during the period since its foundation and established itself as one of the most relevant Croatian and regional organizations with the aim of developing and promoting contemporary dance beyond its institutional framework. By bringing together prominent artists, artistic organizations and initiatives in dance, as well as structuring the axis of its work around the collaboration programme policy, with a focus on the processes of redefining the position of independent performing scene within the framework of official cultural policies, ekscene has been working on the affirmation of the right to public artistic activity for the sake of its members, and answering to their need of having adequate working conditions, as well as adequate presentation, promotion, and distribution of their work. In this way, ekscene has created the conditions for collaborative education, manifold artistic production, international distribution, partnership, and interdisciplinary collaboration, thus securing an adequate setting for selfsustainable and continued artistic practice in the future. By reflecting on the conditions of dance education and production, and self-referring to their methods, practices, and strategies of work within the field of dance, the new generation of Croatian dance artists have raised a number of topical questions related to contemporaneity and its substitutes in the post-transitional cultural framework. The dance process is oriented towards issues that are linked to the very propositions and goals of production within the turbulent structural changes; it extends to the context that goes beyond the reality of dance as such, thus becoming a platform for acting within a broader cultural and social context. Evaluating ekscene’s work in the framework of the newly established situation of temporary normalization has created the need of repositioning the production strategies and restructuring them into new forms of self-organized activity, which might take over the visionary role in the ways of defining the scene and its collaboration policies in the future.
In the period from 2001-2009, ekscene realized the following programmes through its Working Platform: EPDS, ARP, WARP, Collegii Saltati, frappe, TRIATLON, TRANSWARP, CENTAR2, FAQ
International visiting artists: Hiroko Tanahashi and Max Schumacher (post theater), Alice Chauchat and Alix Eynaudi, Stephanie Tiersch and Tom Schreiber (Mouvoir), Andre Curti and Arthur Ribeiro (Dos A Deux), Thomas Plischke and Kattrin Deufert (Frankfurter Küche), Franz Anton Cramer, Mie Coquempot, Chloe Ban, Martin Nachbar, Boris Charmatz & Bocal, Goat Island, Gob Squad, Paul Deschanel Movement Research Group, Bojan Jablanovec (Via Negativa), Tamara Huilmand, TKHWalking theory, Bojana Cvejić, Mårten Spångberg, Ivo Dimchev, Isabelle Schad, Lito Walkey, Jonathan Burrows, Frederic Gies, Ivana Müller, Bojana Kunst, Monica Gomis, Jefta Van Dinther.
Coordination team of ekscene in 2005-2010: Selma Banich, Sandra Banić Naumovski, Maja Marjančić, Željka Sančanin, Zrinka Užbinec Ekscene’s Working Platform has been sponsored by: Municipal Department of Education, Culture, and Sports Zagreb, Croatian Ministry of Culture, Open University Zagreb, Culture of Change at Teatar &TD, HIPP & Zagreb Dance Centre
Experimental Free Scene | Trpimirova 15 | 10 000 Zagreb, Croatia | www.ekscena.hr | ekscena@gmail.com
ekscene
TRANSWARP is a series of collaborations in regional and international A-I-R production and distribution, envisioned as a visiting platform for presenting and evaluating the artistic positions of Croatian and international authors. Derived from the WARP / Evenings of Artworks and Performances / programme, which was taking place from 2003-2007 as a presentation of choreographies created within the Artistic Working Platform of ekscene, the new series has transposed these artistic and production frameworks into the new model of Working Platform. Considering our redirection of the working strategies, priorities, and goals of ekscene, as well as the need to rearticulate our current projects and programmes in the future by developing interregional and international collaboration initiatives, TW aims at redefining the old framework and create better defined conditions for artistic creation, production, and distribution. Therefore, it will be generated as a collaboration platform of ekscene and its international partners. Public promotion of dance as a relevant artistic practice within the Croatian cultural context, as it is visible and recognized on the international level, as well as affirmation of the existing artistic positions and work – these are the primary goals of authors and their activity for the time to come. Independent authors associated in ekscene are active within equivalent propositions as to the production and distribution; thus, the need of defining new propositions and a different model of distribution within the future programme policy will also contextualize Croatian dance on the international art market. Beside increasing public visibility and achieving a better position as to the infrastructure, resources, and the market, ekscene’s reasons for launching such a platform and joining efforts in new relations of collaboration and production include a more efficient realization of coordinate collective actions and creating interest groups, as well as cooperation in creating, using, and distributing information. Another important aspect is the horizontal representation of common interests – in promotion, distribution, and 3D networking, Artist Meet Artist collaboration and joint work in 3D networks – and raising the awareness of the need to take on the visionary role in the future definition of the scene and its collaboration strategies.
TW partner organizations 2008-2009: Beursschouwburg (Brussels, Belgium), documenta (Regensburg, Germany), IETM, Pekarna - magdalenske mreže (Maribor, Slovenia), Centre chorégraphique national de Montpellier (Montpellier, France), Puppet Theatre Zagreb (Zagreb), Teatar &td (Zagreb), International Festival Sarajevo (Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina), Gallery Centre / VRUM (Varaždin), SU Molekula (Rijeka), Stanica (Belgrade).
TRANSWARP 2011-2013 GO OUT AND PLAY Planning the cycle, that is, each particular phase of the project, takes place in a dialogue between ekscene, its regional and international partners, and the visiting artists. The structure for carrying out each individual collaboration cycle includes three models of distributional exchange: 1 GO OUT AND PLAY / PLATFORM FOR PRESENTING ARTWORKS 2 EDUCATION / WORKSHOP AND SHARE-IN SEMINARS 3 A-I-R PROGRAMMES / RESEARCH AND/OR PRODUCTION RESIDENCIES Depending on the needs of Croatian and international visiting artists, as well as the regional and international partner organizations, the three-year cycle of distributional exchange includes all three production models of exchange, while their time span and arrangement of activities are left to the partners and artists to redefine at their will.
Experimental Free Scene | Trpimirova 15 | 10 000 Zagreb, Croatia | www.ekscena.hr | ekscena@gmail.com
ekscene
1 GO OUT AND PLAY / PLATFORM FOR PRESENTING ARTWORKS Visiting artworks by Croatian and international choreographers and performing artists at festivals, dance platforms, and theatre institutions of Croatian and international partners. Inviting visiting artists and their shows occurs independently, according to the principle of individual artist exchanges in seven European cities during a single collaboration cycle. The possibility of integrating the cycle into an educational or residential model of exchange includes temporal merging of educational or residential model of collaboration with the visiting presentation. GO OUT AND PLAY is a distribution network for former and current artworks by invited artists, according to the principle of sporadic and dislocated festival production.
2 EDUCATION / WORKSHOP AND SHARE-IN SEMINARS Croatian and international artists are invited to generate an educational model of collaboration cycles according to their needs and working profiles. Visiting workshops or educational share-in seminars occur independently and/or in an integrated cycle, together with the presentational and residential model. The time span of workshops and share-in seminars is limited to one week of events.
3 A-I-R PROGRAMMES / RESEARCH AND/OR PRODUCTION RESIDENCIES Depending on the needs of current projects by Croatian and international artists or according to the principle of nonselective choice, ekscene and its international partners are invited to organize residential programmes of research or production. Residencies can take place independently or be integrated into the cycle of presentational and educational model. The minimum time span of research workshops is three weeks of events. In order to facilitate working on the current performance, defined by the partner and the invited artist, A-I-R programmes are organized as production residencies during the minimum time span of six weeks, including both premiere and repeat performances of the project.
TW PLANNING INTERNATIONAL COLLABORATION As the Croatian partner and initiator of collaboration, ekscene ensures the following to its international partners and invited international artists, in accordance with the proposed projects: // organizing GO OUT AND PLAY, EDUCATIONAL, AND A-I-R cycles to the total of seven events during the year // promotional support: distributing information on authors, shows, workshops, and partners to the Croatian mass media and public theatre online networks // financial support – covering the travel expenses, accommodation, daily allowance, royalties, and residential stipends for the visiting artists, in cooperation with the project partners. The cost of visits (performance, workshop, residency) are shared between the visiting and the local partner in the agreed percentage of 30% : 70% // consulting in executive production: distributing information and organizing consulting sessions with festival promoters and selectors from Croatia and the region // offering artistic support to the authors and their projects through weekly sessions or in direct project collaboration with Croatian performing artists, dramaturges, dance ensembles, and theatre companies.
Experimental Free Scene | Trpimirova 15 | 10 000 Zagreb, Croatia | www.ekscena.hr | ekscena@gmail.com
ekscene
TW SPATIAL SUPPORT As the Croatian partner and initiator of collaboration, ekscene ensures to its international partners and invited international performing artists all spatial and technical support needed for realizing visiting presentations, educational cycles, and A-I-R programmes, in accordance with the proposed projects and in collaboration with:
HIPP & Zagreb Dance Centre Studio 1 : 250 m2, black box, audio-video, and light system Studio 2 : 60 m2, gray tube, audio-video system Studio 3 : 80 m2, white box, audio-video system Teatar &TD Zagreb (Culture of Change) The total of 3 theatre black box stages, audio-video, and light system 1 white cube gallery, audio-video, and light system 1 cinema theatre, audio-video, and light system Independent Cultural and Youth Centre Zagreb Stage 1: 450m2, audio-video, and light system Studio: 80m2, audio system Open University Zagreb Studio 1: 80m2, DVD, audio system Studio 2: 40m2, audio system Art Workshop Lazareti Dubrovnik Studio 1: 60 m2, audio-video system 1 stage black box, audio-video, and light system 2 galleries
Experimental Free Scene | Trpimirova 15 | 10 000 Zagreb, Croatia | www.ekscena.hr | ekscena@gmail.com