Rafał Sadownik

An incident, or a process?

Grzegorz Kondrasiuk e-teatr.pl, 2020.11.18 Grzegorz Kondrasiuk talks to Rafał Sadownik about the first Polish showcase of contemporary circus.

Grzegorz Kondrasiuk (e-teatr.pl): Before the infamous 2020 came, Carnaval Sztukmistrzów had already had over 10 years behind it. During that time you developed its cohesive and mature formula, and we can speak of Carnaval as a brand. And now all of a sudden you are announcing a new beginning. Is it supposed to be an evolution or a radical change of the formula, a closure of a certain stage?

Rafał Sadownik (the artistic director of Lublin’s Carnaval Sztukmistrzów festival):

This year’s edition titled “The Polish Incident” isn’t an entirely new beginning for us because we are putting life into ideas that we have been thinking about for years. We started in 2010 with a large festival written into the city’s structure. Since then, Carnaval has been one of the events propelling tourism in Lublin. It has been based on the idea of condensing various events related to the circus into one, large, four-day summer festival. It has included typically ludic, playful elements, namely buskers and shows in various spaces in the city, squares, plazas – like a street carnival, while new circus has served as a strong pivot of the programme with large and smaller shows held in tents and on theatre stages. Another important part has been music – fanfares and brass bands veering between concert and street performance. Yet another strong, distinct element of Carnaval has been Urban Highline Festival, the largest festival in the world focused on the equilibristic discipline called “slacklining”, directly inspired by the figure of “The Magician of Lublin”. Every year, Urban Highline Festival gathers nearly 250 highliners from across the world who walk on several dozen lines hung between the most characteristic buildings in Lublin. Until now, all these elements have been condensed into four days of urban street carnival.

Let’s decipher what hides behind the Polish, Lublin iteration of the worldwide discipline of slacklining. A slackliner is a modern day ropewalker who walks not on ropes but lines or webbings and not inside a chapiteau but under the open sky. In Lublin, slackliners walk above streets or squares, sometimes between the largest city buildings or... church steeples. Below the lines are crowds who watch, comment and applaud successful walks, tricks but perhaps most of all the falls (of course, slackliners are secured). The characteristic figure of the slackliner, slightly tilted to the side with outstretched arms against the backdrop of some Lublin tower or building, to use this beautiful visual shortcut, where the old trickster figure, Singer’s Yasha Mazur has received a new form, has

permanently entered Lublin’s imaginarium. The same goes for buskers performing in the streets for a fee into their hats, not just during Carnaval but also beyond it, the entire summer season.

Yes, that has been a success and it’s become a permanent fixture in Lublin’s cultural landscape. It has been promoted well not just locally but also in the country. However, marketing is not the only thing that has worked in the festival’s favour. The festival has filled a certain gap in cultural events in Poland – the lack of a ludic event that does not impose barriers. During Carnaval, people from different social groups, of different ages and experiences come together. Circus shows reach everyone, they take hold on various levels through their conventions, subjects, type of art. The shows have the power to build a community, albeit a temporary one. They show that we can laugh at the same things, that the same topics stir strong emotions in all of us. We have also managed to create a festival that fits the local Lublin identity. Marketing research conducted in 2006 showed that residents of Lublin and inhabitants of Poland on the whole had a hard time defining what constitutes identity. In a way, Carnaval has helped to consolidate that.

This is evidenced by interest that’s been growing from year to year, as I’ve had the chance to observe. Actually, from the very first editions you’ve been accompanied by large audiences. Tens of thousands of people in the streets, difficulties in getting tickets for shows in halls and tents.

Until a certain moment it all worked very well. But at some point we became tired of doing everything all at once. We wanted something more without losing the playful urban character. For instance, we thought about dividing the festival into two parts or even holding two festivals instead of one. One of these festivals would be typically street-based, playful, featuring buskers, various urban actions, showing the full range of outdoor arts, strongly present in festivals in western Europe. Outdoor arts are more commonly recognised than street theatre in Poland because they refer to many fields of art, creating new meanings. The second part of the programme was meant to be an artistic circus, a contemporary circus, a cirque contemporain as they currently call it in France. These are the kind of performances that we had a chance to see for instance at the circus biennale, at festivals in Marseilles or Auch. These are more ambitious shows that set new standards, look for new forms. We had the programme for the 2020 edition of Carnaval ready in February. We wanted to open up the street: we invited buskers to take part in open contests with financial rewards. However, we wanted to put emphasis on the artistic side of things – to come up with a strong offering of ticketed shows performed both on the stages inside tents and outdoors in enclosed spaces. Then the pandemic hit. But the crisis proved to be an opportunity as well. For many years, we had been discussing the possibility of organising an Eastern European circus showcase: an overview of the best shows from several Central and East European countries.It could be a magnet for festival programmers from Western Europe. As participants in the Circostrada network and Circus Next platform, we noticed an increase in interest from countries that are just emerging in the circus arts market, but don’t have a strong representation. We wanted to build a platform for shows from our geographic region to be promoted in Western Europe. This also did not work out for many reasons such as discrepancies among the respective scenes. For instance, the Czech Republic, which has been intensely developing its new circus scene for the last fifteen years, is a lot more advanced.The artistic quality is higher there and they are recognised in Western Europe. On the other hand, there are countries like Slovakia or Croatia where local productions have already been created but they are only now entering international markets and need interest, promotion. One of these countries is Poland. However, the pandemic forced us to react quickly and modify the format. A total lockdown followed: cancelling meetings of the platforms and networks, festivals, banning travels abroad.

It’s pretty clear what it meant for the artists in the industry, predominantly freelancers – the fear of economic collapse and unemployment reared its head pretty much right away.

Poland lacks financial mechanisms to support circus artists. Festivals serve that role – by sending out invitations, working on co-productions. Festivals are the only patrons of circus arts! Hence their role during the pandemic is incredibly important, our responsibility is even greater. All the more reason why festivals should direct their attention to Polish artists. That’s why we reached for the idea of a contest for Polish outdoor circus shows that had been planned as part of this year’s edition of Carnaval and, outside

the contest, decided to financially contribute to and support the production of several additional projects which we selected from among all the submissions.

In total, we presented nine premieres in what turned out to be an interesting range of shows offering different disciplines and aesthetics. We decided to go with the showcase formula and called it The Polish Incident – Incydent Polski. And that’s how the showcase of Polish new circus projects was born.

To the contest jury we invited representatives of other Polish festivals presenting circus productions: OFCA (Oleśnica’s Festival of Circus and Art) and FETA ( Feta – International Street and Open-Air Theatres Festival). Aside from financial support, the prize included premiering at Carnaval Sztukmistrzów and a guaranteed spot at the two festivals. We are perfectly aware that in Poland it’s easier to produce a show, but the hard part is to give such a show its life. In the circus industry, performing a show more than three or four times is already a big success, that’s why we wanted to make sure the selected shows had an opportunity to be presented, at least in this limited scope at first. We are glad that the Polish Incident generated an interest from the community in Warsaw. We hope that more festivals and centres will join our initiative, inviting the winners of the contest to perform.

Which aspects of the Incident were the most important for the artists themselves?

In spring, when everyone was locked up in their homes, the phone call from the organisers of the largest Polish circus festival announcing that they would like to support the production, that a show at Carnaval was possible, really got them going and motivated them to work. These people often carry their ideas in their heads for years, but have no funds to produce them.

Who specifically was this initiative aimed at?

They are often artists with a circus school diploma who have completed various courses on techniques and skills. They are at a point in life when they need to take control and steer their own artistic development. They often end up in the commercial or event industry or look for TV careers. Polish artists have a good command of circus techniques – we have nothing to be ashamed of here. The only things we lack are stage experience, dramaturgy of the show, a director’s or a choreographer’s way of thinking.

So at this current stage of contemporary Polish circus, the most important thing was the basic economic sense of this activity – financing premieres, the initial costs, stage designs, costumes, the work on directing and screenplays or directorial consulting?

Yes. Even if ideas are forged into actual shows, it’s all from the artists’ own cost and effort, without directorial support, without feedback. Here, they received the money for the production, the possibility of directorial consulting, as well as logistical and organisational support. The shows have premiered and will appear at other festivals. All shows were recorded and we screened them online. Full information about all participants of the Incident will be printed in the post-festival publication that we will send to other festival organisers and cultural institutions, among others.

Is the Incident an artistic start-up for the Polish artistic circus?

There has been no such initiative in Poland before. It is important for us to have a comprehensive approach – going from the idea written down by the artist on a sheet of paper, through taking care of the concept and production, leading to the premiere, exposure and promotion.

I think a great potential of this initiative lies precisely in supporting the conceptual side, looking for mature directing of circus shows, supporting circus dramaturgy that after all are different from directing or dramaturgy of a theatre or dance performance.

This potential is still neglected in Poland, or rather it’s undiscovered. It’s something that’s still absent from our education system, even though our circus school is one of the oldest in Europe. It’s very important to understand that a performance is more than a presentation of skills in mastered techniques. To create a performance, you first need to be able to create a short etude that’s simple but well thought-out and fine-tuned in terms of direction. Some of our invited artists have taken the directorial consulting we have offered (run by Marta Kuczyńska) and I’m convinced it has served them very well, bringing enormous results. We will definitely keep developing these aspects of our programme.

Do you think about continuing this project? Do you have a long-term plan?

We’ve discussed this a lot with the artists, and they highlight the need for this programme to stay permanent. We will certainly keep this part of the Carnaval – either in the annual formula or as biennale, or as a showcase of invited productions combined with a contest for premieres. We want the Polish programme to be an element of Carnaval’s new formula.

Is there a Polish idiom of contemporary circus? How would it be characterised?

It’s a difficult question. I think it’s too early to put forward such a thesis, that at the Polish incident we can observe the formation of identity of Polish contemporary circus.Look at Scandinavian countries that a dozen or so years ago had no professional groups and the circus scene didn’t exist, but with the emergence of systemic financial support, schools, quality education and support programmes that identity formed very quickly. The distinctiveness, otherness of their circus grabs you at first sight.

Yes and all the cultural references, echoes from North European heritage, such as highlighting their connection to nature, do not appear artificial in contemporary Scandinavian circus. Betting on elements of local, native identity in art does not have to be something forced on by grant giving organisations.

I think that this character will reveal itself on its own. You need to let these topics take roots. To find your own identity and reflect it through art simply requires time. The artists need to produce many shows, go through a number of failures and success. As in any field of art.

The only distinct identity phenomenon that I noticed in the Incident was the imprint of the Polish street theatre form. Namely, traces of countercultural origins.

Indeed. In Poland, new circus has always been strongly countercultural and its artists have rebellion in their blood. The shows presented at the Polish Incident included such themes as the right to be different, cultural identity, social and cultural roles, the position of women, and a number of ecological themes or those related to the responsibility for the way we function as societies.

Which shows did ultimately draw your attention during the Polish showcase?

I’m always interested in Kejos and their explorations – though we need to wait for the premiere of “The Fool’s Epitaph” in two months because their show at the Polish Incident was a pre-premiere presentation of their work. Kejos is the oldest still active new circus group in Poland. Both Jacek Tinmigeriu and Marta Kuczyńska are experienced directors so there’s no room for infantilism in their approach to this area. The theme and figure of the fool as the progenitor of the clown is important to me and this character combined with the aesthetic in post-apocalyptic tone gives a very interesting effect.

You’ve described Kejos as a new circus group but at the same time you mention terms such as “directing” – I understand you are referring to direction inspired by the theatrical invention of text staging. It might be worth adding here that a distinguishing feature of Kejos is that coming from the circus, with the technical background of circus artists, they always aspire to integrate a fusion of theatralisation with the circus, always invent some new world, create it on stage and amend the skills or tricks to its needs.

I think that in “The Fool’s Epitaph” Kejos displays a very mature way of thinking about how a circus functions on the stage, with traditional oppositions now disappearing: entertainment vs seriousness, high culture vs low, etc. It’s already entered into the modern space of cultural recycling and related melancholy. Whether we agree or not, today we all function on a big dumpster of overused forms and cultural stereotypes. To quote Różewicz – “always fragment”. Kejos’ artists seem to speak precisely form this place, they don’t judge or evaluate the evoked quotes from Shakespeare that by now have become threadbare. Instead, they look for their new potential by remixing the text with body techniques, music citations (not necessarily renaissance music), with a mocking use of technologies. It turns out that unexpectedly their Fool is neither white nor black. He’s not beautiful or nostalgic, nor ironic or derisive. Perhaps he’s simply grey? It’s rather someone who sees culture and tradition from a different perspective, as if turned inside out.

Aside from Kejos, we’ve also had Ale Circus Company at the Incident.

Ale Circus Company’s “VII” is an example of a show that focuses more on circus aesthetics. The group is headed in a similar direction as the Wrocław-based “Prometheus” that we also welcomed at our festival this year. They use the beauty and flexibility of body movement, the grace of acrobatics to make it visually attractive for the viewer, but one that goes beyond a simple demonstration. You have to work really hard in order to keep the message while offering it in a beautiful aesthetic, like “VII” does.

“VII” was what I was thinking of when I talked about the return of Polish alternative theatre traditions. A certain inevitable sadness emerges from the used forms: messianic themes, manifesting a rebellious stance. They use songs by Jacek Kaczmarski, and the stage action builds parallel images, distant reminiscences with metaphors taken from the bard’s texts. The creation of the world, giving it to the people. As we know, not easy matters. Attempts at invoking society, the constant battle of the individual against the collective and with one’s own weaknesses as well as systems imposed on humans. Incorporating passing (a collective, synchronised form of juggling with balls or clubs) in combination with acrobatics (in which Ale Circus Company excels) rhymes well with that. Sometimes very literally, repetitively, sometimes completely departing from the substance of words, here they construct a large, multiperson show that is indeed – as you’ve said – visually attractive. The scathing (or perhaps even feministic) punchline was intriguing. Also, they broke up Kaczmarski with a pop cultural reference from the song by Karolina Czarnecka that stigmatises superficiality and stupidity of the “modern times’’, but also posits a strong need for freedom, emancipation. This in turn went well with the expressivity of the phenomenal actress Nicole Lewicka, the only woman in the group.

Another example: Kamil Żongler with the solo performance “Veggie” in which he tries his hand at the genre of clown monodrama that’s popular internationally. I think it’s a rather successful attempt, one that also starts out from the circus side. The performance is consistent, pure nonsense in its aesthetics and concept. For the artist such a production is also a bridge leading from the street show onto the stage, an opportunity to create a slightly more elaborate stage design compared with typical busker equipment. Another advantage was the fusion of techniques – building the figure of the juggler clown, good contact with the audience. And dropping typical juggling props, using... vegetables instead

We had one more full show circus monodrama at the Incident. That was “Rabbit in HumanLand” by Tomasz Piotrowski, performing as AntiRabbity. Like in the other show, here too circus skills, juggling and object manipulation were jazzed up with theatrical solutions. The introduction of the stage design, plot, dialogue, performing in a mask – all this contributed to a cohesive, philosophising anti system tale.

I’m describing these shows so broadly because they differ from the ones that understand theatre as their point of departure. The incident has shown that in Poland, where there is no established tradition of integrating circus arts into the theatre, the circus might function on the stage as a loose, non-codified collection of forms, associations, techniques. This means that the group of artists consistently building their shows around circus arts – and I’m thinking here of the incredibly small Polish representation that’s been working for years: Ocelot, Kejos, artists associated with the Lublin-based Sztukmistrze Foundation – is joining with new artists. So there have been a few shows that can be called hybrid. Circus has been combined with song theatre or even music by Warszawski Cyrk Magii i Ściemy, with pantomime by Wrzące Ciała and with cabaret in the show by the trio Tres de La Nada.

In the category of playful, light forms, we put forward the show “H2Oooops” by Tres de la Nada. It’s an interesting group with more experience in acting and cabaret than circus. The only person in this group with circus experience is Mirek Urban, but it’s not strictly stage experience, either. Their show reminds me of the group Theatre Irrwisch that comes to Carnaval. They are experienced theatre old-timers who decided to make circus-like shows. It’s something like an adaptation, in which circus

is a tool to be used but at the same time to laugh at.

I will certainly follow the duo Wrzące Ciałe who presented the show “Death and Laughter”, demonstrating how you can play a clown using the language of the pantomime. It’s the initial step of encouraging the girls to delve deeper into the clown workshop – if they follow this path, they certainly have the courage and predispositions to find their own clown that’s different from the rest. I’ve seen a lot of contemporary clown acts and that’s why I had different expectations – I’m more fascinated by how much you are a clown, rather than how you play it. Provocation, trespassing – this is what contemporary clowning brings to my mind.

Wrzące Ciała also had a well thought-out intellectual foundation. They know that for philosophers, the clown-fool is dangerously close to Charon – the ferryman of the dead. It seems that they reached for a book about the deeper meaning of the jester figure. I like that this standard perspective of clowning and circus has been extended into the underworld. The grotesque skeleton dance, danse macabre, a skull with a red clown nose – those elements repeated several times during the Incident.

...coming back to “Death and Laughter”. Despite my initial expectations, I have to admit that it’s a professionally prepared show, well-acted, with good music, choreography and a narrative.

What about Warszawski Cyrk Magii i Ściemy?

They, in turn, offer an example of a mixed genre, a good message conveyed in a language that does not create barriers. It’s hard to stay indifferent to “The Lion Man” – fast tempo, songs, words, good circus skills.

And it’s a show broadly addressed...it evokes the biography of Stefan Bibrowski, a Polish-born lion man performing in freak shows who built his career in the famous American circus Barnum & Bailey. But those are just distant echoes – the author of the script, Michał Walczak, wanted to create a rather witty commentary alluding to modernity that comes down to a very simple message. Through a simple story told in the convention of the pastiche and musical featuring the figures of oppressed and hounded freaks, the clown girl Szmira and the Lion man, Walczak showed the dangers of social or systemic hatred towards exceptions.

It’s a show that fits any convention and one that should appear at all outdoor festivals in Poland. It’s a universal show that perfectly complements an outdoor programme and can be shown in any conditions – on an outdoor stage, in the street, in the theatre – and it will be a success everywhere. This is very important because when we create contemporary circus in Poland, we work more in egalitarian than elitist spaces. There is more interest and understanding for projects that don’t put up barriers in reception and less for experiments, conceptual circus art.

What’s next for the Polish Incident?

I believe that while The Polish Incident may not be a breakthrough, it does mark the beginning of a new phase. The artists are mostly young people – let’s give them time. They need experience: produced shows, confrontation with the audience. The idea for creating a Polish showcase, presenting Polish circus to selectors from western festivals had been cropping up for many years. But there was nothing from which to create such a showcase. Two or three shows were played at a given moment, others quickly faded into history. However this year has shown that there is such an opportunity, that for a number of artists contemporary circus isn’t just a fleeting adventure, but an idea, a way of permanent work.

This year was also different for us as festival organisers. We took a risk. We held the festival in a different season, the weather was unfavourable and most shows were ticketed, we blocked the street, yet the audiences still came. We sold almost all tickets and were met with interest. Contemporary circus shows fill a certain gap, they’ve become a new recognisable category because, and this is my personal impression, street and alternative theatre do not speak to younger generations of spectators, becoming obsolete, turning into a historical phenomenon. I also think that there is a need for something new in the public space, in performing arts. The audiences have already noted the existence of contemporary circus. I hope that the next step will be getting the interest of other festivals. And then of institutions that will notice the existence of this new-old art.