The Changing of Practice section intended for the professional theatre community, reflects on the perspectives of change in various areas of cultural practice. We would like to explore internal mechanisms, and means and tools that can lead to an immediate and comprehensive transformation of artistic practice and its perception by the professional and general public. In addition, topics pertinent to development and process, involvement of experts from non-artistic fields in the creative process, and, in particular, the thematization of ways through which we perceive performing arts in relation to the world we inhabit.

The 2023 Changing the Practice examines the following topics:

Not-visible Dramaturgy

Not-visible Dramaturgy comes after a series of discussions and work meetings that took place in Prague, Brno and Ostrava in 2022. Examining the programme intersections and care for common needs prompted our decision to organise the first encounter of Czech and Slovak dramaturgs. The discussion centres on the question of establishing a professional association and its likely agenda and how it could operate.

The discussion is prepared by: Marta Ljubková, Barbara Gregorová, Petr Pola

Fri 24 February / 15:00 / Vzlet. Vršovice Culture Hub / in Czech
Registration required.
Not-visible Dramaturgy discussion series is a touring production. In May 2023, it will be presented at the Theater World Festival Brno.

Symposium ART-IN-RES

The platform for artist residency opportunities, ART-IN-RES, and the residency programme of the same name have been operating for 2 years. What are the results of the current practice in the Czech Republic, what are the prospects, and what shall be improved? Answers and other suggestions will be provided at the second meeting of the ART-IN-RES residency platform members.

Tue 28 February / 13:00 - 16:00 / Klub Letka / in Czech
Registration required.
Contact to register: terezalacmanova@novasit.cz

Work on: Progress

Modes of Perception and Their Transformations
A dance-theatre event with a follow up discussion about forms of audience perception

How much of what audiences perceive in the theatre is what they bring in with them? Are there methods to free their personal material to organically intertwine with the impulses from the creators and enter a shared space of experience? How to engage spectators in the process of perceiving a theatrical form in a way that can free their creative potential?

In a joint discussion and on the basis of collective embodied experience, we will seek answers to the question of how to negotiate with audiences the opportunities for their engagement in a theatre event. A special attention will be paid to changes in sensitivity, which is this year's festival theme. We will examine the ways to incite audiences, open their sensory receptors, dissolve prejudices, reflect on previously accumulated perceptions, unlock associative processes, and create space for trying new and perhaps unusual methods of reading and perceiving reality.

We will try to gradually formulate an open-access catalogue of strategies that can be used to literally bring the audience into a play, to release their perception, feelings, and thinking, and open them up to the transformative potential of a theatre encounter.

The discussion is moderated by Karolina Plicková.

The programme includes a participatory theatre event entitled Be Provoked by Dance!.

Sun 26. 2. / 11:00 - 15:00 / Korzo National Gallery Prague - Trade Fair Palace / in czech

A show which is not a show but a world of imagination.
Nowadays we find ourselves under a lot of pressure and exposed to many realities that cannot be ignored: war, inflation eating up our savings, high energy prices. We have been taught to keep distance from everything that can upset us – it is important that we function at full capacity! So we turn on our defence mechanisms: we stock up, build a bunker, isolate ourselves. But then, in this solitude of ours, nonverbal emotions begin to accumulate. And they gradually start getting to us. Until one day we realize that our personal and professional relationships and our friendships are falling apart. And that we don’t know what to do about it.

The presented dance and theatre project features a new artistic format based on sharing, as a reaction to our tendency to isolate ourselves and the psychology of audiences’ perception. Using artistic format of the programme designed as a collage and with the moderator’s guidance, the performance allows spectators to experience and understand how they and their community feel about current events. It is based on a heightened sensitivity in perception of contemporary audience, which the author uses as an opportunity to draw spectators into the play. Under his guidance, it is them who begin to determine what they want to experience in terms of the perception of the presented artwork, whether they want to co-create it through their own experience and what key (instruction) they want to discover in it for themselves.

Author and moderator: Michal Nikodem
Cooperation: Tereza Krčálová
Music: Václav Chalupský
Choreography: Jitka Čechová, Yuri Korec /SK/
Interpretation: Jitka Čechová, Daniel Raček /SK/
Artistic supervision, production: Honza Malík & Pulsar z. s.

Supported by: Donio.cz, Helena a Jakub Urbanovi (Studio TEP39), Berrak Yedek (Limpid Works Studio), Jana Dolejšová, Štěpán Zahálka, Anna Línová.

Registration required.
Contact to register: nelahettenbergerova@novasit.cz

Bridging the Scenes

Bridging the Scenes / Berlin, Copenhagen, Sofia, Prague / engages four established festivals in a collaboration including artistic exchange, hosting delegations of programme staff, and development of competences of the professional community.

As part of MI 2023, we will host selected guest(s) from individual cities and organise a two-day workshop for administrative staff of the cities’ public administrations. The aim of the workshop is to secure an information bridge between the way of managing and administering, in particular, grant systems in individual cities.

Wen 22 February / 9:00 - 11:00 / Nová síť / in English
Tue 23 February / 9:00 - 11:00 / Nová síť / in English
Registration required.
Contact: nelahettenbergerova@novasit.cz

We reserve the right to change the programme.