Sreten Asanović, Nomina, Plima, Ulcinj, 2011
By: Ivana Ančić
English version will be available soon.
2050 – A Day in November by Lorenz Hippe, directed by Ninoslav Šćepanović, Mostar Theatre of Youth (guest performance in Bitef Theatre in Belgrade, November 19, 2011)
By: Nikola Skočajić
It is well known to the cultural public of Bosnia and Herzegovina what is happening at the Mostarski teatar mladih (MTM, Mostar Youth Theatre), which, after being renamed from an independent to a public institution, has obviously become a burden for the city budget. As an outside observation, it is difficult to understand the bureaucracy regarding the way in which the City government handles the its staff collective, which has been fired, with suitable demonstrations of power which can be seen in employing the already employed City employees, as well as in less sophisticated methods –changing locks on theatre doors. While the Initiative of the Committee for Restoration of the Independent Theatre of Mostarski teatar mladih, with the ex-director of MTM Sead Đulić, has to work covertly on the street, the newly formed MTM is visiting Belgrade’s Bitef Theatre with Lorenz Hippe’s piece 2050 – A Day in November.
This kind of context presents multiple problems for critiquing. With its mere mentioning, it already pre-positions us and we seem to have chosen a side right from the start. These are, in any case, unwanted implications. We cannot claim that the new MTM could not have made a good show, because the context in which the production of 2050 – A Day in November takes place does not present an artistic category. Hence, hypothetically speaking, the MTM could have made a good show. But it didn’t.
A German author, Lorenz Hippe, unknown in the region, writes about the theatre and theatrical and pedagogical practice, to which he seems to be paying its due with this didactical piece. 2050 – A Day in November is one of his plays on young people that speaks directly to the young people. Hiding behind an atmosphere of an auto-induced ecological apocalypse in the year stated in the title, Hippe gives a conventional moralistic layout of the world that is a consequence of what is happening today. Lia is a thirteen-year-old girl (preformed by twenty years older Martina Kujundžić) that lives through her days just like any other girl of her age. The only difference is that the relationships with her father (Ivo Krešić), best friend Semra (Angela Bulum) and Milan, the boy she is in love with (Stanko Utrobičić) – are marked by an upcoming storm. The unstable climate as a consequence of a disaster and hypocritical authoritarian government as society’s only solution when faced with extreme conditions, are Hippe’s main preoccupation.
Serbian director, Ninoslav Šćepanović, deals with this topic without any comparison to this universal topic or any wish for contextualization. The empty stage becomes the setting of many interesting actions for amateur theatre. The main actress rarely stands up from her chair with wheels (because she is just as mobile in it), although it does not effect the rhythm, or present a stage signal, since all physical play is resolved with paramimetic actions boiling down to pantomime and unusual props. It was difficult to raise any kind of awareness in this atmosphere. There was no help at all from the pleiad of general places of ecological activism that is imposed by the text in which the main argument was the damage of motor vehicles’ to the environment (still used by the Government from the future while others are forbidden to).
As banal as the topic may be, its form corresponds very well with its content. People no longer communicate via wires but through the morphogenetic field which allows telepathical transfer of thoughts. Since Lia is an expert in morphogenetics, she will have to take on the burden of talking to the eco-criminals that have done the evil deed forty years ago (the math is clear!). Since the text itself addresses the present – pointing the finger at the audience, on which Šćepanović insists more than once, becomes redundant.
The main problem of the show (which we cannot categorise as a textual problem even though it need distance opposite its naivety) is that it does not clearly define its interlocutor. At the Bitef Theatre at 8pm, set opposite the non-children audience, it seemed to have been taken too seriously by the cast themselves. Although, even at 11am it would not address thirteen-year-olds, or if it would, it would do so extremely tendentiously. What is very touching is that it allows the teenage characters to recognise what is wrong with the system they are a part of. They can rightfully be suspected of rebellious terrorism or agitatation of the ruling discourse – but that does not make them adults. Martina Kujundžić loyally portrays her character as an actress twenty years older than her character. But the situation in which an adult plays a thirteen-year-old is not contextualised, so there is a huge gap between the actress and her character, since not enough thought went into it. With his school-like performance, Stanko Utrobičić, playing Milan, a character with the biggest drama potential opposite Lia who daydreams and threatens to ruin the thesis of the piece, does not manage to set the rational contrast in the play. Angela Burum as Semra is the only one who manages to set the right balance between herself as an older actress playing a girl, and the character of the girl itself. She is not deluded that she can play a child as Utrobičić is, nor does she act from herself like Kujundžić – but finds a way to triumph over this ungrateful task by graduation of expression .
Until recently, the cultural policy of the MTM was directed at social and political involvement. Even the universal topics were put into the local context. During the last year’s Sarajevo Days, the audience in Belgrade had an opportunity to see such an example in a play by Selma Spahić How I Learned to Drive, produced by the MTM. There is no need to ask the theatres this kind of work, due to the fact that it is, by being a social act, involved by its definition. Environmental awareness as a part of the new cultural policy comes as a blessing to Žižek’s reflection on ecology as a depoliticisation of opinion. Even though the context of making this play is mechanically separated from the context in which this play works – they are (still) connected through the cultural policy.
By consistently implementing Lorenz Hippe’s discourse, with a serious misinterpretation which puts this kind of production on the evening schedule, there is not much to say about the quality of a play which hardly belongs to professional theatre.
Sreten Asanović, Nomina, Plima, Ulcinj, 2011
By: Ivana Ančić
English version will be available soon.
OSMI I SEDMI PUTNIK, Aleksandar Bjelogrlić, Citadela, Agora, Zrenjanin, 201
By: Dalibor Plečić
English version will be available soon.
Stjepan Gulin, Paz’te sad, paz’te sad (Meandarmedia, Zagreb, 2011.)
Authors: Ivana Ančić
Igor Marojević, Kroz glavu (Dosije, Beograd, 2012.)
Author: Dalibor Plečić
Damir Miloš, Pisa. Povratak (Meandarmedia, Zagreb, 2011.)
Author: Morena Livaković
POLITIČKE I DRUŠTVENE KONSTRUKCIJE IDENTITETA U VIDEO-PERFORMANSIMA NA BEOGRADSKOJ SCENI 1970-ih
Esej Vladimira Bjeličića
Esej u celini možete pročitati na portalu SEEcult.org
Esej Tihane Bertek
Od promatrača do sudionika
GALERIJA KAPELICA I POST-JUGOSLAVENSKI BODY ART (1995–2010)
Esej – Bojan Krištofić
Esej o radovima Šejle Kamerić, Maje Bajević i Nebojše Šerića Shobe
Piše: Slađana Golijanin
ESEJ – Razvaline socijalizma kao inspiracija za muzejske eksponate Mrđana Bajića i skulpturalne dosetke Ivana Fijolića
By: Milena Milojević
Piše: Nino Kovačić
Gostujuća izvedba šibenskog HNK, Pir malograđana, prema tekstu mladog Bertolda Brechta (napisan 1919.) izvedena je po sljedećoj formuli: na Danima satire u satiričkom kazalištu Kerempuh gledamo satiričan komad. Prema reakcijama publike, bila je uspješna, ali teško se oteti dojmu da je smijeh bio formulaično zagarantiran, jer bi takav instruirani moment humora trebao zauzdati spontani smijeh. Je li se možda radilo o “malograđanskom” humoru?
Glumice i to, KNAP, Zagreb, premijera 12.5.2012.
Piše: Nino Kovačić
Glumice i to, nova predstava u zagrebačkom KNAP-u, neobičan su kazališni ‘slučaj’. Naime, predstavu su, dramaturški i režijski osmislile te, naravno, glumački ostvarile četiri mlade glumice. U trenutačnoj opće-društvenoj, pa tako i kazališnoj situaciji, kojom prijete olovni pojmovi poput recesije, prekarijata i outsourcinga (nedavno su najavljena i otpuštanja “hladnopogonskih” glumaca), one su, kako piše u najavi “nezaposlene i pune entuzijazma, odlučile su preuzeti stvar u svoje ruke i napraviti hit!”. Očito sklone postdramskom pristupu izvedbi koji se, između ostalog, bazira na ekipnoj work-in-progress metodi, izvedbenoj anti-iluziji i autoreferencijalnosti, glumice/autorice su se “trgnule” i napravile parodiju o tome kako rade predstavu, po ironičnom ključu: kad ne ide pravljenje predstave treba napraviti predstavu o tome kako se ne može raditi predstava.
“Nije život biciklo”, Biljana Srbljanović, režija: Anselm Veber, Produkcija: Šaušpilhaus Bohum, Nemačka; Sterijino pozorje 2012, selekcija Nacionalne drame i pozorišta
By: Tamara Baračkov
English version will be available soon.
„Grebanje, ili kako se ubila moja baka“, Tanja Šljivar, režija: Selma Spahić, Bosansko narodno pozorište Zenica/Bitef teatar-Hartefakt (Beograd), premijera: 7. septembar 2012. (Zenica), 11. oktobar 2012. (Beograd)
By: Tamara Baračkov
English version will be available soon.
„Sluga dvaju gospodara“, Karlo Goldoni, režija: Boris Liješević, Grad teatar Budva/Srpsko narodno pozorište Novi Sad/Narodno pozorište „Toša Jovanović“ Zrenjanin, premijera: 27. jul 2012.
By: Tamara Baračkov
English version will be available soon.