Czech Artists at 68th Edinburgh Fringe Festival
Czech performing art has again a chance to participate in the greatest showcase of theatre and performing art – Edinburgh Festival Fringe spanning from 7 to 30 August 2015. The Czech season of Czech Showcase 2015 is hosting four productions. So this year’s Fringe will feature an adaptation of Havel’s Audience Antiwords performed by Spitfire Company, Cirk La Putyka’s piece Dolls, dance project called Korekce (Correction) by the VerTeDance company, and a duet of Tereza Ondrová and Peter Šavel Boys Who Like to Play With Dolls. The Czech artists are going to hit the stage at four different places in Edinburgh, sixty-three times within one month and they are going to be supported by the Czech Centre London for the fifth time in a row.Fringe provides a unique opportunity to present Czech dance and theatre production to large international professional as well as lay audiences. At the same time it is, considering the opportunity of comparing with hundreds of other world’s top companies, a big challenge for the artists themselves. The recent years have marked the success of Czech dancers, in the form of positive reviews, festival awards (three Herald Angel awards, two nominations for the Total Theatre Award etc.) and invitations to festivals in Great Britain and many other places in the world. This experience indicates that Czech non-verbal theatre is able to compete within the highest-quality spheres of contemporary artistic world. This year’s selection focuses on established Czech ensembles of physical theatre and dance which have already taken part in the past editions of Fringe. “Pieces of diverse genres – contemporary dance, new circus, physical theatre - are linked by the originality of expression and breath-taking performances of the artists in physically challenging choreographies. Across the spectrum of productions, we can find the themes of restriction and lack of freedom – personal, creative or social – and of the possibilities how to cope with them. But the difficult matter is always treated with surprising lightness and humour,“ says Tereza Porybná, director of the Czech Centre London.
After two years, the ZOO Venues will see the return of VerTeDance and its performance Korekce (Correction). This piece directed by Jiří Havelka and accompanied by live music of Clarinet Factory has been collecting awards (Dance production of 2014, Theatre News Award 2014 and others) and favourable critiques since its last year’s premiere. In June, it was awarded two main prizes at the prestigious BE Festival in Birmingham. Cirk La Putyka also revisits the Fringe, after four years, and this time with a project entitled Dolls. The fusion of dance, acrobatics, music and visual theatre explores the phenomenon of artificial imitations of humans and how they may affect our lives. It will be performed at the big top Underbelly, one of the most-visited Fringe stages. Cirk La Putyka, during its last engagement at Fringe, was nominated for the Total Theatre Award 2011.
One of Aurora Nova ‘s (one of the Czech Showcase organisers) stable members is also the Spitfire Company with the piece Antiwords. The company received the Herald Angel award at the Fringe 2013 for One Step Before the Fall. Spitfire will appear in the Summerhall at the former veterinary school and currently one of the offhand festival venues. The dance tandem Tereza Ondrová and Peter Šavel got into the official programme of one of the few year-round operating dance institutions, the DanceBase, with the choreography Boys Who Like to Play with Dolls. The piece deals with the issue of gender, building on the physical resemblance of both protagonists. Last year it became a part of so called European Top 20 Priority Companies 2014, selected annually by the international network Aerowaves.
Czech Dance Showcase Programme:
Dolls – Cirk La Putyka
Underbelly – Circus Hub
The Lafayette
7 – 29 August at 3:25pm (except for 12, 18, 24 Aug 2015)
Correction – VerTeDance
ZOO Southside
11 – 19 August, 8:15 pm
Boys Who Like To Play With Dolls – ALT@RT
Dancebase
12 – 22 August at 1pm (except for 17 Aug 2015)
Antiwords – Spitfire Company
Summerhall – Old Lab Venue
10 – 30 August at 8:25 pm (except for 17 and 24 Aug 2015)
Source: Česká centra
Josef Bartos
Thank you for your thoughts. One got stuck in my mind – that passion makes us different from AI. Just yesterday I read…I am a dance critic. I am a member of an endangered species