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Warmly welcome to

Performing HEL – Performing Arts Showcase in 31 August–2 September 2018

With 5 performances, 5 demos and 24 production pitch- es, the Performing HEL event will showcase the finest work from right now. Taking place in the Finnish - capital city on 31 August–2 September 2018, the event Performing HEL will encompass the full range of performing arts, includ- Performing Arts Showcase ing circus, and theatre, also delivered in exciting in Helsinki yet difficult-to-define combinations. The featured pro- ductions have been chosen for their high artistic merit and international resonance in mind. Curated by Helsin- ki Festival Director Topi Lehtipuu and Finnish National Theatre Director Mika Myllyaho, the programme features performances of all shapes and sizes.

The showcase is organised by the Finnish National The- atre, Helsinki Festival and Svenska Teatern (the main Swedish-language theatre in Helsinki), in cooperation with CircusInfo Finland, Dance Info Finland and TINFO Theatre Info Finland. The event is friendly supported by, among others, the Swedish Cultural Foundation in Finland, Goethe Institut and Finnish cultural institutes internationally.

Valtteri Raekallio: Oneiron ©Stefan Bremer

31 August - 2 September 2018

For further information, please contact Eeva Bergroth, Producer, [email protected] | +358 (0)40 4873620 PerformancesYOUR COMPANY The live music has been especially composed THEATRE NO99 (ESTONIA) for the piece by Aino Venna. Leena Krohn is AND JALOSTAMO2 (FINLAND): The performance consists of different HEINI JUNKKAALA: AXEL – SOLO MALE VOCAL one of Finland’s most internationally acclaimed PROJECT NO30 SHIP OF FOOLS generations considering the division of power authors, and Tainaron is her breakthrough She was born a woman but wished to be and the role money plays in it. As generations Live stream from Tallinn novel from the 1980’s. accepted as a man. Becoming a man required X, Y and even Z use the stage to express hormone treatment. There was just one their views of the future, the result is both In the context of the current refugee crisis obstacle: her voice. She felt her soul was in her humoristic and deep. we mostly see refugees as arrivers disturbing beautiful voice, and she didn’t want to lose it. our peace. However, seeking refuge is always a journey: leaving security in the hope of Eventually the need to be accepted as a man finding security. Be it Moses and the people grew so strong that she decided to undergo COMPANY: ZIMMERMANN TRIO of Israel or the legendary Estonian sea captain treatment. Now, two and half years later, Axel Kihnu Jõnn who during his wanderings loses is both physically and socially identified as a ESSI ROSSI: TAINARON - Zimmermann Trio binds together live everything and gains everything − being on man. But who is he on the inside? MAIL FROM ANOTHER CITY music, dance and visuality in the holistically a journey is the natural human condition, memorable and emotionally moving way that an endless number of steps made into the Axel – solo male vocal is a melodic portrait Tainaron paints a picture of the future – a is characteristic of the works of choreographer unknown. Solastalgy denotes a journey where of someone forced to choose between future which is already here, but hard for us Tero Saarinen. The dance lifts the music of one doesn’t move in neither time nor space, gender and voice. The piece asks – was Axel’s to see. Bernd Alois Zimmermann to the next level yet is in both time and space very far from sacrifice worth it? What is gender? Why must – just as the composer originally planned. where one’s journey began. Pacing, walking, we choose? Is it possible to choose? Newly arrived in the city of Tainaron, our Zimmermann’s impressive, cinematic cello running, rushing − moving, moving, moving - narrator discovers its strange way of life. Here, concerto inspired Saarinen to handle themes and it’s always towards something and away transformation is part of the daily routine, OBLIVIA: CHILDREN AND OTHER RADICALS of leaving and loss in the choreography. from something else. blurring the boundaries between people,

As Finland’s most famous performance animals and plants. As a place, Tainaron is hard The Helsinki Philharmonic Orchestra is The production builds on the common company around the globe, Oblivia is to pin down: totally unrecognizable and yet conducted by Susanna Mälkki. Tero Saarinen cultural heritage of both Estonia and Finland, known for its grandiose ideas and minimalist disturbingly familiar. It is a realm populated Company’s dance soloists Auri Ahola, Misa and moves through different mythological performances. Oblivia audiences have come to by sapient insects, apparently doomed to Lommi and David Scarantino perform together and evolutionary layers that relate to mass expect unexpected, yet recognisable oblivian imminent destruction. The outsider observes with cellist Oren Shevlin. Lighting and set migration, taking tropes from the Bible experiences. The performances will leave your the city’s way of life with curiosity, and sends designer and costume designer up to how salmon rush to spawn with a jaws aching from laughter and confusion. letters to those of us who are still here, in the Erika Turunen create a unique visual world on speed almost suicidal. But even though the world we know, blindly immersed in our own stage. movement can be forward direction, it is The core group of Oblivia has invited a group reality. driven by a longing to find the way back − to of young people from Helsinki to join the The concert ends with Richard Strauss’ the origins, to the amniotic fluid of human kind. working group for Children and Other Radicals. Against a magical dystopia full of poetry and impressive An Alpine Symphony. The dizzying The production will thus create a new and The teens work with highly experienced artists hope, the work explores life’s process of tone poem, completed in 1915, carries the completely fictional situation, relating both to in an equal setting, using art to look at money mourning the past, encountering the unknown audience to the middle of a grand mountain our archaic drives as well as our contemporary and economic structures. and accepting change. landscape. desires. Demos YOUR COMPANY DAVIDE GIOVANZANA & WORKING GROUP: KALLE NIO: THE GREEN ANNA PAAVILAINEN: PLAY RAPE LEHMAN TRILOGY In the medieval theatre actors slang the Play Rape is a declaration of an angry woman, acting area, the stage was referred to as The an icy monologue about the problematics Lehman Trilogy by Stefano Massini tells the Green, as it was often covered in grass. Hence of rape scenes in the theatre of 21st century rise and the downfall of the Lehman Brothers we have the still popular term Green Room, Finland. Actor, playwright and director Anna one of the most important and influential referring to the room closest to the stage. Paavilainen got fed up with submission and THEO CLINKARD, MARIA NURMELA & VILLE bank in the world, which collapsed suddenly wanted to do things in her own way. Freedom OINONEN: ‘WE TOLD YOU THERE WOULD BE following the financial crisis in 2007. It explores The Green is a solo stage performance by of speech and shame meet in a face-off that NO CERTAINTY’ (WORKING TITLE) how the dream of three brothers became Kalle Nio. Visual theatre that uses stage magic, goes far beyond personal experience, deep a merciless machine crushing everything. video projections and surround sound as its down into the power structures of our society. Over the last six years, UK-based The play depicts the evolution of economy means of expression. choreographer and designer, Theo Clinkard, and capitalism towards modern society - our Play Rape was premiered in 2014, and has built a reputation for creating affecting and society - where the work is de-materialized The thematic core for The Green forms from launched a giant wave of discussion in Finland visually arresting work. Recent commissions and where the notion of “profit” absorbs every hauntology, spirituality in the act of consuming about the position of female actors, the for Tanztheater Wuppertal Pina Bausch and human relations. and the unboxing videos of Youtube. The responsibility of directors and playwrights, Danza Contemporanea de Cuba, alongside Green sees shopping and commerce as the and the facts that keep up the patriarchy creations for his company, have established With this play, Davide Giovanzana and his modern day spiritual and magical ritual as the - years before #metoo. Translations into him as a fresh choreographic voice and earned working group are aiming to explore how shopping mall replaces the palace of worship. English, Swedish and German, as well as guest him both critical acclaim and a loyal following. theatre can make economy understandable The Green is a show without words. It’s a visual performances abroad have shown that the in a human way and more globally how theatre performance that mixes elements from play’s themes touch a universal nerv and are Clinkard’s work has long been dealing with art and economy can relate to each other. puppetry, video projections and visual arts and topical around the globe. balancing practical and poetic languages For this, they plan to invite economists combines them with the methods coming from within performance, designing choreographic and professionals of the financial sector to 19th century stage magic. The Green tries to structures that allow space for sensorial dialogue with or to contest the “characters” of find new ways to use magic as an expressive experience for performer and audience alike. the play; the Lehman family. In parallel, they element, but at the same time it stretches and wish to give as well a space of expression to questions the definition of magic and asks ‘We told you there would be no certainty’, people affected by the financial crisis. what is magic anyway? is a distillation of this ongoing practice, housed within the bodies of two exceptional The production is at its early stages. It will In addition to the classic methods and secrets performers, Maria Nurmela and Ville Oinonen. be created in autumn 2020 and will be of theatrical magic, it sees the suggestive and For this duet, one single movement task performed in three parts in different places magical light, scent and sonic interior design of sustains over the duration of the work to of Helsinki connected to economy (banks, modern shopping malls as magical. provide an ever shifting physical, emotional Stock exchange,recycling centre). The first and metaphorical landscape acting as a step of the work will be a theatre installation The Green will be premiered in 2019. prompt for us to recognise the multiple, presented at Espoo city theatre in October complex and layered states of being together. 2018. Demos YOUR COMPANY Pitchings / CIRCUS SAARA TURUNEN: THE PHANTOM OF NORMALITY CIRCUS AIKAMOINEN: What does it mean to be normal? The The show draws it’s inspiration and CIRCUS I LOVE YOU - AN UTOPIAN CIRCUS Phantom of Normality owes inspiration to atmosphere from the modern ways of social Luis Buñuel’s film The Phantom of Liberty. separation and togetherness, urban life A Nordic circus without animals - absurd, Where Buñuel’s film investigates freedom, this and experiences. Urbotek balances surreal death defying, simple and happy. theatre piece pierces our assumptions of the ambience, strong energy and often suprisingly commonplace. traditional but fresh circus acts into a show, The show is an hour long cross composition which has been quoted as the “perfect first of acrobatics and live music using the The play combines and fragments habits circus show to see for new audiences of composition tools of music pieces. We direct and traditions, pouring forth the relentless circus”. our power of action into a family friendly show. struggle of the everyday and the exceptional; of discipline and chaos. The Phantom of Circus I love you was created to fill the void Normality explores the yearning for the of a circus without animals touring with ordinary, the fear of difference, and the horror its tent in the Nordic countries. Our crew of standing out from the crowd. It guides the is an international mix of mobile millenials viewer to think about the norms and diversity embracing the nomad circus life on tour. The without moralistic lesson. collaboration is a logical continuum for the slow life trend standing for voluntary simplicity, The Phantom of Normality is a melodic collage power of action and culture for all. We come from which an absurd, melancholy world from five different countries and through our emerges. It is a sharp illustration of weirdness Race Horse Company: Urbotek ©Jouni Ihalainen acrobatics want to generate for the audience of our habits and traditions, but also a tribute a peaceful inspiration towards taking action in to the beauty and the momentary of life. their own lives.

The play premiered at Q-Teatteri in Helsinki in 2016 and due to it´s great success continued in RACE HORSE COMPANY: URBOTEK the theater´s program during the year 2017.

Urbotek is the latest creation of the award winning contemporary circus group Race Horse Company, which premiered in November 2017 in . The show takes place in an alternative shadow world of the modern society, urbanization and entertainment, as six circus artists collide with work, pleasure and search of fulfillment.

Phantom of Normality ©Pate Pesonius Pitchings / CIRCUS Pitchings / CIRCUS

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WHS / KALLE NIO: LÄHTÖ / DÉPART WHS / KALLE NIO: CUTTING EDGE SANNA SILVENNOINEN (CIRCO AEREO) SIVUHENKILÖT (WORKING GROUP): & THOM MONCKTON: THE ARTIST THERE’S NO ROOM FOR MY WINGS There is a woman and a man, who have a Cutting Edge is visual stage magic and complicated relationship. Confused, they stand physical theatre performance for three The artist tries to begin his creation process Sivuhenkilöt is a fearless group of nine Finnish on a stage, surrounded by clothes. Feelings performers. The visual inspiration for the show but the inspiration is completely lost. The focus cross-disciplinary artists from theatre, circus and thoughts are expressed through the are the historical paintings, images and myths strays, the blank canvas terrifies, and the tools and dance field. Their goal is to combine movement of their bodies – and the movement about decapitations. have been lost to the bowels of the atelier. theatre with contemporary circus so that the of the clothes, which have a life of their own. WHY and the WOW are equally important as

The oldest documented magic trick is by the The Artist follows the success of Circo Aereo’s are the ordinary and the magical. There’s no Lähtö / Départ is directed by magician and ancient magician Dedi who performed for and Thom Monckton’s previous collaboration, room for my wings is their second production visual artist Kalle Nio. The performance brings Pharaoh Khufu. The story tells he could cut a The Pianist, which has proven a smash hit with after a hugely successful Sidekicks in 2016. It to the stage a couple that has drifted apart head of an animal and put it back together. The critics and audiences around the world. Since premieres in August 2019. from each other and is now floating in the trick of decapitation has been in the repertory 2013, it has been performed more than 300 middle of dreamlike imagery and illusions. of magicians ever since. times in Scandinavia, Canada, New Zealand, There’s no room for my wings tells a story Inspired by the work of 19th century magicians’ France, UK, Netherlands, Australia, Russia, of characters in a small office with a need stage illusions, the performance creates a Cutting Edge balances between creating and USA… The Pianist was nominated for a Best to control their emotions and failing in it, mysterious atmosphere where absurd humor destroying illusions. The show asks what is Performance prize at Edinburgh Fringe festival transforming to birds when trying. It is a and tragedy alternate. The piece will provide magic trick by taking classical illusions and in 2014. crooked, playful and enchanting performance a unique theatre experience in which circus, streching them to boundary of not being Like The Pianist, The Artist is co-designed about the need to hide our true selves in a magic, dance, clothing design and visual arts magic no longer. On the stage there are three by Sanna Silvennoinen, circus artist, culture where burying emotions is a norm. It merge. persons, two women and one man. Their choreographer and director of Circo Aereo, uses elements of aerial acrobatics, physical strong physical presence, movements and and Thom Monckton, New Zealand-born, theatre, wings, weight, laughter and shame. “Ingenious visual trickery” – The Stage bodies will mix together and will be cut into internationally acclaimed circus artist. The Office meets Hitchcock’s The Birds. pieces by the ways of stage illusions. The style of the show is balancing between dark The group consists of theatre director Alma humor and minimalistic tragedy. By jumping Lehmuskallio, dramaturge Eira Virekoski, from style to another the performance takes scenographer Janne Vasama, sound designer very twisted and dark look into these horrible Joonas Outakoski, lighting designer Ainu images and makes a combination of magic Palmu, circus artists Milla Järvinen, Henna show, baroque theatre, Kaikula and Saku Mäkelä and actress Ulla and visual arts. Raitio.

The Artist ©Antti Saukko Inspired by Afro Futurism, Iduozee ́s latest In Veli Lehtovaara’s new work, Conversations, Pitchings / YOURDANCE COMPANY creation revises the Creation Story, by three dancers converse through using the myth of the lost paradise as a movement with other forms of nature, their dramaturgical framework. By reconstructing contemporaries, their ancestors, each other, MAIJA HIRVANEN: ART & LOVE IMA IDUOZEE: THIS IS THE TITLE the narrative of Adam & Eve the work re- and the audience. The register of the group imagines the past and envisions a utopian conversation oscillates between what’s logical Love is an eroded, worn out, misused, On a blindingly white dance floor This Is future that is eccentric, inclusive and and poetic, what’s philosophical and practical, contaminated word. The Title unfolds with fluid elegance. The ever changing. The work premiered and and what’s imaginary and actual. Love is the most important word of all. distinctive approach to movement comes played in 3.8.-7.8.2017 during three sold out Love is the more difficult and more incorrect from Iduozee’s background in breaking, performances. The performance combines choreographic, sibling of empathy. contemporary dance and physical theatre. The philosophical, and visual forms of thinking. It Love is a verb. performer emerges in a space that radiates gives attention to what unites human beings around him in a very delicate way, reviving our with other living beings in different stages and Art and Love is Maija Hirvanen’s choreographic thirst for light, calmness and freedom. Alluring SONJA JOKINIEMI: BLAB scales of life especially from the perspective lecture performance. The material of the work lighting and sound design complete this of corporeality, perception and movement. is love that comes in many forms. How to do minimalist world, where the power and grace Blab is a hybrid performance, a blend of Becoming a member of choreography is an and perform love? What is the part of love in of the performer captivate our imagination and painting, sculpture and choreography. It event of belonging. art? senses. The work has received international seeks to escape the world of categories acclaim, touring in 14 countries across the towards the unknowns; towards unions and The scenography of the performance is Art and Love takes a look at shared and globe. blurs of humans and objects, extensions and created by visual artist and filmmaker Eija- learned conceptions of love and harnesses expansions of different bodies, penetrations of Liisa Ahtila. Together with the moving image, them into something that quickens the heart. forms and acts of desire. the light design by Luc Schaltinin, and the Nature fantasies, the dark side of romantic sound design by Jani Hietanen form a strong love, love as an object, love of the unknown The work unfolds itself in the transforming audiovisual entity, which comprehends the and love of art appear in highly charged multisensorial sculpture, the essence of which dance. juxtapositions inside the performance. charts a subconscious territory. The mind of the performance is built on a foundation of The work is inspired by a text of Martin Art and Love does not repeat syrupy and linguistic indefinability, senses and reflexes. Heidegger’s written in 1944-45: A Triadic stereotypical images of love, but invites the The work explores lumpy, tangled thought Conversation on a Country Path between a viewer to go through one’s own areas and processes that have neither beginning nor an Scientist, a Scholar and a Guide. The text is a limits of love. Speech and physical acts run in end. IMA IDUOZEE: THE GARDEN OF EDEN philosophical and poetic contemplation on the parallel in the dramaturgy of the performance. relation between human beings, nature, and in this fiction, the afrofuture shimmers. technology. it forgets itself. it re-visits it embraces the ancestorial ghosts VELI LEHTOVAARA: CONVERSATIONS it doesn’t like all that it reveals. it rewrites | PELTOTIEKESKUSTELU saturated by experience it redefines its own corporeality fluid and in Living is a form of movement – from seaweed constant flux to birds, from trees to snakes, and from

Maija Hirvanen: Art and Love ©Kristiina Männikkö its reveals itself bacteria to human beings. Peltotiekeskustelu ©Liisa Takala Pitchings / DANCE Pitchings / DANCE

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SONYA LINDFORS: COSMIC LATTE VALTTERI RAEKALLIO: ONEIRON Part III: After the performance fades out without applause, the space is transformed It is year 2018. A person separated from their own life, in into a communal wake that honors those A brown artist is sitting on a brown stage. a post-death limbo from which there is no that have passed away and brings the living A brown artist is sitting on a brown stage escape. Time has ceased to exist; the stories together for an atmospheric dinner over soup dreaming of a future still unimaginable. and movement languages of people meet and and bread. It is year 3018. intertwine, revealing new layers of themselves A brown artist is sitting on a brown stage. Cosmic Latte ©Ernest Protasiewicz and each other; joining finally into a shared A brown artist is sitting on a brown stage. It communion facing the smallest common no longer means anything but still feels like denominator of all humanity - death itself. something. Valtteri Raekallio’s evening-length dance work, choreographed for six dancers and Cosmic Latte departs from a utopian project based on the Finlandia award winning novel of playing/reimagining the future we cannot by Laura Lindstedt, takes the audience on a yet imagine. It is the year 3018 and we live breathtaking multisensory journey. in a world that escapes definitions and Oneiron ©Stefan Bremer categories. The logic of our thinking has Oneiron combines site-specific performance changed, because black and white are no SONYA LINDFORS: NOBLE SAVAGE art, a walk-through radio play, a traditional longer opposites. Instead, they contain one stage-based ensemble dance piece and : BREATH another. Borderlines have become less steep, Noble Savage is a piece that studies communal dinner into a single evening-length meanings mix like liquids. colonialized bodies and racialized experience. The work is composed of three Live music, dance and visuals intertwine to representation. In the piece blackness is a sections that are performed sequentially create wild forms and mythical images – Afrofuturism, a term coined in 1993 by Mark mythical, mystical and untamed landscape during the same evening: infused by Beckett-inspired existentialism and Dery, provides the framework for the radical that both creates and deconstructs meaning. absurd humour.

dreaming that is Cosmic Latte. The term, Blackness and the black performers act as Part I: Site-specific performances outside the initially used in sci-fi contexts, defined, terrain for the viewer’s fantasies, dreams, venue as well as a radio play that the audience Two globally acclaimed Finnish artists, reimagined and dreamed blackness and expectations and fears. By facing the viewer’s listens to with headphones. choreographer-dancer Tero Saarinen and black identity. Afrofuturism dreamed of a gaze the work attempts to escape it’s own accordionist Kimmo Pohjonen, take measure

place where freedom, equality, past, present otherness. It attempts to shake the existing Part II: The audience and performers convene on each other on stage, composing a power and future are come together in a mystical norm and instead recentralize itself. in a white, empty theatre space. The virtuosic web of sound and movement. Bessie-award interzone that escapes all limitations and ensemble dance work explores the world of winning wizard of stage and lighting design, borders. Sonya Lindfors is a Helsinki-based the novel from multiple viewpoints, combining Mikki Kunttu, will add his spell on the work. The choreographer and the artistic director of the intense solos, duets and ensemble scenes duet is further enhanced by the imaginative Afrofuturism, contemporary art, West African UrbanApa community. She uses her works to with recorded text, spatial sound design and sound design of Tuomas Norvio, known cosmologies, Sun Ra and Bach are placed side shake up power structures. Sonya Lindfors austere yet carefully crafted lighting. for his work in electronic music. Costumes by side on a stage, which is porous, diverse was Zodiak’s house choreographer during the are by fashion designer Teemu Muurimäki. and beige. season 2017–2018. Choreographer’s Assistant is Henrikki Heikkilä. Pitchings / DANCE YOUR COMPANY Pitchings / THEATRE

ELINA PIRINEN: BRUME DE MER NOORA DADU: MY PALESTINE - My Palestine is a personal story about identity that’s created by various influences, memories, ”The forest falls in their ears and their mouths A MONOLOGUE FOR TWO ACTORS false memories, interpretations, hard facts and drown into colors. My Palestine is a deeply personal and directly a personal struggle. Through the personal the They go to the wet mountains, kind gods, evil political monologue play for two actors. Main play deals with the general topic of the history flowers.” character is the author and director of the of Israel’s establishment and the occupation of

play, Noora Dadu, who tells the story of one Palestine. The tone of the play switches from Brume de Mer is a physical and vocal sonata Finnish-Palestinian Finnish-speaking Finland- farcical humour and almost stand-up comedy painted by Elina Pirinen and her workgroup. It based actor struggling with Palestine, a place to direct political lecturing — in the end Dadu consists of the sheer volume of the combined she knows partly from her childhood home even sincerely proposes a solution to the abstraction of psycho-neurologically rich and in Kuusankoski, Finland and mainly from the conflict, not easy but possible. emotional ring dance, a lyrical field sung in a news filled with bombs and suffering kids. peculiar manner, scents, intoxicating visions of duration and organ music that accumulates in Being Palestinian is political. This play shares the soul. with the audience some highlights from

Dadu’s 14-year long trying-to-understand- Brume de Mer fumbles for, deforms and Palestine-journey starting from 9/11/2001. reforms new expressions for desire, obsession, Trying to be an activist. Failing. Making a fool mutism, killing and intuition. The sonoric stage of herself. Trying to discuss atheism with a consists of tremendous organ composition muslim relative. Trying to argue with a christian NOORA DADU: FAIL - A FLAWED PERFORMANCE made by the performance makers and zionist in an aeroplane. Being interrogated at featured by Russian composer Viktor Suslin Noora Dadu’s Fail is a play that deconstructs Ben Gurion Airport for 6 hours. Struggling with and his Sonata no. 2 for Organ. her previous play, My Palestine. Both works are racism and hate and with questions of love

about identity, but Fail is about those aspects and forgiveness. Trying to find a way to act The performance is a self-standing instalment of identity that are not given but chosen. and finding it finally on stage. of Pirinen’s series of works based on Russian Fail is an attempt to create a stage that’s a compositions. For the artists of the workgroup, place where anything is possible, a place of The first part is mainly a monologue, a Brume de Mer is a delightful and novel metamorphosis and shared existence. performance lecture. The second part is more comeback. theatrical and has more dialogue, with the It starts with a simple stage: a styrox cabin in supporting actor Iida-Maria, who plays various the middle of the stage. Inside the cabin Noora Israeli characters. Dadu is talking into a microphone, as if she was making some kind of radio show, looking out through the cabin’s window. Pitchings / THEATRE Pitchings / THEATRE

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She talks funny stuff, regrets some parts Conceptualized and directed by Anna-Mari in her previous play, makes jokes, shows Karvonen and Anni Puolakka, Amor fati was the audience 7 or 8 alternative futures co-created and performed by the working she has, answers phone calls from theatre group including sound designer Tatu Nenonen, directors, and refuses several Arab roles she actor Samuli Niittymäki, and stage and light is offered. She talks about identity and about designer Heikki Paasonen. representation, about being an actor and what SVENSKA TEATERN: it means, takes various roles and lets them preach to the audience. HERMAN MELVILLE/MILJA SARKOLA: I Would Prefer Not To ©Cata Portin JUHANI NUORVALA/JUHA SILTANEN I WOULD PREFER NOT TO In the end the form of the performance breaks /ERIK SÖDERBLOM: FLASH FLASH into improvised, a bit chaotic part with surprise I Would Prefer Not To is based on the visitors or a guests. Some kind of dialogue Juhani Nuorvala’s opera is based on the American writer Herman Melville’s short story FRANZ KAFKA/CHRISTOFFER MELLGREN: starts, maybe with a sense of joy. life and works of the American pop artist ”Bartley – The Scrivener”. The story is simple; FÖRVANDLINGEN - THE METAMORPHOSIS and media personality, Andy Warhol. Flash one day a scrivener on Wall Street declines the Fail is a praise for failure. And free tits. Fail is a Flash describes a person and a culture tasks he is given for no apparent reason. He The life of an ordinary family is disrupted in manifestation for a human being that cannot that are forced by their own history to flirt does not exactly refuse work, but he prefers Franz Kafka’s short story “The Metamorphosis”, be identified by anyone else but herself. Fail with destruction and death, substituting not to do it. He prefers not to spell-check his when the family’s sole breadwinner Gregor reaches beyond the political and structural personal experience and self-knowledge with documents. He prefers not to write them. And Samsa, wakes up and finds he has been to something unidentified, fuzzy and funny. consuming people, time, sexuality. At its core much to his employer’s despair, he prefers not transformed into a giant insect. His parents and Fail liberates the stage from the burdens of lies a simple and coherent story of a lonely to give a reason for this behaviour. his sister are out of their minds. Suddenly they storytelling and of authenticity too. It liberates man surrounded by people, but interwoven are responsible for chores, weekly earnings and gives mercy. in it and surrounding it there is a portrait of I Would Prefer Not To by the highly acclaimed and debt, while their son and brother crawls American culture, placed, through the opera writer and director Milja Sarkola examines on the walls of his now closed-off bedroom. form, in one frame with European tradition. Bartleby, and his mysterious presence. Who is Gregor’s sister is the only one who dares ANNA-MARI KARVONEN: AMOR FATI Thus, it is a double portrait picturing both an he? A rebel? A despondent? An irresponsible facing him. But is it still Gregor, in spite of his opera and its “hero”. worker? Who is someone that refuses to new condition? Does he hear her, does he

A certain earthly material enchants our explain and define himself to the people understand her, does he remember all the protagonist Brad, who has drifted into a life Flash Flash is a crazy piece of work, not so around him? things they’ve experienced together? crisis and a type of raw condition. He works on much “about” Warhol as it is set around the the clay and caresses it. He feels the need to idea of him. It’s written in just intonation, highly I Would Prefer Not To is a performance about Christoffer Mellgren’s new adaptation and unite with it. He wants to decay into it. rhythmic, and highly lyrical, with heavy use passive resistance, social responsibility and director Carl Knif examine the family unit and of stage projections and lights. It could be alienation. It received great critical and popular the forces that can disrupt such a closed The performance premiered at the Kiasma defined as “populist high art”: it is manic and success at the Swedish Theatre in Helsinki entity. How much can the people close to us Theater, as part of ARS17 exhibition which meditative, tasteless and touching, superficial in the spring of 2018, and will be shown at change, before we can no longer recognise dealt with digital revolution and showcased and probing, all at once. Above all, though, it is the Tampere Theatre Festival this upcoming and love them? How do we measure a artists of the new millenium. human, and grounded in a heartfelt emotion. summer. person’s worth? What is a successful person? Pitchings / THEATRE Pitchings / THEATRE

YOUR COMPANY

Kafka’s surreal nightmare was staged with KRISTIAN SMEDS: FROZEN IMAGES MINNA LEINO & WAUHAUS: great success at the Swedish Theatre in SAPIENS (WORKING TITLE) - Helsinki in the spring of 2016, and was invited Frozen images offers a glimpse into the souls FROM ANIMAL TO SELF-MADE GOD to the annual Tampere Theatre Festival. In and fates of the people who inhabit the harsh The Finnish National Theatre is creating the spring of 2019 it will tour with landscape of the North. the world première of Yuval Noah Harari’s Riksteatern. international best-seller Sapiens: a Brief FINNISH NATIONAL A single mother raises her kids by drawing on History of Humankind. Opening on the Main THEATRE: hate and anger. A drowned boy observes the Stage in September 2019, Sapiens will be way of the world from the bottom of a lake. A LARS NORÉN/SOPHIA JUPITHER: EPISODE adapted by the FNT’s dramaturg Minna Leino young girl tries to break free from her mother’s MINNA LEINO: OLD MASTERS - A COMEDY and realized in collaboration with leading apron strings but the big wide world offers no We get to meet six people in different stages cross-disciplinary arts collective succor. Even a wise old woman’s faith in life, of their lives under a single house viewing: In the Bordone Room of Vienna’s W A U H A U S, known for its bold audio-visual god and art is shaken. The owners of the house who want to sell it Kunsthistorisches Museum, there hangs a aesthetics. The piece will be directed by the in order to leave the sorrow and stagnation in famous work by Tintoretto: Portait of a White- collective’s founding member Anni Klein, Life is grim, bleak and brutal, but punctuated their life; the middle-age couple that need a Bearded Man. Sitting in quiet contemplation of working together with choreographer Jarkko by sudden flashes of dark humour. Written and new project in order to find a spark between the painting is Reger, music critic and tireless Partanen, scenographers Samuli Laine (set) directed by Kristian Smeds. Performed by Pirjo them again; and a younger couple that has seeker of authenticity. Reger in turn is being Jani-Matti Salo (light) and Laura Haapakangas Luoma-aho, Esa-Matti Long, Petri Manninen, just recently begun their journey through life contemplated by author and philosopher (costumes), as well as sound designers Heidi Rea Mauranen ja Taisto Reimaluoto. together. Lives intersect for a short moment Atzbacher, who himself is contemplated by the Soidinsalo and Jussi Matikainen. Finnish and shake the foundations of old building museum attendant Irrsigler. contemporary dance company Zodiak will also stones. What do we do because we want to be involved in the production. do it, and what do we do because we think we Sporting long white beards as in Tintoretto’s have to? portrait, each of these three men has been In Minna Leino’s interpretation of Harari’s work, placed on his own white pedestal. The ensuing Sapiens tells the story of a species inclined The renowned Swedish dramatist Lars Norén discourse flows like a piece of music, creating to tell stories, presented by an ensemble of describes our attempts at reaching each other a performance whose thematic sweep both actors and dancers in a powerfully visual in the midst of our lives with great tenderness. encompasses replicas, forgeries, loneliness, performance. Episode is a collaboration between Jupither originality, theatre, kitsch, graveyards, Josephsson Theatre Company, The Swedish Viennese toilets and monstrously over-rated Seventy thousand years ago Homo Sapiens Theatre in Helsinki, Riksteatern and the city old masters. was a creature of minor importance pottering theatres in Malmö, and Uppsala. around a corner of Africa. Over the next It was received to much acclaim during its Thomas Bernhard’s hilariously vitriolic critique, millennia, it reinvented itself as lord and premiere in Malmö in April 2018, and will be first published in 1985, is a modern classic. This master of the planet – and the biggest threat shown at the Swedish Theatre in the fall of production has been specially conceived to be to its ecosystem. Nowadays Sapiens is 2018. performed in a museum. becoming a self-made god, bent on acquiring both eternal youth and the divine power to create and destroy. YOUR COMPANY

PERFORMANCES: PITCHINGS DANCE:

Heini Junkkaala: Axel Maija Hirvanen: Art & Love Oblivia: Childer and Other Radicals Ima Iduozee: This Is The Title Essi Rossi: Tainaron Ima Iduozee: The Garden of Eden Tero Saarinen Company: Zimmermann Trio Sonja Jokiniemi: Blab Theatre NO99 & Jalostamo2: Ship of Fools (live stream Veli Lehtovaara: Conversations (Peltotiekeskustelu) from Tallinn) Sonya Lindfors: Cosmic Latte Sonya Lindfors: Noble Savage DEMOS: Elina Pirinen: Brume de Mer Valtteri Raekallio: Oneiron Davide Giovanzane & working group: Lehmann Brothers Tero Saarinen Company: Breath WHS/Kalle Nio: Green Anna Paavilainen: Play Rape PITCHINGS THEATRE: Saara Turunen: The Phantom of Normality

Theo Clinkard, Maria Nurmela & Ville Oinonen: I told you Noora Dadu: My Palestine there would be no certainty Noora Dadu: FAIL - a flawed performance Sophia Jupither: Episode PITCHINGS CIRCUS: Anna-Mari Karvonen: Amor Fati Carl Knif: The Metamorphosis Circus Aikamoinen: Circus I Love You - an utopian circus Minna Leino: Old Masters - A Comedy Race Horse Company: Urbotek Milja Sarkola: I Would Prefer Not To WHS/Kalle Nio: Lähtö / Départ Kristian Smeds: Frozen Images WHS/Kalle Nio: Cutting Edge Minna Leino & WAUHAUS: Sapiens (working title) - From Sanna Silvennoinen (Circo Aereo) & Thom Monckton: The animal to self-made god Artist YOUR COMPANY Performing HEL – Performing Arts Showcase in Helsinki 31.8.–2.9.2018 Sat 1.9.

At 10.30am Demo Anna Paavilainen: Play Rape Lavaklubi, National Theatre

Thu 30.8. HEAD START At 11.00am Theatre Pitchings (approx. 90 minutes) Lavaklubi, National Theatre At 7pm Performance Oblivia: Children and Other Radicals Alminsali, National Opera At 1pm Lunch at Lavaklubi

From 2pm to 5pm Seminar on International Cooperation & Touring in Performing Arts Field WHS Theatre Fri 31.8. Keynote speakers and panelists tbc

At 11am Demo Kalle Nio: Green At 7pm Performance Essi Rossi: Tainaron WHS Theatre National Theatre, small stage

At 11.30am Circus Pitchings (approx. 60 minutes) At approx. 8pm Live stream from Tallinn Jalostamo2 & WHS Theatre NO99: Ship of Fools Lavaklubi, National Theatre At 12.30am Lunch at WHS

At 2pm Demo Theo Clinkard & Maria Nurmela & Ville Oinonen: ´we told you there would be no certainty’ (working title) WHS Theatre Sun 2.9.

At 2.30pm Dance Pitchings (approx. 2 hours) At 11am Demo Saara Turunen: Phantom of Normality WHS Theatre WHS Theatre

At 7pm Performance Essi Rossi: Tainaron At 1pm Demo Davide Giovanzane & working group: National Theatre, small stage Lehmann Brothers Lavaklubi, National Theatre At 7pm Performance Tero Saarinen Company: Zimmermann Trio At 4pm Performance Heini Junkkaala: Axel Helsinki Music Centre, Concert Hall Lavaklubi, National Theatre