PQ CAT Institut del Teatre Institut del Teatre

Invited by:

Quadrienal de Praga

Eighth participation of the Institut del Teatre representing Catalonia at the Prague Scenography Quadrennial

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PRESENTATION

This year was the first time that Catalonia took part independently in the Prague Scenography Quadrennial.

At the Institut del Teatre we were thrilled to mark this starting point and worked to continue and consolidate this participation in forthcoming editions.

With the mottos of CATALAN WAYS (national section), NEW WAYS (school section) and THEATRE IN THE CITY’S HIDDEN FOLDS (theatre space section), we wanted to reflect precisely on how artistic activity relates to the territory where it occurs and its environment.

Territories are not closed and unconnected places, they are areas with particular characters and impulses.

What sense is there in talking about borders?

We prefer to talk about threshold of mergers between cultures.

The open paths in a territory are irradiated, merged and grow beyond their borders.

ALFONS FLORES, FRANC ALEU and LLUC CASTELLS are scenographers and explorers in search of new paths and new styles; explorers and creators who crossed the borders of Catalonia but who, with their artistic activity, have also questioned the border separating stage arts from the rest of the arts.

Are they Catalan scenographers or artists of the world?

They are undoubtedly EVERYTHING.

Each of them with their own particular universe. Together they produce worlds of fiction that are always new and always surprise, linked to the impulse and context of the time; always different from what came before and from what will come. Their unceasingly active spirit captivates us and invites us to want to see their creative universes close up.

In CATALAN WAYS we presented a significant part of the work they have shown around the world.

The work we presented from the schools section under the motto of NEW WAYS stressed this need to seek and explore new paths and new styles. The Institut del Teatre de Barcelona wants to give this drive, promoting the most genuine creation of each individual or group. Each and every one of the pupils has their own voice, all of the voices form the identity of the school, which necessarily changes with every year that passes.

In the theatre space section, we asked ourselves where all of these artistic activities born out of particular impulses and concerns are situated.

What is their relationship with their surroundings? What is the site we choose from stage arts to be situated in the urban fabric of cities? What theatre cartographies do we draw on our social maps? What new looks do already known cities produce? What experiences do we draw from them?

THE CITY AS A STIMULUS, questioned all of these subjects in the context of Barcelona and aimed to export the content of the study and the live experience to the city of Prague.

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Lluc Castells interview. © Alfonso Ferri