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PARTNERS AND ARTISTIC TEAM

ARTEMREDE

Artemrede is a cultural cooperation project operating uninterruptedly for the last 12 years. It currently gathers 15 Portuguese municipalities, therefore promoting the interaction between cities of different scales. Artemrede focuses on the specificities of the territories through its support to artistic creation, cultural programming in network, qualification, training and designing of strategies for cultural mediation.

Artemrede was established on January 5, 2005 as a non-profit cultural organisation. Since then, Artemrede contributes to a regular cultural offer to its members, coproduces performances, organises specialized trainings, develops community projects and other initiatives which involve different cultural agents and audiences.

In 2016, Artemrede launched its first Political Forum. Simultaneously it also gave its first steps in the process of internationalisation by receiving funding from the Creative Europe programme to implement the project A Manual on Work and Happiness. Two of its members, the municipalities of Alcobaça and Montijo joined the project.

PERGINE SPETTACOLO APERTO

Pergine Spettacolo Aperto is a cultural association based in Pergine Valsugana (Italy) that every year, since 1976, runs the Pergine Spettacolo Aperto Festival. The Festival’s aim is to commission, curate and deliver high quality, interdisciplinary art and live events, at national and international level, while fostering collaborations with the city, its inhabitants and local organisations.

Created as a summer stage for local audiences, the festival grew over time becoming a cultural benchmark in the region, planning and implementing high-quality artistic trainings, workshops and productions.

In 2007, the Festival started to explore the controversial heritage of Pergine, the former Mental Asylum, concentrating its productions on the themes of marginality, mental illness and deviance. In 2011 the Festival won the Best Territory Improvement Award from Festival of Festivals association. In 2012, after the closure of its open-air theatre, the Festival reshaped its format and mission, fostering a reconnection to the local dimension through an international perspective.

The festival revitalised abandoned places of the town through site-specific and participatory projects with the local community, while delivering a thematically focused international programme of contemporary theatre and performance, and a special audience development project to improve accessibility for people with disabilities to venues and programme content.

In the framework ofA Manual on Work and Happiness project, the Festival will host the International Seminar, a training session of the Southern Coalition, as well a residency which will lead to a public performance scheduled for July 2018.

L’ARBORETO – TEATRO DIMORA DI MONDAINO 

Created in 1998, L’arboreto is a cultural organization recognized locally and internationally for the quality of its activities. L’arboreto’s aim is to enhance the culture of theatre and performing arts, through, among others, two main activities: training and creative residencies.

The Theatre Dimora – which opened in 2004 – and the two guest houses – built in Mondaino (Rimini province, Emilia-Romagna region) in an arboretum park of nine hectares with about 6,000 types of plants – make L’arboreto a unique structure in Italy, particularly suitable for the research and the production of new artistic contemporary works. Guests can develop all sort of performing arts. Emerging artists and projects intending to develop and involve audiences are particularly welcome.

In 2016, L’Arboreto takes, for two seasons, the artistic direction of the Teatro Sociale Novafeltria (Rimini), with a project entitled “Teatro Sociale Novafeltria. A small-town theater for the tradition of contemporary performing arts”. It is also a lead partner of the network Rete Teatrale Valmarecchia (Rimini province).

L’Arboreto won a Special Prize of the UBU AWARDS 2016, one of the most prominent prizes for Italian theatre, which recognises the quality and rigor of twenty years of activity.

In the framework ofA Manual on Work and Happiness project, L’arboreto will host theatre company mala voadora and Pablo Gisbet during the writing residency of the play and open its headquarters to the very first public reading of the manual. L’arboreto will also organise a training session of the Southern Coalition.

 MUNICIPAL AND REGIONAL THEATRE OF PATRAS

The Municipal and Regional Theatre of Patras (DI.PE.THE. Patras) was founded in 1988 and since then, it has been working with significant artists in several theatre productions staged all over Greece. Since 2012 DI.PE.THE. Patras has its own Drama School, which is the only drama training centre out of the territories of Athens and Thessaloniki. It also owns an Opera Studio which does not only provide training to lyrical singers but it also produces concerts and operas. Furthermore, the it collaborates with the department of theatre studies of the University of Patras,  co-organising workshops, lectures and events.

DI.PE.THE. Patras’ activities extend to multiple artistic and cultural sectors through the implementation of special projects, educational programs, organization of conferences, festivals, exhibitions and publications, as well as community-orientated project which promote the involvement of the local audiences and encourage social integration. DI.PE.THE. Patras runs drama workshops for children, teachers, teenagers, theatre practitioners, and adults. It also implements projects targeting minority groups such as immigrants, people in rehab and mental health patients.

In the framework ofA Manual on Work and Happiness project, DI.PE.THE. Patras organises a training session of the Southern Coalition and hosts a residency and performance with the participation of local inhabitants.

MALA VOADORA


mala voadora is an artistic project that operates in a triangle between (1) the experience of making  theatre by resetting each new show what this “theatre” can be; (2) the creation of events and programmes which gather artists and/or artists and people; And (3) the use of a house at Rua do Almada, in Porto, with several work spaces and residency.

It was founded in 2003 by Jorge Andrade (director, actor and playwright) and José Capela (set designer and architect), both responsible for the artistic direction, to which joined, in 2013, Vânia Rodrigues as management and programming coordinator and Joana Costa Santos, now in charge of the production management.

Besides Portugal, where it has already been staged at the most relevant theatres, mala voadora has performed in countries such as Belgium, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Brazil, Cape Vert, England, Finland, Germany, Greece, Lebanon, Scotland, Poland or the US; and was included in several theatre showcases such as Chantiers d’Europe (Théâtre de la Ville, Paris), Iberian Suite (The John F. Kennedy for Arts, Washington), and international platforms.

mala voadora handles the artistic direction of A Manual on Work and Happiness. After a writing residency with author Pablo Gisbert in L’Arboreto, mala voadora will be in residency in Montijo, Alcobaça, Patras and Pergine in the first half of 2018, creating four performances involving the participation of the local communities.

PABLO GISBERT

Pablo Gisbert is Spanish playwright born in 1982. After attending the Faculty of Philosophy in Valencia, he studied drama and directing in Madrid. In 2011, he got a degree in drama from the Institut del teatre (Barcelona). In 2013 he won the Sebastià Guasch prize in Barcelona for his theatre work in the dance company La Veronal, with which he has worked since 2005. Pablo also presents his own creations with El Conde de Torrefiel, a stage project that fluctuates between theatre and dance, presenting his pieces at various venues and festivals across Spain and Europe.

In 2016, he published Mierda Bonita, a book gathering all his texts written for the stage performances of El Conde de Torrefiel.

Pablo Gisbert will be writing the text of A Manual on Work and Happiness, which will afterwards be staged in Montijo, Alcobaça, Patras and Pergine, under the direction of mala voadora and with the participation of local communities.