NEWS

Among the notable personalities who will grace the festival with their visit will be the Moldovan author Nicoleta Esinencu. As part of the German-Austrian festival line-up, she and the teatru-spălătorie collective will present a genre-boundary „theatrical concert“ for sound drills with the ironically subversive title Symphony of Progress…  

foto Florin Tăbîrţă

Nicoleta Esinencu (1978) works as a playwright and director in Chișinău, Moldova. She garnered Europe-wide attention for her musical, rhythmic texts addressing the situation in her home country after the fall of the Berlin Wall. She sees the Eastern European region as a buffer zone between Western and Eastern culture, filled with explosiveness, violence and painful historical memory. The monologue FUCK YOU, Eu.ro.Pa! (2005) sparked controversy and gave her a sticker „angry voice of Moldova“. For her engaged work, Esinencu have been awarded the Tabori Award International 2022 – Germany’s highest distinction for independent theatre.

In 2010, Nicoleta Esinencu co-founded teatru-spălătorie – a space for alternative political art with its own stage in Chișinău; translated as „theatre-laundry“ after its original, now defunct stage in a former laundry building in Chișinău. In their works, the artists of teatru-spălătorie create an echo for politically and socially serious, often explosive topics, such as issues of nationalism, homophobia, or new forms of capitalist exploitation. Or, as they humorously put it, "washing dirty laundry in public. 

This will be the first time the Moldovan formation will present itself to the Czech audience. Performance Symphony of Progress, created in collaboration with the production house HAU Hebbel Berlin, through real episodes points out the reverse side of the phenomenon of open Europe and the discrimination faced by people who long for a “better” life west of their homes. With sarcastic insight, the Moldovan theatre collective has transformed their testimonies into an industrial symphony mixed right on stage by a trio of performers. Drills and saws were transformed into musical instruments by Moldovan engineering students, who themselves are eagerly waiting for a job offer from abroad.

SYMPHONY OF PROGRESS – May 18th Sat, 8:00 PM – 9:45 PM | S-klub – TICKETS

discussion about the production – May 19th Sun, 1:00 PM – 1:45 PM | KONVIKT – ŠAPITÓ free entry

More information about the German-Austrian FREIHEIT line can be found here.