It seems like yesterday that we started our Conferences for a Better World, but in fact we kept organizing encounters for every single Sunday for the better part of the last two months, each time with a different guest presenter, talking about either natural building or performing arts (sometimes both!). These are the two areas Itínera Theater eats, breathes, and lives, and these are also what we want to focus on in promoting our ongoing crowdfunding campaign, which you certainly should visit (and hopefully donate, but at least share on all your social networks).
A Very Special Guest for Itínera Members
Since this was the last of our planned Zoom conferences, we wanted to leave the most important guests for last. As it turns out, some technical problems forced us to postpone the conference from two weeks ago to today. But the description "most important" equally applies to both last week's presenter Sofía Monsalve, and also today's guest Else Marie Laukvik from Odin Teatret in Holstebro, Denmark.
In her talk Else Marie explained both her own history at the Odin Teatret, as well as how she got to meet Julia and Manuel, two founding members of Itínera. In the meantime she also introduced her work, making sure to emphasize the unconventional, the unexpected, and the art of telling stories in a non-linear fashion. Together with Manu and Julia she underlined her presentation with a slideshow, interspersed with some videos, and the three got to give us an exact impression on what this non-linear storytelling is like. It's a truly remarkable experience, though at first you may feel completely overwhelmed, and towards the end realize that this sensation never left off. So instead you start paying attention to the general impression of it all, which is profound, to say the least.
From Goya's Guerrillero to a Homeless Actor in Rimini
At first Else Marie told us how much she was influenced by the paintings of Goya, especially the Third of May 1808, depicting a Spanish guerrillero in front of a firing squad, lifting his arms in defiance to the French forces. Eventually, the story took us around several corners to how Julia and Manu were working together with Else Marie at the Odin Teatret on two important performances: metaMORPHEOSis and Knots - To Be Happily Unhappy.
The former of these two deals with dreams (using the name of the Greek god in its title), and how cold-fact scientists intend to study them. The latter one examines homelessness, as it was inspired by a homeless actor who was living on the streets of Rimini, the Italian town Julia is from. Though talking about the two plays was not the objective here, so we also got mere glimpses at them from the point of view of their creators. Instead, both works contributed to the creation of the overall impression Else Marie wanted to transmit to us. For example, in talking about using objects on the stage outside of their usual contexts, the example of the accordion was used: one day Julia was rehearsing for her role of a homeless, playing the accordion, when she realized she had forgotten to put on a pair of pants. So she tried doing so without stopping playing her accordion. You can probably imagine the impossibility here, but Else Marie, who was directing the piece, liked it so much that she suggested to incorporate it into the play.
A Noteworthy Audience
Seeing how today's encounter was also the last one on our list (for now), I really would like to mention our awesome audience! Coming from the world of performing arts, it's not surprising how most attendees were also artists themselves. Some had been with us for the last couple weeks, in fact, some had been guest presenters in previous encounters. However, it would have been pretty one sided, if all our audience had been made up of other stage performers applauding each other. For this reason I should point out some very faithful attendees, who had followed most of our events, starting out with our natural building series, and sticking with us even once we changed the topic to theater related presentations. It is precisely these folks I appreciate so highly, and I am so happy about. Thank you guys, you made our conferences a humongous success!!!
Please Have Patience for the Recording to Come Out
Unfortunately this event was not without its share of technical challenges: distorted microphones and lagging connections made following the information a bit difficult. As for the subtitled translation ... I just don't know! After the third conference we felt we had gotten the hang of it, but today I'm afraid it was not so great after all. In any case, we made sure to record the meeting, and it's in line waiting to be cleaned up and uploaded to Itínera's YouTube channel - along with five other conferences. And sure, we'll get around to it eventually. For now, the best we have is the facebook streaming which is as raw as it comes. But if you put yourself in the right mindset, I'm sure you can enjoy it.
Focus on our Campaign
So, now that our Conferences for a Better World are complete, we would like to focus on our campaign: By December 25th we would like to raise €16,000. Can we do it? With your help certainly. Please visit our Indiegogo Campaign Page to leave some money or to share it with everyone you know. Also, take a look at our campaign video, which I believe turned out quite funny. You are welcome to share this also wide and far across the Internet. Finally, to get even more info on our theater, please take a look at Itínera's website. Thank you all for your interest, and for supporting our crowdfunding efforts!
