Author: renate.dinu

Do you have at least two years of professional experience in contemporary dance and are you interested in perfecting your skills and meeting colleagues from abroad? We invite you to apply for a six-day choreography workshop in Bucharest, organized in the framework of the European project Moving Balkans.

Application deadline: December 29, 2024, 23:59 CET
Application form HERE.

The workshop will host 27 young dancers from Bulgaria, Serbia, Slovenia, Croatia, Albania, Greece, North Macedonia, Turkiye, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, Kosovo* and Romania.
The National Dance Centre Bucharest (the host organization) will cover the workshop, travel and accommodation expenses.
More information on www.movingbalkans.eu

Project facilitated by
National Dance Center Bucharest
SKC Novi Sad
Kino Šiška
Interart Cultural Center – Dance Fest Skopje
En-Knap
ARC FOR DANCE FESTIVAL
Hrvatski kulturni dom na Sušaku
Derida Dance Center
Gibanica
Albania Dance Meeting-Festival
Hrvatski institut za pokret i ples – HIP

We are delighted to announce the Aerowaves #Twenty25 artists! The 2025 line-up includes work from 17 countries and showcases an exciting and diverse selection of emerging dance makers working across Europe.

The Twenty25 artists will present their work at the Spring Forward Festival from 24 – 26 April 2025 in Gorizia and Nova Gorica (IT/SI) (European Capital of Culture) hosted by Artisti Associati.

Save the date!

Full details and list of selected artists HERE.

The Podcast Academy is a new Aerowaves initiative designed to explore, enjoy and master a valuable tool for dance and performance promotion. It will consist of online sessions in February/March 2025 and in-person practice at Aerowaves’ Spring Forward festival, 24 – 26 April 2025, in Gorizia and Nova Gorica (IT/SI).

We are looking for 5 participants to be mentored in the fundamentals of podcasting in the action-packed environment of the annual Spring Forward festival.

Complete info HERE.

Raluca Turcan’s message, the Minister of Culture, for the opening of the Iridescent Festival:

Contemporary art is the voice of a generation and dance is an excellent means of expression and communication with others.

The Iridescent Festival, which starts on Friday, celebrates contemporary dance and connects artistic worlds from different geographical spaces, putting Bucharest on the map of international dance festivals.

I want this young festival – now in its third edition – to become in time a real tradition on the Romanian cultural scene and an international benchmark event, just like the Sibiu International Theater Festival, TIFF or the George Enescu International Festival for theater, film or classical music.

I invite the public to discover the more than 20 events that will take place over four weeks at the National Dance Centre, the organizer of the festival, as well as at the Bucharest National Theatre, Odeon Theatre or CINETic.

The Ministry of Culture remains a supporter of Iridescent and a promoter of development through culture for Bucharest and Romania in 2024.

– Raluca Turcan, the Minister of Culture

Les Films de Cannes à Bucarest Schedule
Edition 15 / October 25 – November 3, 2024

The most awaited film festival of the fall, Les Films de Cannes à Bucarest celebrates 15 years of movies, memories and movie-going experience. With a dense 10-day program featuring the best art films of the year, exclusive films, the most promising names of world cinema, world-class directors present for Q&As and masterclasses, the Romanian audience has the chance to experience the thrills of a high-caliber film festival in their own home.

The film festival caravan will also travel to Timisoara, Cluj-Napoca, Iasi and Arad.

Tickets
The screenings take place at Cinema Elvire Popesco, Cineplexx Băneasa, Cinema Muzeul Țăranului, Auditorium Hall of the National Museum of Romania.

Tickets can be purchased on Eventbook.ro, at the Eventbook office in Str. Ion Brezoianu 21, in the Eventbook network and at Cinema Elvire Popesco. Tickets for screenings at Cineplexx Băneasa can be purchased at Cinplexx.ro.

From October 25, tickets can also be purchased at the other festival venues (Cinema Muzeul Țăranului, Auditorium Hall of the National Museum of Romania), which will be open one hour before the first film in the program.

Ticket prices
Cinema Elvire Popesco, Cinema Muzeul Muzeul Țăranului, Auditorium Hall of the National Museum of Romania

The price of a ticket is 25 lei.

Students of UNATC and the Faculty of Arts of Hyperion University have free admission within the limit of available seats, upon presentation of their student card.

More details here.

Like every year, in November we make it possible for new worlds to emerge. In the context of celebrating 20 years of existence of the National Center for Dance, Iridescent – international festival of contemporary dance and other reconfigurations of the sensible insists on the transformative power of dance.

We create this festival with the idea that movement and the body are tools that can revolutionize, that have the capacity to build and imagine better futures. Through dance, we build bridges between spaces and worlds and provoke new ways of thinking and dialog, new paths of exploration and understanding, and discover new perspectives on the world.

More details HERE!

Emerging dance writers wanted!

#SpringbackAcademy is looking for up to 10 people to be mentored in quality dance criticism in the action-packed environment of #SpringForward25. Celebrating its tenth Anniversary in 2025, the Academy will take place during Aerowaves’ festival 22–26 April 2025 (inclusive), in Nova Gorica/Gorizia (SI/IT).

The participants will be mentored in #criticalwriting by our lead critics including Sanjoy Roy (The Guardian), Kelly Apter (The Scotsman), Laura Cappelle (New York Times) and Emily May (Times Literary Supplement, Frieze et al), and directed by Oonagh Duckworth.

More information and application form available HERE.

Apply before 24:00 (UTC) 1 November 2024 .
Good luck!

We are putting out an open call for the opportunity to be part of the CNDB team at the second edition of the International Festival of contemporary dance and other reconfigurations of the sensible IRIDESCENT 2024, taking place throughout November.

Your role will be essential to the smooth running of the festival. You will have the opportunity to learn many interesting things and gain valuable knowledge about the organisation of an international festival. And of course about contemporary dance and performance.

We’re looking for someone who…

Will be in charge of the following activities:

• Coordination of access and audience in the venues;
• Welcoming guest artists, keeping in touch with them throughout their visit and informing them about programme, venues and other important details.
• Constant communication with your new colleagues in the CNDB team.
• Making sure things are going according to plan and being actively involved in managing unforeseen situations.
• Distribution of promotional materials in partner venues and other artistic hubs in Bucharest.

Has the following skills:

• Knowledge of English
• Ability to work in a team
• Communicates effectively and transparently
• Is punctual and responsible
• Has attention to detail

WE OFFER for our future volunteers…

• Working experience in organising large cultural events;
• Proof of practical experience;
• Free access to festival performances, subject to availability;
• Opportunity to get in contact with established artists;
• Access to resources and information in the field of contemporary dance and performance;
• Promotional items (festival tote bags).

What do you need to do?

• Fill in the form available HERE, until October 11th, in which you write a few things about yourself (what you do, what field you work in and why you want to be part of the team behind an international contemporary dance festival).
• Keep an eye on your email; if you are selected we will contact you by 20 October and send you details of our first meeting and info on what to do next.

We’re looking for people who are enthusiastic about the prospect of working in the cultural field, passionate about dance and performance, and no previous experience is necessary to participate.

We look forward to having you join us for a month full of dance at Iridescent – International festival of contemporary dance and other reconfigurations of the sensible!

The schedule of the National Theatre Festival (FNT) 2024 (www.fnt.ro)

The 34th edition of the National Theatre Festival will take place from October 18-28 in Bucharest, with performances and events being hosted by most of the theaters in Bucharest, as well as other well-known cultural spaces. An edition under the sign of the Playwrights of the Possible, which analyzes, researches and highlights the dynamics and trends of the Romanian theatrical phenomenon. The performances were chosen from the perspective of the variety of dramaturgical formulas, the three curators, Mihaela Michailov, Călin Ciobotari and Ionuț Sociu emphasizing approaches in which the dramatic structures and content arouse the interest of the audience. The attachment to one theme or another, the appetite for a certain type of aesthetics, the sensitivity for a certain creator, the availability for a certain type of dramaturgy, the chance to meet less developed performance typologies were at the center of the three curators’ choices.

We would like to inform you about the program of the performances of the National Theatre Festival 2024 edition. Follow also the National Theatre Festival Facebook page to keep up to date with all the details on the program of performances and related events.

Tickets for the performances of the 34th edition of the National Theatre Festival will go on sale on THURSDAY, October 3, at 12.00 noon, simultaneously, on all sales platforms of each host theater, as well as at the ticket offices. For easy access, we recommend that you go to the desired performances from the day-by-day program posted on www.fnt.ro and, by pressing the Buy Tickets button, you will be redirected exactly to the page where you can purchase tickets for the desired performance. We will come back soon with the program of all the events of the 34th edition of the FNT (performative and visual installations, reading performances on new texts from contemporary dramaturgy, independent theatre performances, modules dedicated to established artists, educational performances, debates, conferences, workshops, exhibitions, book launches, radio theatre performances, as well as the program of workshops, conferences and exhibitions organized within the Bucharest Scenography Biennale, a partner event of the FNT 34th edition).

Information is being updated on www.fnt.ro.

We invite you to access the program HERE and we look forward to seeing you at the Festival!

The 34th edition of the National Theatre Festival takes place in Bucharest between October 18 and 28, curated by Mihaela Michailov, Călin Ciobotari and Ionuț Sociu. Cultural project produced by UNITER – The Romanian Theatre Union. FNT is a cultural project funded by the Ministry of Culture. Co-producers: Bucharest City Hall through ARCUB – Cultural Center of Bucharest, Bucharest Directorate of Culture. Partners: Romanian Cultural Institute, National Theatre “I.L. Caragiale” in Bucharest, ITI – Romanian Center of the International Theatre Institute.

Corina Cimpoieru and Paula Dunker participated in the symposium “(in)visibilities – Moderner Tanz Re-Visited”, which took place in Essen and was organized by the Institute for Contemporary Dance of the Folkwang Universität der Künste. The two presented a lecture performance that brought back into the limelight two of the outstanding personalities of Romanian modern dance, Iris Barbura and Trixy Checais.

Abstract:
“Map To The Stars” is a moment of inverted history, a lecture performance in the footsteps of two forgotten legends of Romanian modern dance, Iris Barbura and Trixy Checais. The performance retraces and reimagines parts of their artistic lives, creating a moment of performative lucidity, a “what if”. Putting together dates, places and facts with dreams, hopes and gossip, Corina Cimpoieru (archivist at the National Dance Center in Bucharest) and Paula Dunker (choreographer and performer) not only map the period of modern dance in Romania, but propose, through an imaginative dialog, an alternative reinterpretation of cultural archives in new contemporary contexts.

Who were these splendid Romanian superheroes? And why so little has been said about them? What legacy did they leave us? Were they able to fulfill the projects they dreamed of at the time? And how can we bring their magical dance among us today in the absence of any video recordings?

Iris Barbura (1912-1969) belongs, together with Trixy Checais and Floria Capsali, to the first generation of Romanian modern dancers. She lived and worked internationally, with Bucharest, Berlin and later Ithaca (U.S.A.) as important landmarks in her artistic career. In the 1930’s she took dance classes under Mary Wigman and Harald Kreutzberg and danced with Gret Palucca and Rosalia Chladek. She later returned to Bucharest, where she opened a modern dance studio while creating sets and costumes for various performances at the Freien Volksbühne and Hebbel-Theater in Berlin.
In 1945, he befriended a group of surrealist artists in Berlin, with whom she formed the collective Die Badewanne, named after the show they performed together. In 1951 she emigrated to Ithaca, New York, as a displaced person, where she opened a modern dance studio. Her life came to a tragic end in 1969, when she committed suicide by jumping off the Triphammer Bridge at Ithaca Falls.

Trixy Checais (1914-1990) entered the world of dance relatively late, participating in modern dance classes taught by Floria Capsali and Iris Barbura around the age of 20. Between the two World Wars, he became an important artistic personality in Bucharest, noted for his queer recitals. In a 1943 chronicle: “Trixy loves and loves demonically. He cannot resist anything, he cannot resist!
He consumes himself with a rare, hallucinatory voluptuousness. From a refinement gone to oblivion it falls apart, vaporizes, so that it reaches the tail of a volute to descend and weave itself into an initial stage from which it started and from which it leaves in a cross.”
To create his unmistakable dance style, Trixy Checais drew inspiration from German Expressionism (following in the footsteps of Harald Kreutzberg and Gret Palucca) and the Oriental visual world. Between 1938 and 1952 (when he was sentenced to hard labor by the communist regime and sent to the Danube-Black Sea Canal), he worked at the Bucharest Opera. After his release from prison, he faced severe marginalization. In an interview published in 1984, at the age of 70, Trixy Checais was asked what he would choose if he were to start over. He replied, “I would still be passionate about dancing, although I suffered from it. I think I would also like archaeology.”

Corina Cimpoieru is researcher and coordinator of the Dance Archive at the National Center for Dance in Bucharest. Her interests cover the history of dance and performance in Romania, as well as archival practices and their potential for contemporary projects. In recent years, she has dedicated her time to researching lost or unknown dance archives, both private and institutional, in order to retrace dance paths for the future. Her activities also include curating dance history exhibitions and dance publishing projects.

Paula Dunker promises that their (artistic) work is based on analyzing systems of representation, production and creation. She works mainly with the body. Daughter of Romanian contemporary dance, sister of local political theater, mother of the queer clubbing scene in Bucharest, she is (together with Alex Bălă) the initiator of the techno-faggothique musical genre. Confronting existing patterns, Paula contributes to the construction of possible new worlds and the healing of this world.

We are looking for young voices from Bucharest who have important things to tell the world!

This year is our 20th anniversary. It has been 20 years of struggle, of experimentation, of thinking in terms that have always put in tension the realities of the world in which we have lived and models to look at them critically, to question them and to transgress them through dance. I did it with the thought that movement and the body are tools that can revolutionize, that have the capacity to build, to imagine possible futures. At 20, we are not in a festive moment, but in a moment where we want to understand, more than ever, who we are and what are the histories to be written.

With this in mind, we set off again, with stubbornness and hope, towards the third edition of Iridescent – international festival of contemporary dance and other reconfigurations of the sensitive. We aim to bring to Bucharest, for the third year in a row, the most coherent and surprising people, performances, discourses and aesthetics, and to propose to the audience different ways of looking at the same things. Colors. Shades. Poetics and discourses.

One of the most cherished events Iridescent has proposed is the Ideas for Planet Earth ideas and statements marathon. Inspired by the book “140 Artists’ Ideas for Planet Earth”, we set out to invite people with relevant speeches into the public space to address their messages and ideas to a wide audience. In a context where dominant structures generate and sustain the conditions that today put us in a situation where we are simultaneously experiencing the climate crisis, health crises and current wars, we find it important to reflect on power relations in society, on the relationship between human beings and the environment, and to talk about the gap between privileged and defenseless bodies. We find it important not just to observe and criticize, but to challenge our thinking and push our imagination towards ideas, proposals and models that inspire us, give us courage and propose new visions for the future.

At the 2024 edition, 20 years of CNDB, we propose to invite people who are approaching the age of 20 to Ideas for Planet Earth, which will take place on November 16, at the National Dance Center Bucharest, in a special but not exclusive way. We’re looking for them because we’re curious about their stories, their hopes, the way young people as young as us with just as many dilemmas see and imagine the world. So help us to find them. Tell them about this call and we will give them attention, space to express themselves and financially reward their work.

If you are in our target audience and the message has reached you, don’t hesitate to contact us!

To apply, we are waiting for an e-mail with a 2-3 minute video containing a short presentation of yourself, from which we understand who you are and what your concerns are, and in which you tell us, in brief, what you would like to propose as an idea, a message for Ideas for Planet Earth. Please submit your video via a Google drive link or an unlisted YouTube link. It is important that you leave a phone number in the email. We will contact you to discuss the details of the collaboration.

Application deadline: October 15, 2024

Where you send your email: (with the subject line Ideas for Planet Earth).
We look forward to meeting you!

From 27 September to 19 October, the National Center for Dance Bucharest and Rezidența9 are organizing a large-scale exhibition dedicated to choreographer and dancer Miriam Răducanu and the impact she had on several generations of artists. The opening will take place on September 27 at 19:00 at Rezidența9, and until the end of the exhibition period, the public will have the opportunity to participate in a series of events.

The exhibition presents the artistic career of the choreographer over a period of half a century and brings together for the first time photographic and videographic documents, which have been recovered from public archives in Romania (TVR Archives, ANF and the archives of the Țăndărică Theater, Bulandra Theater, Jewish State Theater, Small Theater), as well as from the private archives of those who collaborated with Miriam Răducanu from the 1960s until today, such as Gigi Căciuleanu, Raluca Ianegic, Liana Tugearu or Ioan Tugearu, and from the choreographer’s personal archive.

The National Center for Dance in Bucharest (CNDB) and Rezidența9, in partnership with UNITER /UNITER, bring together, in the generous space at 32 I. L. Caragiale Street, the voices of over 10 artists from various cultural fields who have collaborated with Mrs. Miriam Răducanu.

The opening of the exhibition will take place at Residence9, on September 27, at 19:00, and during the exhibition period there will be a series of events: guided tours, film screenings, performances and presentations.

The video montage “Miriam’s SenZe”, based on a concept by director Alexandra Gulea, is among the works on show at the exhibition and is being premiered. On September 28, from 19:00 there will be a discussion with the director, and on October 5 the whole artistic team behind the video will be present.

On Friday, October 4, from 8pm, there will be a performative event (as part of the White Night of Galleries / NAG), a reconstruction of choreographer Miriam Răducanu’s piece “Genesis”. The reinterpretation by choreographer Mădălina Dan was commissioned and presented by the Present Institute in 2019 as part of the exhibition “24 Arguments. Early connections in the Romanian neo-avant-garde 1969-1971” (November 2019 – February 2020, National Art Museum of Romania). Idea and research: Alina Șerban; research and artistic direction: Ștefania Ferchedău. The performance is followed by a Q&A.

The documentary film “Without Expectations”, presented at the exhibition, will be accompanied by a Q&A with the director Mircea Sorin Albuțiu, on Sunday, October 6, at 19:00. The film is the culmination of an encounter between dancer and choreographer Miriam Răducanu and photographer Mircea Sorin Albuțiu, who spent eight months in 2017 working together on a jazz theme inspired by a 1959 Miles Davis video recording from Robert Herridge’s studio in New York.

To end the exhibition, on October 19, at 12:00, the round table “Miriam Răducanu. A distruge pentru a recrea” in the exhibition space (with the support of UNITER/ FNT), with special guests Gigi Căciuleanu, Mariana Mihuț, Raluca Ianegic, Vava Ștefănescu, and the discussions will be moderated by Michaela Michailov. The round table will be followed by the performance created by Miriam Răducanu, with Lari Giorgescu – Poezia visului (excerpts).
The whole event with the artist’s creation at the center will conclude with the performance NOCTURN, conceived by Gigi Căciuleanu, presented as part of the National Theatre Festival, on October 20, 9.30 pm – Izvor Hall.

For me, the art of dance has never for a moment been detached from senZe – Miriam Răducanu

“Before opening the window to Miriam Răducanu’s archive, I am grateful to choreographer Gigi Căciuleanu for this key to Miriam’s senZ, he is the one who put the point on senZ, revealing the concepts behind this saying:

«A word that keeps coming up in working with Miriam – everyone who has worked with her has heard it countless times! – is senZ. With a Z. At first I thought it was a mispronunciation. With time, however, I realized that this way of “saying” was an (perhaps?!) unconscious but (almost certainly!) revealing sum of two concepts: that of senS (“meaning”, but also direction, “vector”!) and that of senZation; but, why not, also of senZuality…»

For me, the encounter with Miriam Răducanu’s archive cannot be detached from this senZ, it is what I have been looking for in all the archiving activities of the documents I have researched. The exhibition is a reenactment of this archive with the senZ that Miriam leaves in photographic and videographic documents, in interviews, in the memory of those who danced with her, who learned from her or who watched her as spectators. This exhibition is a form of active archiving of this senZ. Searching for the senZ in Miriam Răducanu’s archive meant for me first and foremost to discover, as much as possible, the original and unalterable meaning of what Miriam pursued in her creation, the archive of ideas in her dance, but also to reveal aspects of the ephemerality and fragility of what is left behind in dance, of the role of archives in the lives of dancers and their potential in the present for other generations, about the memory of dance recovered in ways that matter for the present and the future. The documents are not mere traces, by researching them, they become traces charged with senZe.”– Corina Cimpoieru, curator

To dedicate an exhibition to Miriam Răducanu today means to make the gesture of inscribing her in the centennial links of modern dance, it means to look at her kaleidoscopically through different research perspectives, which rather than exhaustively revealing her artistic facts, aim to reflect on her artistic trajectory and to understand how her creation has not ceased to form breaches in the order of things and bodies in both dance and theater. It means realizing that the act of looking back is always charged with the present. The exhibition retrieves multiple fragments of meaning from Miriam Răducanu’s creation and signals their resonance with what today’s dance has very much alive in its artistic, critical dimensions and in the vivacity of the performative gesture and the thinking behind it. Miriam Răducanu joins the infinite library of choreographic art, indispensable to any continuation in the field of performing arts today.

The exhibition is the result of a monographic archival research and of some projects to reactivate the choreographic cultural heritage, dedicated to the dancer and choreographer Miriam Răducanu, realized in the last 15 years through individual or collective projects that the National Center for Dance Bucharest (CNDB) has constantly supported in order to recover and reactivate her artistic and pedagogical path.

The exhibition will open on September 27, 2024 and can be visited according to the Residency 9 program (Tuesday – Friday 16:00 – 20:00/ Saturday – Sunday 13:00 – 20:00) until October 19, 2024.

The exhibition schedule is available HERE.

Concept: Corina Cimpoieru and Vava Ștefănescu
Curators: Corina Cimpoieru, Suzana Dan
Curator theater activity: Mihaela Michailov
Guest artists: Alexandra Gulea (video-montage), Vlaicu Golcea (sound restoration & music), Mircea Albuțiu (film), Gigi Căciuleanu (round table), Mădălina Dan (performance), Ștefania Ferchedău (presentation), Lari Giorgescu (performance)
Visual identity: Andrea Nastac
Special thanks: Gigi Căciuleanu, Raluca Ianegic, Denisa Badea (TVR Archive), Gabi Fiter (TVR Archive), Miruna Simion (Țăndărică Theatre Archive), Mihaela Popescu (Teatrului Mic Theatre Archive), Dan Druță (Jewish State Theatre Archive), Mirel Leventer (photographer), Ștefan Theodorescu (Bulandra Theatre), ANF, CNC, Uniter and FNT

With the support of
Foundation 9 | BRD – Groupe Société Générale, Administration of the National Cultural Fund (AFCN).

In partnership with
UNITER/ National Theatre Festival (FNT).

MIRIAM RĂDUCANU: an exhibition – archive with “senZ” is a cultural project co-financed by the Administration of the National Cultural Fund – AFCN. The project does not necessarily represent the position of the Administration of the National Cultural Fund. AFCN is not responsible for the content of the project or how the results of the project may be used. These are entirely the responsibility of the grantee.

Institutional Partners
Romanian Television, National Center of Cinematography, National Film Archive, Jewish State Theater, Țăndărică Animation Theater, Bulandra Theater, Little Theater, National University of Theater and Cinematographic Art “I.L. Caragiale” in Bucharest (UNATC), Cinema Union

Media partners
Radio Guerilla, Scena 9, Adevărul, Agerpres, Revista Arta, Zile și Nopți, ELLE, Ziarul Metropolis, Happ.ro, The Institute, ISCOADA, Revista Zeppelin, Agerpres, LiterNet, Radio România Cultural, Revista Golan, Feeder, Visit Bucharest, Empower Art & Artists

The latest music documentaries at DokStation: September 18-22 in Bucharest

Now in its eighth edition, DokStation Music Documentary Film Festival, the only festival in the country dedicated to music documentaries, takes place from September 18-22, in several venues in Bucharest: Control Club, Apollo111, Expirat and Grădina cu Filme.

This year’s selection features 29 documentaries, most of them national premieres, with and about music legends: The Rolling Stones, Simple Minds, José Feliciano, Neil Young, Freddie Mercury, Bruce Springsteen, ABBA, Cyndi Lauper, Mogwai, Pete Doherty, The Black Keys, Blur and many others, as well as concerts with Fulu Miziki (afro-futuristic punk, Congo) and Liraz (electro pop, Iran).

The program of screenings and related events is available at: www.dokstation.ro

Tickets are available through Eventbook.

Wednesday, September 18 – the first day of the festival brings six national premiere music documentary screenings: Simple Minds: Everything Is Possible (2023), about one of Scotland’s most acclaimed bands, and This Is a Film About The Black Keys (2024) – screening followed by Q&A with director Jeff Dupre – at Control Club. Cyndi Lauper: Let The Canary Sing (2023) and Teaches of Peaches (2024) talk about music and activism from a feminist perspective at Apollo111 Theater. The evening ends with two documentaries about two rock music legends, Neil Young and Zucchero, at the Movie Garden.

Thursday, September 19 – DokStation continues at Control Club with a screening of the documentary Éthiopiques Suite Magnétique (2023) about the largest collection of Ethiopian music, followed by a concert by Congolese band Fulu Miziki, known for their Afro-futuristic punk sound and energetic live shows using instruments improvised from recycled objects in search of new sounds. At Apollo111, we see the lesser-known side of ABBA’s success in the latest documentary about the famous Swedish band, followed by Michel Gondry’s feature-length film Do It Yourself (2023) about the music video wizard. At the Film Garden, rock legends Bruce Springsteen and The Rolling Stones tell their stories in two national premiere documentaries, while fans of Blur are expected at Expirat – Carol Halls. The evening concludes with the screening of the documentary Free Party: A Folk History (2023) about the biggest illegal raves in British history – from 20:30 at Expirat.

Friday, September 20 – the third day of the festival brings documentary screenings of the beloved bands Efterklang and Mogwai – at Control Club – and the controversial Die Antwoord – at Expirat. At the Film Garden, the documentary 35,000 Watts – The Story of College Radio chronicles the adventures of the visionaries and rebels on American campuses who changed the course of musical history and left a powerful cultural imprint. The evening concludes with a must-see documentary about legendary Puerto Rican-born musician José Feliciano. The screening will be followed by a Q&A with director Helen Murphy.

Saturday, September 21 – DokStation continues with documentaries on British rocker Pete Doherty (The Libertines) and Swedish musician José González at Expirat, while fans of stars Céline Dion and Freddie Mercury are expected at the Movie Garden. At Apollo111, an evening dedicated to the music and pop culture of the 90s, with documentaries about iconic artists of the period: Vanilla Ice (screening + Q&A) and Milli Vanilli. The evening concludes with a concert by Liraz – the queen of Persian electro-pop, for the first time in Bucharest – at 9pm at Control Club.

Sunday, September 22 – the last day of the DokStation Music Documentary Film Festival brings documentaries about musicians and iconic moments in alternative culture – S/He Is Still Her/e: The Official Genesis P-Orridge P-Orridge Documentary (2024) and Electronic Body Movie (2024) – at Control Club, an evening dedicated to jazz music – The Best of the Best: Jazz from Detroit (2024) and They All Came Out to Montreux (2024) – at Apollo111, as well as an event in memoriam Nicu Covaci at the Film Garden: the screening of the documentary Phoenix. Har/Jar (2022) followed by a Q&A with director Cornel Mihalache and his guests Mircea Baniciu and Mircea Florian.

The DokStation Music Documentary Film Festival is designed to attract a diverse audience passionate about two of the most popular arts – film and music – through music documentary film screenings, live concerts and related events in buildings with history and tradition, as well as in unconventional spaces.

The 8th edition of the DokStation Music Documentary Film Festival is organized by Wearebasca and DokStation Association and presented by Orange.

A cultural project co-financed by the Administration of the National Cultural Fund and the National Film Center.
The project does not necessarily represent the position of the Administration of the National Cultural Fund. AFCN is not responsible for the content of the project or how the results of the project may be used. These are entirely the responsibility of the grantee.

Partners: Capital City Hall through creart – Garden with movies, Control Club, Apollo111, Expirat, Cărturești. Media partners: RockFM, Scena9, GLAMOUR magazines, Zile și Nopți, Ziarul Metropolis, IQads, AaRC, MovieNews.ro, Happ.ro, Munteanu, AIVI Media Hub.

The performing school for children announces the pre-selections for the new school year at CNDB! They will take place on September 13, 14, 15 for the dance groups and on September 17 for the theatre groups. Parents of interested children are kindly requested to send an e-mail to mentioning the name and age of the child, as well as the preferred pre-selection day (only one pre-selection day per discipline is sufficient). The children declared admitted after the pre-selection will start school the week beginning September 23.

The courses are for children aged 6 to 14 in a new format: classes focusing on the study of contemporary dance technique, games, improvisation and diction for the theater groups. At the Performing School, classes are structured in 5-week modules and run throughout the school year, taking into account vacations and public holidays. Throughout the year some of the children will be selected for the development of choreographic/theatrical moments that will constitute the repertoire of the Performing school.

Pre-selections
The pre-selections for the formation of dance groups take place according to the following program:
-September 13, Friday: 17-18:30 – category 6-9 years, 18:30-20:00- category 10-14 years;
-Sept. 14, Saturday: 12-13:30 – category 10-14 years, 13:30-15:00 – category 6-9 years;
-September 15, Sunday: 12-13:30 – category 10-14 years, 13:30-15:00 – category 6-9 years;

For the theater groups, pre-selections will be held on September 17: 17:00-18:30 – category 6-9 years, 18:30-20:00 – category 10-14 years.

Classes

• Mondays: 17:00- 18:30 -Yoga for children: 6-14 years (Eva Danciu)*
• Tuesday: 17:00-18:15- Contemporary dance technique: 6- 9 years (Eva Danciu) Available places: 8 places
• Tuesday: 18:30-20:00- Contemporary dance technique: 10-14 years (Catrinel Catană& Andreea Belu)** Places available: (12 places total)
• Wednesday: 17:00- 18:30- Theater games and exercises: 6-9 years (Alexandra Vieru). Places available: 7 places
• Wednesday: 18:30- 20:00- Games and theater exercises: 10-14 years (Alexandra Vieru). Available places: 6 places
• Thursday:17:00-18:15- Contemporary dance technique: 6- 9 years (Mariana
  Gavriciuc). Available places: 10 places
• Thursday: 18:30-20:00- Contemporary dance technique: 10-14 years (Catrinel Catană& Andreea Belu)** (12 places total)

*Classes are drop-in and open to all children enrolled in the Performing school.
**The course is designed for attendance 2 times a week.Attendance on both days is encouraged and recommended.

Running period: module 1 (September 23 – October 25)

Registration
The children enrolled in the courses will be those who have been admitted following the pre-selections on September 13, 14, 15 (dance) or on September Registration for the pre-selections can be done at , specifying the name and age of the child as well as the pre-selection day chosen.

From July 28 to August 6, 2024, the artistic residency “Panoramic Banana” will take place in Bucharest, a project of MK in collaboration with CNDB, realized with the support of IIC Bucharest.

There is no place for the exotic; it is pure representation. But its hollowness can certainly be a real space, a container for collecting a catalog of dances untethered from any verisimilitude, an evocation of an environment that holds fast to a single savage principle: mingling, proximity, the incomprehensible euphoria of a world only imagined. While ethnologists finally reconvert to examining the last stainless tribe still around – the tourist tribe – and anthropologists go rogue dealing with television series, wild thought is forgotten by entertainment but proliferates undisturbed in the haze, without proclamations of redemption but for that very reason absolutely crucial to the future of humanity. Sonic, aquatic, tropical future, 40-degree-shaded, epidemic, balsamic, anatomical and humid future. 

mk’s new production is a kaleidoscope of dances and images immersed in a hybrid sound, hot as a furnace; an incessant production of choreographic systems that seem to refer to a new folklore, evocative of a world to come, in which the disorder of things is the rule, and the environment becomes cloudy and pulsating, finally undisturbed in its desire for ‘rewilding’.

Grupul mk lucrează în coregrafie și performance din 2000 și gravitează în jurul unui nucleu original de interpreți și proiecte comune și transversale, inclusiv colaborarea constantă cu muzicianul Lorenzo Bianchi Hoesch. Grupul a fost imediat invitat la cele mai importante festivaluri ale noii scene din Italia și din străinătate. Printre producțiile din ultimii ani, Veduta (2016) oferă o investigație imersivă a peisajului și a perspectivei, adaptabilă oricărui orizont urban. Bermudas, o lucrare despre mișcare perpetuă și mișcare pură cu peste 60 de spectacole la activ, a primit premiul Danza&Danza ca cea mai bună producție italiană 2018 și premiul UBU 2019 ca cel mai bun spectacol de dans în versiunea Bermudas_forever. Spectacolul EDEN, conceput în 2020 de Festivalul BolzanoDanza/Tanz Bozen, cu coregrafia lui Carolyne Carlson, Michele Di Stefano și Rachid Ouramdane a primit premiul special Danza&Danza al anului și a evoluat independent într-o serie de programe site-specific, inclusiv versiunea concepută pentru instalarea sculpturii côté cour / côté jardin de Eva Jospin în Reggio Emilia – Festivalul APERTO în 2021.

With: Mr Biagio Caravano, Sebastiano Geronimo, Luciano Ariel Lanza, Flora Orciari, Laura Scarpini, Francesca Ugolini
Choreography and atmosphere: Michele Di Stefano
Live modular system: Biagio Caravano
Music: by The Creatures
Lighting: Giulia Broggi
Video: Lorenzo Basili
Management: Carlotta Garlanda with Silvia Parlani
Cast: Jean François Mathieu

Co-produced by: mk/KLm, LAC Lugano Arte e Cultura (CH), Triennale Milan, Théâtre du Briançonnais (F), Bassano OperaEstate
With the support of: The Italian Institute of Culture Bucharest (RO)
In collaboration with: USI Academy of Architecture Mendrisio (CH) – project coordinated by arch. Riccardo Blumer – and CNDB National Dance Center Bucharest (RO)
With the support of: KOMM TANZ/PASSO NORD residency project Compagnia Abbondanza/Bertoni in collaboration with Comune di Rovereto, ORBITA /Spellbound Centro Nazionale di Produzione Danza in collaboration with ATCL Circuito multidisciplinare del Lazio – Spazio Rossellini
Thanks to MIC – Italian Ministry of Culture

“Balkan Ballerinas”, a multidisciplinary artistic project dedicated to Balkanism! “Balkan Ballerinas” will include a regional touring performance, a documentary film and an anthropological study.

Starting in August, choreographers & performers Anca Stoica, Sergiu Diță, Sofia Sitaru-Onofrei and Andreea Vălean start working on Balkan Ballerinas, a multidisciplinary project investigating the Balkan identity & the situation of the Balkan dancer and aiming to dispel stereotypes associated with the idea of Balkanism.

Initiated by Platforma 13, an artistic collective founded by Anca Stoica and Sergiu Diță, the project includes a dance performance, a documentary film and an anthropological study.

The eponymous performance will center on a body reactive to borders, prejudices and normative models, will explore the various Balkan subcultures in post-communism and will enjoy a regional tour, as follows:

September 2 / Bucharest: National Center for Dance Bucharest
September 4 / Sofia: Toplocentrala
September 7 / Belgrade: Magacin
September 13 / Timisoara: Hungarian State Theater “Csiky Gergely”
October 6 / Sfântu Gheorghe: “Andrei Mureșanu” Theater

Open call
To begin with, the team of artists is launching an open call to students and professionals in contemporary dance and performing arts. The latter are invited on August 5, 6 and 7 at the National Center for Dance in Bucharest for informal meetings designed as movement workshops.

The performative exchange of ideas on the 5th, 6th and 7th will open the movement trails that will form the basis of the performance. Details here.

A multidisciplinary & on-going project
Following the tour, the multidisciplinary project will be completed in October with two other related events: the documentary film Balkan Ballerinas and the anthropological study.

Directed by Mihnea Toma and with Beatrice Păun as cinematographer, the documentary will present the entire journey of the artistic team in the project, from research and rehearsals to the tour and the Q&A sessions with the audience at each performance.

The anthropological study will be conducted by anthropologist Laura-Maria Ilie, who will accompany the dancers in their performative research and publish the resulting material in ISCOADA.

Unique in the field of performing arts, the project consolidates the residency on the same theme carried out by Anca Stoica and Sergiu Diță at AREAL in 2023 and aims to be a framework for a broader conversation:

“The body is closely linked to society. We hold and react to all the social mores we are brought up with. So the society we live in also conditions the way we move. That on the one hand; on the other hand, the project also gives an x-ray, through dance, of the cultural point in which we find ourselves, of the interests that exist in the artistic world. But perhaps more than anything, Balkan Ballerinas asks a question about our cultural identity: how does the way we move show who we are?” – Anca Stoica

More information about Balkan Ballerinas can be found by following Platform 13.

Institutional partners: National Book Center – Romanian Cultural Institute, National Center for Dance Bucharest, “Andrei Mureșanu” Theatre Sfântu Gheorghe, Hungarian State Theatre “Csiky Gergely” Timișoara, KC Magacin, Toplocentrala Center for Contemporary Arts

Media partners: ISCOADA, Happening, Teatrul Azi

The project is co-funded by the National Cultural Fund Administration. The project does not necessarily represent the position of the Administration of the National Cultural Fund Administration. AFCN is not responsible for the content of the project or how the project results can be used. These are entirely the responsibility of the beneficiary.