Performers

Festival Club is open 3.07–6.07 23:00–03:00.

3.07

23:00–03:00 The DJ-s from festival opening performance "Postsummer Choir", the 31st class of EAMT School of Performing Arts

4.07

23:00–00:30 DJ Märten Matsu

00:30–02:30 DJ Johannes Richard Sepping 

02:30–03:00 DJ Laura Niils 

5.07

23:00–00:00 DJ Rainer Elhi

00:00–01:00 White Girl live concert

01:00–03:00 DJ Paul Henrich Daude

White Girl is the alter ego of performance artist Elina Masing, who has gained fame on the alternative music scene in recent years. The artist's performances are performatively captivating and avant-garde. The musician's journey began as part of the band 5HORSES, and in 2020 he released his debut single "Tra pls" as a solo artist, which has collected over 40,000 listens to date. In recent years, White Girl has been on tour in Central Europe with the duo Putan Club and has successfully performed in dozens of cities. Elina Masing has directed in collaboration with, for example, Kanuti Gildi SAAL and Tartu Elektriteater. In May, his modern interpretation of the play "Bakhandid" premiered in the Tartu 2024 capital of culture program. As an actor, he plays the main character in Marko Raad's feature film "The 8 Faces of Lake Biwa" and in autumn he can be seen in a supporting role in Liina Triškina-Vanhatalo's film "Mother Lion".

6.07

23:00–01:00 DJ´d Maria Helena Seppik ja Getriin Kotsar

01:00–02:00 Mihkel Kuusk live concert

02:00–03:00 DJ Jaune Kimmel 

Mihkel: "I long to experience the shaking of the concert venue, the potential collapse that would end with the feeling of freedom, the passion of being alive. Every concert is a step towards that."
Mihkel Kuusk is a solo artist who plays with the sound of electropop music, using his voice, synthesizers and acoustic instruments (organ, drums). He creates a performative audiovisual whole on the stage where, in addition to the music, space also plays a part.

Opening of the festival and greetings

Wednesday, 3.07 18:30 Rakvere Market.

Duration 15 minutes. For free.

Baltoscandal will take place 3rd-7th of July 2024. Biannual festival Baltoscandal takes place 18th time and its the oldest international theatre festival in the Baltic countries. This year it is also 30 years since the festival has been held in Rakvere. Its artistic director is Priit Raud and it is organised by Rakvere Theatre.

Johhan Rosenberg / Von Krahl Theater (Estonia) 

POST-SUMMER CHOIR
 

Post-Summer Choir is a choir performance in public space with songs about time, the body and the hot summer. The choir seeks hope, a way to enter a more ecstatic, interfused connection with the world. To receive daily reminders of how we are all connected and always in motion. To free our minds from death, sex, tired rituals and heteronormativity. To start dancing with other species. Our cells are made of love that does not operate on a dominant, invasive or gendered basis. The production is based on Aino Kallas’ The White Ship (1913), as translated into the context of contemporary bodies and geopolitical mythology. The choreography structure observes social order.

The performance attempts to decode how our actions leave traces on the land and on each other's bodies, and how collective emotions affect our language, physicality, and movement. The production peels back the layers of colonization individually and collectively, across generations and in specific locations in urban space. Looking back through centuries at the patterns of violence and oppression and the transformation of language, the cast from 31st Class of the EAMT School of Performing Arts along with Johhan Rosenberg orchestrate an extremely industrious and prolific choir. The choir embodies the intermingling of cultures, the craving for a fresh sense of purpose and a protest movement.

Those gray and black human figures stood there on the open beach from morning to night, and in their tanned faces their longing eyes were always drawn towards the sea. They are called the Post-Summer Choir, and they were waiting for a ship. The white ship. The ship that would come to save them was supposed to be white, bright white, as white as God’s sun in the sky… Everyone’s faith and hope had finally united on this ship. The vessel that would take everyone back to their roots. This ship was created from religious poetic foam, but over time it acquired a slightly more real shape on the seashore of Tallinn. The ancestors traveled in a white ship, returning at the end of summer to be reborn. The Post-Summer Choir has rusted skin and on their heads pigtails made of worn reefs that melt under the sun. The village says that they have consumed too much seawater while waiting for the ship and see illusions and visions. They sing and cheer openly and sell skulls to ancestors. So they have decided to come to share and celebrate loss, heat, happiness and failure, shaking the flesh from their bones and the voices from their heads. Their white ship revolution is irresistible. They remember how the world worked before them.

Wed 3.06 kl 17 Rakvere Market (outside, near Laada 39) 

FOR FREE
Duration: 90 min
Language no problem

Author and choreographer Johhan Rosenberg; Vocal arrangement Anne Türnpu; Designer Pire Sova; Make-up Pire Sova, Iris Lillemägi; Performers Markus Andreas Auling, Lauren Grinberg, Karl Birnbaum, Hanna Jaanovits, Jette-Loona Hermanis, Richard Ester, Hele Palumaa, Laurits Muru, Kristina Preimann, Herman Pihlak, Juhan Soon, Emili Rohumaa, Edgar Vunš, Astra Irene Susi; Technical assistance Linda Mai Kari, Rainer Põldeots; Produced by EMTA Lavakunstikool (EAMT School of Performing Arts), Johhan Rosenberg.

Special thanks to Tallinna Linnavalitsus (Tallinn Municipality), Angela Mooste, Jaak Prints, Erki Naumanis, Ekke Hekles, Johanna Ulfsak, Kodulinna Maja, Maike Lond.

Previous showings 6. and 13.05 2024 at Balti jaam tunnel.

Täpp / Paiste / Kuusk / Kala / Bartels / Seppik / Kröönström (Estonia)

IN SICKNESS AND IN HEALTH

A wedding is a phenomenon that everyone has an idea of – whether it stems from films, theater, the experience of friends, family, or one’s own past, present or future. Holding a wedding is a decision in which the pros and cons are important, whether the beginning of partnership is celebrated or not.

The performance „In sickness and in health” is a wedding with a formal and informal part: gathering, ceremony, congratulating and celebrating. The guests are part of the happiest day of two people’s lives, they join the couple on a physical and emotional journey: strolling from place to place, touching different spheres of the emotional spectrum. All parties participate in a ritual, a sociocultural game where the onlookers play along.

As always, the impulse is to simply smile, hope for a perfect day and to sympathize silently because such is the custom - a wedding is an event where no one is allowed to have doubts. But what if this time someone asked “why”? Why, how, to whom is it held and what does it mean? What is the purpose of the wedding, its thousand details? What is behind the choices? Why do people get married and hold weddings; who even has the right to do so? Why is the veil of idealism so suffocating - is the moment that seems so real tinged with grain or two of fiction, delusions, hidden motives, or even hopelessness? How does all this affect sincerity, care, love?

As is the custom at a wedding, the guests will be entertained by a live band, the lights flash and the plates and glasses are emptied. There is dancing and singing, toasts, speeches and laughter. You can see the happiness and exaltation. And tears. Not just out of joy. Because the illusion only lasts a certain time: how long can you hide from the mundanity, suppress the vices and gloom, hide the desires and greed of human nature. In the end, we’re only humans. Nothing more. Or maybe…? Hooray! Wedding day!

NB! The wedding’s duration is 3 hours in total. During this time, there is walking around the city and buildings (on different levels and floors). Loud music is played at the wedding.

Fri 5.07 17:00 Rahvaaed BUY TICKET (sold out)

Sat 6.07 18:00 Rahvaaed BUY TICKET (sold out)

Recommended from the age of 14.

Idea and director: Robin Täpp; Author-performers: Maria Paiste, Mihkel Kuusk, Liisbeth Kala, Karl Jakob Bartels, Maria Helena Seppik, Oskar Kröönström; Production dramaturg: Isabel Laiapea; Designer: Reti Pauklin; Lighting designer: Timo Tali; Sound designer: Tõnis Veelmaa; Musicians: Ott Ajaots, Markus Lehtsalu, Robin Kiisholts; Stage and lighting technician: Mairon Tovstsik; Video technicians: Deili Post, Tom Tristan Kidron; Sound technician: Sigrid Koor; Organizer: Eleriin Miilman

Additionally, the community of Rakvere is participating.

In cooperation with University of Tartu Viljandi Culture Academy.

Supported by EELC (The Estonian Evangelical Lutheran Church) Rakvere Congregation of the Trinity, Cultural Endowment of Estonia, Culture Centre in Viru Nigula Parish, Moe Distillery, Municipality of Rakvere, Municipality of Viljandi, MTÜ KaRakTer, Nudist Drinks, Pizzakiosk, Rakvere Cultural Centre, Rakvere Vocational School, Re-use Center, University of Tartu Viljandi Culture Academy.

Ivo Dimchev (Bulgaria)

THE SELFIE CONCERT

An interactive musical performance for a white cube space.

"Selfie is a choreography, Selfie is a sculpture, Selfie is a tragedy, Selfie is love. Selfie is less about me, It's more about us. " 
I. Dimchev

Ivo Dimchev is a theatre maker, choreographer, visual artist, singer-songwriter, and queer activist from Bulgaria. His work is an extreme and colorful mix of performance art, dance, theater, music, painting, and photography. He is the author of more than 40 stage performances and has received numerous international awards for dance and theater. Most of his stage performances are included in his book Stage Works 2002–2016. He has also written more than 100 original songs all included in his Songbook. His work has been presented throughout Europe, South and North America, and Asia.

Ivo Dimchev has previously been invited to Baltoscandal festival twice: with a concert in 2017 and “Lili Handel” in 2012.

Thu 4.07 18:00 Rakvere Linnavalitsuse valge saal BUY TICKET (sold out)

Fri 5.07 22:00 Rakvere Linnavalitsuse valge saal BUY TICKET (sold out)

Duration: 60 min
In English

Idea, text and music by Ivo Dimchev.
Performed by the artist and the audience.

Branko Jordan / Katarina Stegnar / Primož Bezjak / Mart Kangro / Juhan Ulfsak / Eero Epner (Estonia, Slovenia)

FUN FACT

And the next question is: in what year happened? How many were there? Did anyone survive or nobody did? Human being is a creature asking questions. We wanna ask. And sometimes we also want to give the right answers. But only sometimes. Fun Fact is a celebration of knowledge and logical thinking. We are sailing on the ocean of facts, blowing wind into the sails of deduction and avoiding the rocks of being mistaken. The right answer must be found before time runs out. Five. Four. Three. Two. One. The time is up! Up!

Fun Fact is created by one the best-known names in Slovenian theatre Katarina Stegnar and Primož Bezjak plus Estonian team Mart Kangro, Juhan Ulfsak and Eero Epner. Instead of concentrating on the common past of two countries the question being asked is: what is it that unites us in the first place?

Katarina Stegnar and Primož Bezjak are among the best-known actors of the last decades in Slovenia. They have worked in very different genres, from dance theatre to classical theatre. Together with Branko Jordan they created the group Beton Ltd (2010), which has toured around Europe.

Mart Kangro, Juhan Ulfsak and Eero Epner are theatre makers with different backgrounds. So far they have done two productions together: Workshop (2019) and It Stays As It Is (2021).

Fri 5.07 17:30 Haljala Rahvamaja BUY TICKET (sold out)

Sat 6.07 20:30 Haljala Rahvamaja BUY TICKET (sold out)

Duration: 90 minutes (in addition, the driving time to Haljala Rahvamaja and back is a total of 40 minutes)
In English

Authors Branko Jordan, Katarina Stegnar, Primož Bezjak, Mart Kangro, Juhan Ulfsak, Eero Epner; Performers Katarina Stegnar, Primož Bezjak, Mart Kangro, Juhan Ulfsak, Eero Epner; Sound Jure Vlahovič; Costume design Olja Grubić; Production of scenic elements Martin Podrzavnik; Graphic design Jaan Evart; Project Managers Eneli Järs (Kanuti Gildi SAAL), Maja Vižin (Bunker); Produced by Bunker, Ljubljana; Kanuti Gildi SAAL, Eero Epner, Juhan Ulfsak, Mart Kangro.

Supported by: Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Slovenia, City of Ljubljana, European Union – Culture Moves Europe programme, Cultural Endowment of Estonia, Estonian Ministry of Culture, Goethe Institute, Ridango

Marta Aliide Jakovski / Von Krahli Teater (Estonia)

FUNDAMENTALIST

„The Fundamentalist” is a story about love. The characters are Markus, a progressive pastor who has publicly admitted to being a tool of Satan, and Heidi, his former good friend who has been floating through life like a piece of driftwood. One fateful autumn night, Markus and Heidi meet again, engaging in mutual spiritual warfare and a quest for truth. In the process, both are forced to reexamine their beliefs and reasons for believing. What is the truth? Can multiple truths exist at the same time? Is it possible to help another person selflessly? How far should you go with this? What is the extent of one person’s responsibility for another? How does fanaticism work and when does it become dangerous?

Erki Laur – Estonian Theatre Award Best Actor winner for the role of Markus
Liisa Saaremäel – Estonian Theatre Award Best Actress nominee for the role of Heidi

Wed 3.07 19:15 Rakvere Teatri väike maja BUY TICKET (sold out)

Thu 4.07 16:30 Rakvere Teatri väike maja BUY TICKET (sold out)

Duration: 2 h 45 min (interval included)
In Estonian, with English translation

Playwright Juha Jokela; Director Marta Aliide Jakovski; Translated by Kai Aareleid; Set Designer Kristel Zimmer; Lighting Designer Priidu Adlas; Music Designers Henrik Esse, Marta Aliide Jakovski; Cast Liisa Saaremäel, Erki Laur.

A collaboration between EAMT (Estonian Academy of Music and Theatre) drama department and Von Krahl Theatre, with the support of Estonian Cultural Endowment.

Robert Henke (Germany)

CBM 8032 AV

Audiovisual performance with vintage computers. 

CBM 8032 AV is a journey into the beauty of abstract graphics and sound, created with five iconic early personal computers. The work is about the ambivalence between a contemporary aesthetic and the usage of obsolete limited technology from more than 40 years ago. 

CBM 8032 AV is performed with five Commodore CBM 8032 computers, each with a single 8bit CPU running at 1 MHz and with 32kByte of total memory.

These machines were never meant to be used for the creation of audiovisual art, and the results are slow, harsh, geometric, with low resolution and exclusively in monochromatic green. Yet they radiate their very own groove and visual appeal. The sonic spectrum includes digital noises, deep gritty sine waves, sparse clicks and glitchy percussions: very cut-up and metrical, with interwoven quiet or even silent moments, further processed and refined with studio electronics from the early 1980s.

CBM 8032 AV has been awarded Best Production of the 67th International Festival of Contemporary Music – La Biennale di Venezia.

Robert Henke explores abstract patterns in space and time, made of sound and light. His tools are computers, code and electronics. He creates music, audiovisual performances, installations, and computer graphics.

Robert Henke’s installations, performances and concerts have been presented at Tate Modern in London, Centre Pompidou in Paris, Palazzo delle Esposizioni in Rome, Le Lieu Unique in Nantes, PS-1 in New York, MUDAM in Luxembourg, MAK in Vienna, Palazzo Grassi in Venice, the Art Gallery of New South Wales in Australia, KW Institute for Contemporary Art in Berlin, STRP Biennale in Eindhoven, and on countless festivals including Unsound, CTM, MUTEK, Sonar, New Forms Festival.

Thu 4.07 22:30 Kinosaal BUY TICKET (sold out)

Fri 5.07 20:30 Kinosaal BUY TICKET 

Duration: 65 min
Language no problem

Florian Malzacher (Germany)

THE ART OF ASSEMBLY

Book Presentation

The Art of Assembly surveys theatre today to demonstrate its political potential in both form and content. Drawing on numerous examples from around the world in performance, visual art, and activist art, curator and author Florian Malzacher examines works that draw on the particular possibilities of theatre to navigate the space between representation and participation, at once playfully and with sincerity.

In a time of wide-ranging crisis, The Art of Assembly is a plea for a strong definition of the political and for a theatre that is not content merely to reflect the world’s ills, but instead acts to change them.

Florian Malzacher is a curator, author, and dramaturg as well as the host of The Art of Assembly, a series of talks and conversations about the potential of gathering in art, activism, and politics. From 2006–2012 he was festival programmer of the interdisciplinary festival steirischer herbst in Graz; from 2013–2017 the artistic director of the Impulse Theater Festival. He is the editor of numerous publications on theatre, on the relationship between art, activism, and politics, and on performance curation. These include (co)edited books on the work of theatre companies Forced Entertainment, Rimini Protokoll, and Nature Theater of Oklahoma, as well as Truth is Concrete: A Handbook for Artistic Strategies in Real Politics (2014), Not Just a Mirror: Looking for the Political Theatre of Today (2015) and Empty Stages, Crowded Flats: Performativity as Curatorial Strategy (2017). His books and essays have been translated into fifteen languages.

The talk will be moderated by Oliver Issak and Jan Teevet from Kohtumiste ja Mitte-Kohtumiste Instituut (Institute of Meetings and Non-Meetings).

Sat 6.07 13:00 Rakvere Teater

Duration: 60 min
In English
For free

Philippe Quesne / Vivarium Studio (France)

FARM FATALE

A handful of poetic scarecrows live in a world where human beings have seemingly disappeared, attempting to preserve what remains of the living. Farm Fatale is a touching post-apocalyptic tale, situated somewhere between melancholy and combativity. 

Five masked scarecrows, neither fully human nor puppets – live inside an immaculate white setting. The only remaining vestiges of nature are a few bales of hay which the characters use periodically for shelter. Hoping to not forget their previous world, they try to record the final sounds of animals, run a pirate radio service and invent new utopias. Facing the world environmental threat posed by humanity, the activist-clowns of Philippe Quesne show us the damage, while not giving up on thinking about the future: their capacity for wonder as they contemplate the beauty of nature can now be counted as an act of resistance.

Philippe Quesne received his education in Visual Arts. For 10 years he designed sets for theater, operas, and exhibitions. In 2003, he created the Vivarium Studio Company as a laboratory for theatrical innovation and collaboration between painters, actors, dancers and musicians. As he did as a child, collecting insects, he now works and studies small communities under his microscope. The scenography is used as an ecosystem in which he immerses his actors into. His shows, such as La Démangeaison des ailes (2003), L’Effet de Serge (2007), La Mélancolie des dragons (2008), Swamp Club (2013), compose a repertory of tours all over the world.

Philippe Quesne has previously been invited to Estonia several times: with the “L’Effet de Serge” at the August Dance Festival (Tallinn, 2015) and with “Big Bang” (2010) and “The Night of the Moles” (2016) at the Baltoscandal festival.

Sat 6.07 23:00 Rahu hall BUY TICKET (sold out)

Sun 7.07 15:30 Rahu hall BUY TICKET 

Duration: 90 min
In English with Estonian subtitles

Directed by Philippe Quesne; With Léo Gobin, Anne Steffens (role created by Julia Riedler), Sébastien Jacobs (role created by Stefan Merki), Nuno Lucas (role created by Damian Rebgetz), Gaëtan Vourc’h; Stage Manager François Boulet; Sound Manager Félix Perdreau; Lighting director Vincent Chrétien; Set design collaboration Nicole Marianna Wytyczak; Costume Designer Nora Stocker; Masks Brigitte Frank; Lighting design Pit Schultheiss; Sound design Robert Göing, Anthony Hughes; Assistant directors Jonny-Bix Bongers, Dennis Metaxas; Dramaturgy Martin Valdés-Stauber, Camille Louis.

Creation production Münchner Kammerspiele
Touring production Vivarium Studio
Shows at Baltoscandal are supported by Institut Francais Estonie (French Institute in Estonia).
Show created on 29 March 2019 for the repertoire of the Münchner Kammerspiele, Munich (Germany).

Andrea Salustri (Italy)

MATERIA

A choreography for several polystyrene shapes and one human, that you can enjoy with the whole family.

MATERIA explores the possibilities of one material, polystyrene, to the point it becomes alive and protagonist of the events on stage. The role of the performer shifts towards the one of the facilitator, and the focus is constantly negotiated between object, manipulator and manipulation.

A path leads and follows the material from the hesitating movement quality of a delicate encounter to the loud soundscape of a self-sufficient apparatus. Drifting between calmness and darkness, between discovery and destruction.

The piece tries not to force a narrative but rather let the audience project their own narrative on the images presented on stage. Within a set score, objects are free to perform and take initiatives.

Andrea Salustri comes from Rome, where he learned contact juggling, fire manipulation, and has been working as a street artist. In 2013 he graduated cum laude in Philosophy at La Sapienza University in Rome, then decided to move to Berlin to pursue an education in contemporary dance. He first completed the Dance Intensive program at Tanzfabrik Berlin, and successively studied dance and choreography at HZT Berlin University.

Sat 6.07 19:30 Rakvere Teatri väike maja BUY TICKET 

Sun 7.07 14:00 Rakvere Teatri väike maja BUY TICKET (sold out)

Duration: 55 min
Language no problem
Show for the whole family, for the age 6+
The performance uses strobe light and stage smoke.

Creation & performance Andrea Salustri; Light design & technical direction Michele Piazzi; Technical team Andrea Parolin, Andreas Harder; Sound design Federico Coderoni; Creative advisors Kalle Nio, Roman Müller, Darragh McLoughlin, Alex Lempert, Benjamin Richter, Matthias Buhrow, Mariagiulia Serantoni.

Distributor Diffusion Carolina Ortega – Aurora Nova international theatre booking agency.
Co-production PERPLX.
Residencies Espace Périphérique – La Villette, La Maison des Jonglages, Cirqu’Aarau, Katapult, Zirkusquartier Zürich, La Briqueterie CDCN du Val-de-Marne, kunstencentrum BUDA, PERPLX
Further support circusnext European Platform co-funded by the Creative Europe Programme of the European Union, Chamäleon Productions, Cirqu’Aarau, circus re:searched, Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Europe, TelepART programme of the Finnish institute in Germany. 

Back to Back Theatre (Australia)

SHADOW

Film

Simon, Scott and Sarah, a trio of activists with intellectual disabilities, hold a town hall meeting about the future impacts of artificial intelligence. Simon, considering himself a saviour for the community, quickly appoints himself the mayor, and Scott reluctantly steps into the role of facilitator, but soon becomes enamoured with his own power and begins to dismiss the experiences of others. Sarah, often overlooked and underestimated by her counterparts, explodes, confronting the self-appointed leaders on their inadequacies. What begins as a polite discussion quickly descends into bickering and chaos, seemingly provoked by a force within. Sarah acts to unite the group, only to realise the battle to get their message across may be lost already.

Australia’s internationally acclaimed Back to Back Theatre, a professional theatre company with an ensemble of actors with disabilities at its core, has produced its debut feature-length film, “Shadow”. Film is based on their award-winning stage play “The Shadow Whose Prey The Hunter Becomes” (2019).

Director Bruce Gladwin: “”Shadow” uses a combination of dramatic and documentary-style elements to tell the story of a group of activists who hold a public meeting only to discover their own prejudices are their biggest obstacles to saving the world. 

As artists we are seeking alternative models of story creation and screen production. Created over two and a half years through conversation and improvisation, the performers are also the co-authors, 95% of the people on screen are people with disabilities, and the majority of the crew roles are fulfilled by interns who identify as people with disabilities supported by professional mentors.

This is community filmmaking.”

The Back to Back Theatre company, the pioneer of renewal in Australian theatre and one of the companies best known around the world for making disability a tool of artistic inquiry, is the recipient of the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement of the 52nd Biennale Teatro 2024 (Venice).

Sat 6.07 15:00 Kinosaal BUY TICKET 

Sat 6.07 21:30 Kinosaal BUY TICKET 

Duration: 56 min
The film is in English with Estonian subtitles.

Director Bruce Gladwin; Screenplay Michael Chan, Mark Deans, Bruce Gladwin, Simon Laherty, Sarah Mainwaring, Scott Price, Sonia Teuben; Producer Alice Fleming; Director of Photography and Editor Rhian Hinkley; Musical Composition Luke Howard Trio (Luke Howard, Daniel Farrugia, Jonathan Zion); Art Director Tao Weis; Costume Designer Shio Otani; Associate Producer Meret Hassanen; Assistant Producer Pippa Wright; Executive Producers Bruce Gladwin, Tim Stitz.

SHADOW was funded by the Australian Government Department of Social Services, the City of Greater Geelong through the Arts & Culture Department’s Arts Industry Commissions Program in partnership with UNESCO Creative City of Design, with additional support from Give Where You Live and the Une Parkinson Foundation. SHADOW was supported by Screen Australia through the COVID-19 Budget Support Fund Program.

Lawrence Malstaf (Belgium)

SHRINK

Two large, transparent plastic sheets and a device that gradually sucks the air out from between them, leaving the body vacuum-packed and vertically suspended. The transparent tube inserted between the two surfaces allows the person inside the installation to regulate the flow of air. As a result of the increasing pressure between the plastic sheets, the surface of the packed body gradually freezes into multiple micro-folds. For the duration of the performance the person inside moves slowly and changes positions, which vary from an almost embryonic position to one resembling a crucified body.

The work of Lawrence Malstaf is situated on the borderline between the visual and the theatrical. He develops installation and performance art with a strong focus on movement, coincidence, order and chaos, and immersive sensory rooms for individual visitors. He also creates larger mobile environments dealing with space and orientation, often using the visitor as a co-actor. His projects involve physics and technology as a point of departure or inspiration and as a means for activating installations. 

Lawrence Malstaf has received several international awards in the field of art and new technology. He is also well known as an innovative scenographer in the dance and theatre world.

Sat 6.07 16:00–18:00 Rakvere Theatre (Attention! The location has changed due to weather conditions)

Duration of one session: 20 min
Language no problem
Show for the whole family
FOR FREE

Laura Kutkaitė / Lithuanian National Theatre (Lithuania)

THE SILENCE OF THE SIRENS

The sirens are singing – beautifully, writes Homer. They sit on an island, lure men onto land and then kill them. Except for Orpheus, who sings louder, and Odysseus, whose companions stuff wax in their ears and have him tied to the mast so that he can listen to the sirens without dying.

European mythology is dominated by violence: between people, gods, mythical creatures and the sexes. Inequality and power imbalances produce fears and defence strategies instead of relationships. What makes us hold on to these structures?

Working with her collaborators, director Laura Kutkaitė puts a contemporary story right in the middle of the minefield of myth: four years after the highpoint of the #MeToo movement in Lithuania, she puts the issue of abuse of power in the arts world on the stage. Posing on a rock, four female actors open their island theatre and tell true stories from their working life, while waiting for “the great Odysseus”. They leave no dark detail out – not even the competition between them – and at the same time perform theatre: in costume and makeup, with sound and light, with bitter humour, passion, vulnerability and plenty of reasons. In this way they strike the structures exactly where they could change.

Laura Kutkaitė is a Lithuanian theatre director. “The Silence of the Sirens” is her first work at the Lithuanian National Drama Theatre in Vilnius. Winner of FAST FORWARD 2022 – European Festival for Young Stage Directors in Dresden. 

Sat 6.07 18:00 Rakvere Teatri suur maja BUY TICKET (sold out)

Sun 7.07 17:30 Rakvere Teatri suur maja BUY TICKET (sold out)

Duration: 1h 45 min
In Lithuanian, with English and Estonian subtitles.

Director Laura Kutkaitė; Playwrights Teklė Kavtaradze, Laura Kutkaitė in collaboration with the cast; Set and costumes designer Paulina Turauskaitė; Composer Agnė Matulevičiūtė; Choreographer Laura Kutkaitė; Choreography consultant Agnietė Lisičkinaitė; Light designer Vilius Vilutis; Director's assistant Urtė Sėjūnaitė; Playwright assistants Simona Jurkuvėnaitė, Eglė Poškevičiūtė; Producer Rugilė Pukštytė; Cast Gerda Čiuraitė, Rimantė Valiukaitė, Toma Vaškevičiūtė, Oneida Kunsunga, Aistė Zabotkaitė, Jūratė Vilūnaitė.

Susie Wang (Norway)

BURNT TOAST

Existential splatter-theatre for adults. 

Somewhere Deep South, in an all-red hotel lobby. Betty, the receptionist, is busy typing, when Danny appears with a silver briefcase chained to his wrist. After checking in, Danny wants to go to the museum, but then he sees Violet. She sits in the lounge sipping the welcome drink, while breast-feeding her baby daughter. 

Danny and Violet strike up a conversation and quickly bond. Violet notes that her daughter looks a lot like Danny. A lot. Could he possibly be the father? What is in his briefcase? When does the museum close? And what about the future? 

The afternoon in the lobby becomes increasingly bizarre and blood will flow until dreams and hallucinations and theatre merge into a wild genre blend.

The Norwegian theatre group Susie Wang has quickly become one of Norway’s most prominent theatre companies. It was formed in 2017 by writer and director Trine Falch, composer and sound designer Martin Langlie, actor Mona Solhaug and set designer Bo Krister Wallström. 

Trine Falch and Bo Krister Wallström have previously visited Baltoscandal festival in 2002 as members of artist collective Baktruppen and their show “Very Good”.

“It is obviously great to be human, but it’s not like we aren’t part of nature simply because we are conscious beings. Culture is mistaken when it tries to escape from nature. And the faster we run, the harder the crash when we meet. What we left behind as the Garden of Eden now comes at us like a living hell. Perhaps it’s best to play dead. Susie Wang plays dead and alive, as naturally as we can.”
– Susie Wang on their trilogy about human nature

“I can safely say that I’ve never seen anything quite like Burnt Toast (…) a disturbing yet tender tale of love and cannibalism.“
– New York Times

Wed 3.07 22:30 Rahu hall BUY TICKET 

Thu 4.07 20:00 Rahu hall BUY TICKET (sold out)

Duration: 85 min
In English with Estonian subtitles.
Recommended age 16 +
Contains depictions of violence and scenes featuring blood.

Concept Susie Wang; Text/direction Trine Falch; Scenography Bo Krister Wallström; Music/sound Martin Langlie; Light Phillip Isaksen; SFX Fanney Antonsdottir; Stagecraft design Antti Bjørn; Carpentry Jon Løvøen; Stagecraft, live Simen Ulvestad, Jon Løvøen, Lars Halvorsen; Language consultancy: Dean Clark, Sarah Valentine; With: Kim Atle Hansen, Julie Solberg, Mona Solhaug, Phillip Isaksen, Fanney Antonsdottir.                                                 

Co-production Black Box Theatre                                                                                                                                                                    
Supported by Arts Council Norway, The Audio and Visual Fund and Visual Artists Fund

Miet Warlop (Belgium)

AFTER ALL SPRINGVILLE – DISASTERS AND AMUSEMENT PARKS

A restaging of Miet Warlop’s iconic work after 12 years of its world premiere. With the lightness of a cartoon, the tragic story of a failed community is told, the show is perfect to visit with the whole family. 

In it, an explosive narrative unfolds around a colourful-smoking cardboard house, its inhabitants and the neighbourhood: an elegant walking table that would like nothing better than to be set, a man who wants to take out the trash, a frustrated fuse box and a very long pair of pants go through big and small dramas with varying degrees of slapstick and disaster potential. With the lightness of a cartoon, the tragic story of a failed community is told. And because all this could hardly be more topical, Warlop has restaged her iconic work premiere under the title After All Springville.

Miet Warlop is a Belgian visual artist living between Ghent and Brussels. She received a master’s degree in visual arts from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of Ghent. In 2004, she won the Jury Prize of the KASK Franciscus Pycke and the Young Theatre award of the Ostend Theater Aan Zee with Huilend Hert. Her reflection about theatre as an artistic form has led to a physical approach where one can find elements reminiscent of her previous plays: the concert as ritual, the effort, the repetition, the objects.

Everything in Miet Warlop’s artistic practice is connected, be it implicitly or explicitly. She sees her work as a cycle, just like life. Her latest production, “One Song”, in collaboration with NTGent Theatre, was chosen by many experts as one of the 10 best stage productions in 2022.

Wed 3.07 20:00 Rakvere Teatri suur maja BUY TICKET 

Thu 4.07 15:30 Rakvere Teatri suur maja BUY TICKET 

Duration: 45 min
Language no problem
Show for the whole family

Concept and Direction Miet Warlop; Performance Emiel Vandenberghe, Freek De Craecker, Jacobine Tone Kofoed, Jarne Van Loon, Jef Hellemans, Margarida Ramalhete, Margot Masquelier, Wietse Tanghe, Milan Schudel; Costumes Sofie Durnez; Technical Coordination Patrick Vanderhaegen; Technical Crew Bart Van Hoydonck, Eva Dermul, Frieder Naumann, Jurgen Techel, Pieter Kinoli; Production Manager Rossana Miele.

Production: Miet Warlop / Irene Wool vzw; Co-production: HAU Hebbel am Ufer – Berlin, Arts Centre BUDA, Arts Centre Vooruit, PerPodium (BE), De Studio Antwerpen, Internationales Sommerfestival Kampnagel.

With the support of The Belgian Tax Shelter, Flemish Authorities, City of Ghent

Thanks to: Arts Centre CAMPO, TAZ – Theater Aan Zee & cc De Grote Post, Amotec, Bennert Vancottem, Winston Reynolds, Alexandra Rosser.

WAUHAUS (Finland)

THE COMPANION

The Companion is a private encounter between one audience member and a robotic dog. In the performance, the robot entices the human participant into different negotiations, interactions, and play. The encounter harnesses our innate curiosity and empathy towards all moving beings. What kind of agency are we willing to embrace? Are we ready to surrender to and trust a non-human companion?

“Robots can’t feel, but we feel for them.”
– Kate Darling, The New Breed

WAUHAUS is a Helsinki-based multidisciplinary arts collective. The works of WAUHAUS are situated between different genres of art and take place at various venues from small black box theatres to urban sites, large stadiums, and the main stages of established theatre houses.

WAUHAUS is already familiar to Estonian audiences, having performed at the Kanuti Gildi SAAL, STL and at the Baltoscandal Festival (in 2018, with their production “Flashdance”).

For buying the ticket choose suitable day and starting time (NB! The show is for one participant at a time with a duration of 20 minutes. Some of the times have been reserved for festival pass owners and are not on sale.)

BUY TICKET (sold out)

Thu 4.07 14:00–18:50 Kinomaja proovisaal

Fri 5.07 13:10–19:00 Kinomaja proovisaal

Sat 6.07 14:00–18:50 Kinomaja proovisaal

Sun 7.07 13:10–18:50 Kinomaja proovisaal

Duration: 20 min
In English
For one participant

Children aged 5–12 can experience an adapted version of the performance together with an accompanying adult.

Concept WAUHAUS; Choreography and direction Jarkko Partanen; Sound design Jussi Matikainen; Scenography Samuli Laine; Operation/Performance Jarkko Partanen & Jussi Matikainen; Concept art Heikki Ulmanen; Producer Julia Hovi; Production WAUHAUS.

Artists Jarkko Partanen, Jussi Matikainen, Laura Haapakangas from WAUHAUS; Visual design of the robot Kari Kankaanpää; Lighting design Mia Jalerva; Software development Aki Panuma (Probot); Producer Julia Hovi; Production WAUHAUS (FI), Black Box (NO), Kiasma Theatre (FI), in collaboration with Probot (FI).

Support: Nordic Culture Point, Jenny and Antti Wihuri Foundation, The Arts Promotion Centre Finland, City of Helsinki