Labstreet Project

OPIS WYDARZENIA:

"Projekt Labstreet" / "Labstreet Project" refers to an ancient idea of dance squares which were located in the centres of the Ancient Greece cities and which served the inhabitants as a place for community celebration during ritual cultural activities. With the growth of the ancient civilisation, a metaphysical element withdrew from social spaces to special, more secluded places dedicated to religious practices. Since then the dancing squares turned into agorae. With the use of art, we want to come back to these primal common functions of cities. Labstreet means "urban laboratory" so observations, research on city entropy, experiments on the language of art in a living, every day, "ordinary" space. We want to be consistent and, at the same time, discreet in our actions, we strive to be natural in our provocations in the urban open space. We use various techniques – starting from meditation, (also participant) observation, mathematical/statistical operations, improvisation and behaviour intensification to self-reflection. 

Labstreet means also performing a mathematically ideal structure of an ancient labyrinth at the dance squares of contemporary cities. This game, thanks to its universal and accurate structure, can move into any of the "dreamt of" spaces, it can realize its potential and a hidden dimension... 

Consequently, connecting coincidence with a repetitive pattern produces something interesting. Performance is twofold. It is put on a street in possibly neutral and discreetly provocative manner and later, with the same structure, it is moved into a place usually used in a theatre. Audience has a chance to make observations, analogous to those of the artists, of reality as the art's substance. They can experience intensification of activities usual and unusual for the street. They can observe a process of naturalization of two orders (of life and art) in remarkable circumstances and contexts.

INFORMACJE O TWÓRCACH:

Dorota Porowska - Actress, theatre director, choreographer, theatre workshop instructor, academic lecturer. Leading member of Centre for Theatre Practices 'Gardzienice' in 1984-2003. Leader of theatrical workshops in Royal Shakespeare Company, at the Acting Departments Columbia on Stanford University and in the Institute of Meyerhold in Moscow. In 2002 co-created a dance group 'Labyrinth Dances'. CHOREA Theatre Association co-founder and member since 2004. Constantly works as an educator running workshops for students of theater and cultural studies at the Universities in Poznan, Lodz, Wroclaw, Lublin, Warsaw and School of Theater in Liège (Belgium).
In her artistic biography, apart from acting and directing theatre performances, she is occupied with analytical work on human creativity and perception, and the mechanisms which control our way of being in a separated space dedicated to the creative act. It is an unusual and very concrete space, natural for everyone, and it is worth visiting.... from time to time.