What happened?

Short summary of the 20th edition

The six-day-long 2011 Divadelná Nitra 2011 International Festival (23 - 28 September) featured 14 productions by ensembles from 10 countries. Around 15,000 visitors joined the celebration of the festival’s jubilee by attending the events included in its main programme and in its accompanying programme. Thanks to its top-quality offer, high attendance, efficient organisation, extensive media coverage and pleasant ambiance, this year’s festival became one of the most successful in Divadelná Nitra’s history.

The productions featured in the main programme were all centred around the theme of memory and the ways of dealing with the past, as suggested by the festival’s slogan,“(Don’t) Tell Your Secret”. Ensembles from Russia, Hungary, Belgium, Poland, the Czech Republic, France, Portugal, the United Kingdom, Lithuania as well as four Slovak troupes came to Nitra to reveal universal truths about life, death and love; 266 company’s members performed 19 plays as part of the main programme, attended by more than 4,700 spectators.

The festival celebrated its own 20^th anniversary through a series of special events grouped under the umbrella title “Extra 20”. These included a reinstallation of selected parts of Intersection: Intimacy and Spectacle originally presented within the Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space. The professional public particularly welcomed the working events, including the Festival As (Creative) Industry international colloquy, focusing on the impact of cultural events on a region’s economic potential, and the presentation of a new research theatre project run by the Divadelná Nitra Association, Parallel Lives – 20^th Century Through the Eyes of Secret Police. Planned to span over a period of three years, the project is based on the stories of people spied upon by secret intelligence services. The events prepared on the occasion of the festival’s anniversary also included visual arts exhibitions and installations, street theatre performances, as well as several events tailored specially for children. Last but not least, two publications were issued to celebrate the jubilee.

This year, a record-breaking number of 84 foreign guests from 18 countries attended the festival. They included individual observers, representatives of theatres and various theatre events, renowned critics, and journalists. As many as 40 guests represented thedomestic professional audience, such as theatre artists, theoreticians, critics, journalists, and drama teachers.

Divadelná Nitra owed its pleasant atmosphere to 93 accompanyingevents such as street theatre performances, concerts, movie screenings, visual arts events, happenings, photography exhibitions, interactive screenings, and numerous activities for children and families. Of course, the programme again featured the popular White Night and the traditional Lantern Parade, attended by more than a thousand people. Our systematic effort towards the education of young people continued with another edition of the How to Understand Theatre project, this year focusing on The Paranoia, a production by the France-based Théâtre des Lucioles. In addition, an all-year project aiming at the integration of disabled children, A Tulip for You,culminated at Divadelná Nitra.

The Divadelná Nitra Association would like to extend its thanks to its main partners: the Andrej Bagar Theatre in Nitra, the Karol Spišák Old Theatre in Nitra, the Theatre Institute of Bratislava, Nitra Region, and the City of Nitra, as well as to an additional 31 co-organisers from Nitra and Bratislava. The festival was supported by 19 Slovak and foreign public institutions, most notably the Ministry of Culture of the Slovak Republic, and 5 foundations; 32 firms and businesses provided in-kind support. Thanks to our 26 media partners, the public was constantly informed about the programme, ideas and activities of the festival and about its history spanning 20 years. The festival was prepared by 22 backstage crew members and 170 volunteers, another record-breaking figure.