New dramatic forms between documentary and fiction
This is an on-line course.
One of the most interesting women playwrights in the Germanic sphere proposes exploring the fine line that sometimes separates documentary theatre and fiction.
Since the documentary theatre has become widely popular and established, it will be interesting to explore the latest movements that can be found into a new correlation between documentary and fiction, or documentary that transgress its ‘realistic’ limitations with the means of literature.
While strongly connected with its political contents, these new forms have been developed also in order to avoid certain authoritarian structures. Is there a poetics of the ‘non hierarchic’? And in which different ways can that be expressed?
During the workshop we will read a couple of plays that deal with different political issues such as nature and the climate change, political oppression, social movements and artificial intelligence. And related to the last: Is there a way to narrate this topic beyond the classic science fiction?
The workshop offers a journey through nowadays playwriting led by the question: which new aesthetic positions can be found by reading, discussing and, last but not least, writing?
Within the GREC 2020 Festival of Barcelona.
Supported by:
Maxi Obexer studied Comparative Literature, Philosophy and Theatre Studies in Vienna and Berlin. She writes fiction, stage and radio plays and made her name with political dramas and essays. Her work in recent years as a dramatist, author and lecturer has repeatedly examined European policies towards migration. She has been awarded prizes and scholarships by institutions including the Akademie Solitude, the Academy of the Arts, Berlin, and, more recently, she was the winner of the 2016 Eurodrama Prize for Illegal Helpers.
She has been a visiting professor at Dartmouth College, USA, at the University of the Arts, Berlin, at the German Literature Institute in Leipzig and at Georgetown University in Washington, DC.
Maxi Obexer has a long-standing interest in advanced education in the field of dramatic arts. Together with Sasha Marianna Salzmann, in 2014 she founded NIDS, the “New Institute of Dramatic Writing”: www.nids.eu.
Obexer has also developed numerous performances in recent years as collaborations with artists working in contemporary visual arts and music. In 2008 she created the installation Defending Europe together with the sonic artist Hannes Hölzl for the European Art Biennial Manifesta 7.
The Ghost Ship, her most frequently performed play to date, is a critical examination of the responses to refugee crises: a modern requiem about the many dead washed up on Europe’s shores and the indifferent reactions to this (world premiere: Theaterhaus Jena, 2007).
Her plays have been performed at the state theatres in Brunswick and Dresden, the theatres in Basel and Freiburg, at the regional theatres in Swabia and Tübingen, Theaterhaus Jena and the Theatre die Rampe in Stuttgart.
Illegal Helpers was produced as a radio play by WDR in 2015. The eponymous stage play received its world premiere at Schauspielhaus Salzburg in January 2016, followed by a German premiere at the Hans Otto Theater in Potsdam. HOT Potsdam then commissioned Maxi Oberer to write Going or Staying on the specific situation of refugees in Potsdam.
Obexer’s plays have been translated into several languages, including French, English, Bulgarian, Czech and Romanian.
Admission to the course will be based on order of arrival and CV assessment, which should be sent (with photograph included), filling in the form on the right.
Places on courses are limited. Places will be reserved once the course amount has been paid. Payment must be made within one week of receiving the corresponding acceptance email.
The dates indicated for each course or seminar may be subject to variations in exceptional circumstances. These will be notified when applicable.
For the course to take place, a minimum number of students must be registered. If this number is not reached, the course will be cancelled and the student will have the option of registering for a different course (providing that there are places available) or alternatively will receive a refund of the amount paid (100%). If a student withdraws, a refund of 75% of the registration fee will be applicable, providing that written notice is given at least 10 days before the start of the course.