Bridges

ongoing

Bridges is a 26-month international artistic project, conducted by four European theatres: EUX - Compagnie d'Improvisation (Paris, France), KD IGLU (Ljubljana, Slovenia), Grund Színház (Budapest, Hungary) and Teatro a Molla (Bologna, Italy). It is a project of artistic exploration of language used in artistic improvisation. Our objective is to explore how different languages and non-verbal communication can be used in a live artform such as improvisation, where the content of the performances is produced on the spot through collective collaboration. Through 3 artistic Labs 10 artists will research, explore and develop tools to use in performances of artistic improvisation, creating Shows that will include movement, mime, uses of made up languages and their own native languages, where the expression of words is more important than their meanings. The 16 performances will engage audiences in five countries, especially seeking audience members who rarely visit touring shows due to the fear of not understanding English - the language most commonly used among touring improvisers. Through Shows the project aims to draw more than 1.600 spectators, with more than two thirds of them seeing an improvisational performance not in their language for the first time. The results of the project will be disseminated through an artistic Academy, which will invite 32 young theatre professionals to learn new methods of performance and production in improvisational theatre. They will also study techniques of making their performances more environmentally sustainable, get a platform to form new networks and a licence to produce the project’s Show format within their collaborations. The results, methods, a series of podcasts and articles about the project will be widely available on the Bridges Knowledge Sharing portal with the idea of spreading and inventing new innovative approaches to the uses of languages other than English in international improvisational collaborations.