Transatlantic
AGRFT, Ljubljana
14 December 2017
PRE-STORY (2012 – 2014)
In the autumn of 2012, an intensive two-week workshop led by Foreman and his longtime colleague Sophie Haviland was produced by the Projekt Atol and co-produced by the Slovenian Youth Theater. More than twenty Slovenian artists and students of the Ljubljana Academy of Arts AVA, the Slovenian Youth Theater and freelance artists took part in the proceedings
NEW YORK CITY, OCTOBER 2017
The latest phase of this complex project, in which Slovenian artists and the associated film crew work with colleagues from New York, took place in one of the historic districts of Harlem, New York, on a site built in 1886 and played an important role in the history of African Americans and the so-called Harlem Renaissance. Directed by Foreman and Haviland, the creators designed materials for a multi-media performative structure – TRANSATLANTIC (TRANSATLATIC BRIDGE) – in accordance with Foreman’s typical generative poetics.
Colophon
Režija: Richard Foreman & Sophie Haviland
Cast: Manca Dorrer, Martin Emeršič, Harry Hughes, Katjuša Kovačič, Alenka Kraigher, Mila Sofia Kraigher, Jan Krmelj, Nicolas Norena, Nikola Orešković, Leona Paraminski, Fulya Peker, Jakob Ribič & Ana Laura Richter
Camera and photography: Akaša Bojić, Sašo Podgoršek & Luka Umek
Assistants: Martin Emeršič & Jakob Ribič
Production: Projekt Atol – Barbara Hribar, Marko Peljhan & Višnja Racan
Coproduction: The Bridge Project & Ontological-Hysteric Theater (New York, ZDA)
The project was supported by the Ministry of Culture (Slovenia) and the City of Ljubljana.
Bios
Richard Foreman, founder and director of Ontological-Hysteric Theater, has written, directed and designed over fifty of his own plays both in New York City and abroad. Five of his plays have received “OBIE” awards as best play of the year—and he has received five other “OBIE’S” for directing and for ‘sustained achievement’. He has received the annual Literature award from the American Academy and Institute of Arts and Letters, a “Lifetime Achievement in the Theater” award from the National Endowment for the Arts, the PEN Club Master American Dramatist Award, a MacArthur “Genius” Fellowship, and in 2004 was elected officer of the Order of Arts and Letters of France. His archives and work materials have recently been acquired by the Bobst Library at NYU.
Foreman is the founder and artistic director of the non-profit Ontological-Hysteric Theater (1968-present).
Seven collections of his plays have already been published, and books studying his work have been published in New York, Paris, Berlin and Tokyo.
Richard ForemanSophie Haviland is a writer, director and producer. She has presented her film and theater productions in the USA, Europe and Australia. Haviland moved from Australia to NYC in 1992 and then took over the management of Foreman’s St Mark’s Church Theater. She has produced seven performances of Foreman’s Ontological-Hysteric Theater in New York and 3 international tours (Permanent Brain Damage – New York, Meltdown Festival – London; Pearls for Pigs – New York, Paris, Rome, Montreal, LA; Paradise Hotel – New York , Berlin, Salzburg, Paris, Copenhagen). In New York and Europe, Haviland collaborated with Ridge Theater on their play – also an OBIE Award winner – Carbon Copy Building (performances: The Kitchen, NYC; Settembre Festival, Italy) and with film director Hal Hartley on his play Soon (Salzburg Festival, Austria; de Singel, Belgium). She directed Sophocles’s Electra, Copi’s The Four Twins and her own text Amnesia. She also directed several short productions for numerous festivals in New York City.
