Alexander Manuiloff

The perfromance "The State" was selected for 2015 contemporary dance and theatre festival "Globalize:Cologne" in Cologne, Germany.

The perfromance was staged on October 23, 2015 at

Tanzfaktur
Siegburgerstr. 233 w
50679 Köln

http://freihandelszone.org/globalizecologne-2015.html

After the show this report appeared:

http://stunst.com/?p=6969

And I decided to write an article on the whole festival which I was kindly invited to attend in full.

So this is the text:

SHINE ON YOU, CRAZY DIAMOND

GLOBALIZE:COLOGNE

Cologne-Sofia, Oct 2015

I was one of the invited artists for this year’s programme and I am not going to coment on the shows in details. But a few years ago I was also involved in organising a theatre festival in Sofia and the whole event in Cologne was interesting for me also as a concept and phenomenon in general.

What I like about GLOBALIZE:COLOGNE is that it pays almost no attention to lustre and external polishing of things. At the opening evening we were served soup and bread. What could be more cosy, family-like and non-pretentious than that? No press conferences, no special place for journalists, just audience. A tremendously experienced audience mainly coming from a city of one million that however has more than 60 theatres and decades of intensive theatrical life for which many other countries in Europe may only dream of.  That is why Cologne seems mature enough to just let things happen. And not involve itself that much in talking about how things are. They just are. Here and now.

The invited performances were for sure not the most lavish ones you can find in Europe or beyond.  Neither in terms of volume of set designs, nor as costumes, number of actors/performers or  technical equipment needed. On the contrary. But some conceptually fascinating trends have been clearly showcased and brought to the attention of the audiences. The organisers invited not only internationally renowned names, but also debutants and risky experimental projects, a bravery for which they deserve congratulations. If we don't take any risks, the development in theatre will stop and we will be producing and reproducing what we already know and have seen too many times.

To cut the long story short: if the festival were to be likened to a family, then it would never give money on designer clothes. People here spend on bringing together new concepts and ideas. I think this festival, although small and focused on international productions, stays at the centre of what is most powerful about German culture as a whole: that it still is able and willing to pay for intellectual vision, rather than for clothes.

Divided in five days, the festival's programme features one central performance each day plus one additional small-format event. This makes it possible for the interested ones to see everything without much effort. Which also provides time to digest things.

The festival spirit here doesn't come in the form of shiny cafes or bars selected for the gatherings of artists and audience. Nor does it come from the quantity of the glittering champagne (we had almost none). It comes in the fact that remote, small, independent and sometimes virtually unknown theatre spaces in Cologne host internationally important performers. The shows are sometimes designed for 30 people, or even less – they may be for only one at a time.

Germans like to discuss and this may be a bit of a tiring exercise for some other Europeans. The discussions after the shows here, however, happened more informally and if and when people want it, not as something that has to be planned and catered for specifically. The maturity of this decision lies also in the option given to everybody to find on their own the people they want to comment with. And the right time as well.

Not everything that shines is gold, they say. From Cologne I learned that not all gold shines. Old gold – especially – not.

The most luxurious thing about GLOBALISE:COLOGNE is that local audiences get the chance to experience theatre phenomena coming from around the globe in their authentic, local, non dressed-up or puffed-up neighbourhood stages, as an adequate and integral part of their city's own current theatre life. In a way the festival is more like Localize:The Globe, in Cologne.

It would be an outrageous idea to think that the clever example of Cologne can be followed by others to colognize the Globe with similar festivals around the world. But I am a dreamer. I imagine that one day I will be able to open the theatre programme of Sofia and see that in alternative, independent places, some of which I may have to discover for the first time, this week there are performances from Japan, from England, Ireland, Sweden or Portugal for example. And that if I make the effort to go, I may be one of the privileged 30 to see something new and important. In Cologne this became possible only because the organisers had not sacrificed theatricality and intimacy to the number of tickets that could be sold. They had not hosted the shows in big, shiny theatres in search of higher revenue or some form of superficial glamour. On the other hand, this choice to stay local is also very good for the foreign artists – they immediately become part of the theatre life of the city, they don’t find themselves under some kind of shiny museum exposition window or showcase. On the other other hand, the audience that does not belong to the neighbourhood here has to be active, find out what they want to see from the programme, and take the touble to commute to a theatre space they may not know well. I don't think that anybody from the visitors was there by accident or driven by a fashionable trend which in other festival cases may be created by a special PR campaign. GLOBALISE:COLOGNE made it possible for something real to happen – and it happened for the people who were able to really appreciate it. This doesn’t mean the festival was created for theatre makers and experts. No. Visitors in the audience varied in age between 19 and 80 and also in background: from proven theatre professionals to people who are just starting to discover theatre and performative arts. But all of the spectators showed some kind of special willingness to participate. And as an artist – I just can’t ask for more.

If we are talking about cultural policies: over the years, I guess, all this smoothly creates permanent interest, develops tastes and caters for establishment of a well-informed, thinking, independent audiences. The institutions who financed the festival could not have made a wiser decision in what to invest for the future of their regional (and also national) culture.

Talking about national culture – there is a point I find important to contemplate on:

People in Cologne wait at red light even when the street is only two metres wide and there are no cars to be seen kilometres away.

I think I am a very patient person, but not when it comes to waiting.

Here, aber, I wait and I like it. For me it is a minute of respect to be paid to the rules that constitute this country.

The totally opposite thing is also true. People in Cologne don't wait at red light. When somebody crosses on red and if he looks credible enough (not an Obdachlose) everybody else will do the same. It is interesting to observe this feeling of being solidary to others.

Probably, it is also part of the constitutional values.

I don’t know why this year’s edition of GLOBALISE:COLOGNE and the topic of crossing on red or not crossing on red light are totally intertwined in my head.

I think the festival in a way was about that.

To cross or not to cross? To break(change) the rules or to obey to them? To do or to be? To act as an individual or to stay a member of a small socium? Or maybe – find ways to enjoy both?

Around Europe, we have seen festivals and artists who always set the wrong, unimportant, self-sufficient and self-centered questions. Sometimes they cater for the artists’ egoes more than for the artistic values.

Not this time. Not here. For me GLOBALISE:COLOGNE is one true, small, non-polished diamond. It produces so much inner joy when you find it. And there is one thing I can say:

Vielen Dank, Koeln, you will stay in my heart.

Alexander Manuiloff