After last year’s happening Utopija oblik (Utopia of form), the Ples senc (Shadow dance), was the second event, organized, as usually with far too little financial resources and with the spirit of “wanting to do” by Ana Čepin and her Art.Con gallery.
In addition, this year the entire happening was put on scene.
The wonderful location in front of the municipality at the cities Rotenturn manor was also this year the host of this happening in three acts, – workshop – talk – presentation.
The artists involved this year were the befriended duo Katja Vravnik and Tea Kovše from Zadruga Zraven, who are very fresh, kinky and active in the field of the performing arts. Both vivid, observant and open-minded persons, curious and capable of transforming the seen into performing arts, they promised to set good impulses during the day of action under the sign of the shadow dance. We met the girls years ago and they later also participated in one of our Erasmus+ Youth Encounters, the European Creative Camp 017.
Nevertheless, let us return to Ples senc – in a moment, where the Covid-19 crisis was almost fully forgotten, before it should only some days later come to another ultimate lock-down, the air was full of good promises.
What happened? An entire day in the sun, starting with the Lutkovni Poligon (Training ground for puppets), a workshop held by the artist duo, focused on promoting sensitivity to the common in the youngest, followed by a discussion, that lead into the highlight, to the performance of the shadow dance named “Ime mi je vida” (My name is Vida).
The discussion, entitled “Tu in zdaj” (Here and now), evolved around the importance and role of non-governmental (therefore somehow more independent) cultural production within a local community.
Aljaž Kitak, who, coached by Urška Čerče, prepared and moderated the talk, to which he invited, next to the vice-mayor Martina Šisernik, two representatives of major non-governmental cultural good contributors of the region, Katja Vravnik from Zadruga Zraven and Rado Carlo Poggi, chair of raum AU.
The discussion itself was very pleasant, the time of the crisis made sure, we all were happy to hear people speak and participate in these kind of events. However, we talked very concretely about the needs of our sector; we often see undervalued by the officials respective to all the benefits a local community, especially a city-community like Slovenj Gradec must acknowledge to gain by our productions. Now, that we just freshly stepped in a kind of partnership with our municipality in the HABitat Slovenj Gradec, the dialog got better while the expectations of our sector gradually became common ones. However, an hour passed by quickly and as the sky got darker, the shadows shall start their play …
“My Name is Vida”, written and performed by Katja Vravnik and Tea Kovše, the shadow-dance performance where we could become testimonies, was a reflection of the role of the individual within society. – catching!
All in all, a quite successful and applauded second project for Art.Con, that saw once more, next to the facilitating city administration of Slovenj Gradec and Spotur, involved the youth center Slovenj Gradec, the youth city council, the association MAD, the association Spektakularnost glasbe as well as Zadruga ZRAVEN and us, raum AU. Good and exemplary networking – economy of scale 🙂
