Choreography and performance Ugnė Dievaitytė (Lithuania), Koke Armero (Spain) | Music VIDAL (France) | Costumes NIKITA NIPONE (Spain) | Light Design Pablo Seoane, “Cía de la Luz” (Spain) | Project coordination, management Aušra Degutytė, Carmen Fernandez

Anhelo (Yearning) is the result of creative cooperation between Madrid-based Lithuanian dancer Ugnė Dievaitytė and the Spanish origin artist Koke Armero summarizing their interest in the newest research and studies of emotional intellect by D. Goleman and other scientists on how different emotions are reflected through expressions and forms of the physical body. The performance showcases the transition from instinctive, subconscious human existence to daily routine experiences and conscious perception of reality. At the beginning, live sculpture images reflecting a person like an animal lead the observer to the reality of sensuous images. Dream-like, surreal portrayal of the world gradually becomes more rational. In the second part of the performance, dancers’ movements acquire daily, recognizable forms. Anhelo is a travel of two people from the dream-like world to the reality, from subconscious depths to the light of consciousness. The duration of this travel is not known beforehand, as here, self-determination to do that together is of utmost importance.

The main goal sought by Ugnė and Koke - to find a physical expression and choreographic- dramaturgic form that would embody a multi-faceted dynamics of the human relationship with the world. Close human relationship is sophisticated and complex, consisting of ambiguous feelings, thoughts and intentions. Even before our birth, we are in the relationship with another person and the space in which we develop. In life, we inevitably constantly create and destroy different relations with everything what surrounds us. We frequently do it even unconsciously. Meetings, interrelationships and separations – are the experiences of our existence, natural like breathing. Ugnė and Koke, by creating the dance performance Anhelo invite the audience to look for answers together: how we become attached to people, places, particular experiences, activities; what arises at the time of the meeting, separation, approach and withdrawal, arrival and departure. The performance provides the spectator with a possibility to reflect, tune in and identify oneself with what is going on the stage.

Ugnė Dievaitytė is a Lithuanian choreographer and dancer based in Madrid. She has been studying contemporary dance and dance improvisation with teachers from Europe and the United States. She has been also exploring dance therapy with Alexander Girshon. So far, Ugnė has collaborated with diverse companies and artists from Lithuania, the United Kingdom and Spain.

Choreography, performance Greta Grinevičiūtė, Agnietė Lisičkinaitė | Dramaturgy Sigita Ivaškaitė | Music Arturas Bumšteinas | Set design and costumes Laura Darbutaitė | Video projection Jonas Tertelis | Light design Povilas Laurinaitis | Producer Arts Agency Artscape

Like the opening of a fairy-tale, B&B Dialogue began when a Cork sweet maker, a shoe-maker and a furniture-maker met two dancers from Vilnius. It was a funny and personal homage to the craftspeople and disappearing trades of Cork and Vilnius – where them and us became we, as different generations and ways of life came into contact with each other. During the developing process the two dancers/choreographers Agnietė Lisičkinaitė and Greta Grinevičiūtė created two characters and called them B&B. Unfortunately, they didn’t expect that those two blond girls would take over their creation. B&B started to live their own independent lives and this stage piece became unpredictable. No more boundaries between choreographers and performers are left. Only one question still bugs young choreographers – do we need masks in order not to be afraid to be who we truly are?

Dance makers Agnietė Lisičkinaitė and Greta Grinevičiūtė are actively performing artists in professional Lithuanian dance scene where they have been first seen in 2012 and a year later they both performed in their preceptor Aira Naginevičiūtės’ work Hora lupus/Hour of the wolf. The two dancers are invited to perform in works of well-known Lithuanian choreographers, as well as they are always involved in their individual artistic projects.

Choreography and dance Marius Paplauskas, Marius Pinigis | Sound design Andrius Stakelė | Light design Povilas Apulis | Visual design Artūras Bulota | Management and Public relations Agnė Pinigienė

In its pure meaning the term ground zero has quite destructive and militant DNA. But in our case “(g)round zero” marks the point in time and space where two dancers, Marius and Marius, feel inescapable need to meet each other on stage, challenge themselves and start their dance adventure from zero. Why from zero? Because we need to find the common way to move on stage since our dance backgrounds are completely different. And more importantly, we feel more than ever before strong desire to search for a reason why we dance and what is the trigger for us to keep on doing it.

“Rising up, back on the street/Did my time, took my chances/Went the distance, now I'm back on my feet/Just a man and his will to survive” – Does this text sound familiar to you? Yes or no, but it certainly does to us! These are the opening lines from the Survivor song “Eye of the Tiger”. And they work as inspiration and motivation for us. Rocky, Terminator, Baywatch, Mortal Kombat, Bruce Lee or Muhammad Ali, Michael Jackson or Jimmy Hendrix, Backstreet Boys or All4one, and many more movies, singers, bands, artists have the same effect for us and our peace. So, “(g)round zero” is not only a fusion of two differently trained dancers. It is a tribute to our childhood and our heroes from that time, to freedom and bravery, to fantasy and being present all the time.

When you start to feel that forces are awakening deep inside of you... Your guts are screaming “I want to break free”... You have the eyes of the tiger and your body is sharp and electrified as if you would be the Terminator... There is no other way than just to believe that we all have the power, for sometimes it’s so hard to see. And whenever you have any doubts, just follow these words: “I'll be there,/I'll be ready,/Never your fear,/Now don't you fear,/I'll be there,/Forever and always, I'm always here!”.

Marius Paplauskas is a well-known street dancer and choreographer in Lithuania, great teacher, willing to make a huge leap of his carrier in professional field of performing not only locally but also internationally.

Concept, choreography, dance Austėja Vilkaitytė | Set Laura Marija Balčiūnaitė, Austėja Vilkaitytė | Costume Sandra Bučiūtė, Marija Puipaitė | Hair Justė Margarita | Video Monika Janulevičiūtė | Light design Minijus Vilbrantas | Bar Rugilė Deksnytė | Artists in collaboration Laura Marija Balčiūnaitė, Grégoire Blunt, Egle Kulbokaitė, Antanas Lučiūnas | Project curator Silvija Čižaitė-Rudokienė

CC_BLACK, latest version of CC_SPIRIT, continues bringing extraterrestrial energies and abducted modern moves to the black box stage. Abducted movements from Maurice Béjart, Martha Graham, Pina Bausch, Mary Wigman, Maya Plisetskaya 5 stages to fulness continues with lap dance instructors, belly dance, fitness, vogue, whacking, twerking and cursing witchcraft leading to Bio-healing dance, surrounded by “PURITY” element, also known as black oil.

CC_SPIRIT was first presented in 2014 as a collaboration between Grégoire Blunt, Eglė Kulbokaitė and Austėja Vilkaitytė, held at the project space Altes Finanzamt in Berlin and curated by Viktorija Šiaulytė. For the development of the piece Austėja Vilkaitytė has received Individual state grant.

Different carbon copies (CC) of CC_SPIRIT were also presented at the art space "VU Planetarium" (Vilnius), SING 6 (Brussels), AURA+ theatre (Kaunas, LT), festival PIN Day: Culture Marathon “Kablys” (Vilnius, LT), STRCAMP music festival (Trakai district, LT), Rokai Culture centre (Kaunas district, LT) such as CC_ASMR, CC_DIAMOND, CC_PIN, CC_YIN&YANG wedding, CC_Rokai and CC_UDO.

Contributing: Rokai Culture centre, Vilnius University Planetarium, Arts Printing House, Medical SPA Eglės sanatorija, “Puantas”, NGO Arts Management Platform.

Choreography Aira Naginevičiūtė | Playwright Gabrielė Labanauskaitė | Music Vladas Dieninis | Set design Arūnas Adomaitis | Artists Goda Laurinavičiūtė, Benas Šarka, Greta Grinevičiūtė, Gabrielė Labanauskaitė

Towers of Melancholy is a performance exploring the states in which peripheries of loneliness and perception of new spaces are experienced. Fog has been meditated in these states, one melts away into musing about oneself and existential emptiness. At the same time, it is a modern dance performance, where everyone builds his own interpretation of the towers.

Towers of Melancholy is a part of a diptych, continuing a trip started in the play Glass Gardens, and exploring intermediate moments of a Being. However, if in the Glass Gardens moments of the sacred being on both sides is lived through, in the Towers of Melancholy one dives into the deep stratum of the human soul to observe the state of melancholy stigmatized by sadness and anxiety.

In the Towers of Melancholy the creative team looks at the creator’s world when creating neologisms of motion and music. By combining anxiety with irony, the choreographer Aira Naginevičiūtė the vivid and true human emotion turns into aesthetic reality.

Aira Naginevičiūtė entered the professional theatre stage in 1989 when she founded FLUIDUS Dance Company and became one of the creators of contemporary dance in Lithuania. Since then she has created over 30 dance performances and compositions, the most prominent of which are Processus (2002), Pregnant Silence (2005), Ego and ID (2007, 2009), The Moon Does Not Care About Barking Dogs (2008).

In 2003, Aira Naginevičiūtė received the most important theatre award in Lithuania, the Golden Stage Cross (for the performance Processus, 2002). Two years later, she was also nominated for the Golden Stage Cross for the performance Pregnant Silence (2004).

The performances created by Aira have a strong identity characterized by intensely visual stage images, interdisciplinary way of thinking and examinations of inner states of a human being through movement. As a choreographer, she is always on quest of artistic innovations, which involve contemporary music, sounds, dance cinema, improvisation, text, voice and poetry. Her uniqueness lays in her visual and meditational character, seemingly vision-like, full of metaphors and links to philosophical truths, filled with sound architecture.

AIROS Dance Theatre was established in 2013 by the Lithuanian choreographer and director Aira Naginevičiūtė after more than 25 years of her experience on the professional stage.

Within a very short time of company existence, Choreographer Aira Naginevičiūtė staged three complex, large-scale philosophical dance theatre productions Chimera’s Beads (2013), Glass Gardens (2015) and Towers of Melancholy which was premiered on April 15-16, 2016 in Vilnius. The site specific project Hour of the Wolf was created in 2013.

The AIROS Dance Theatre has already been marked by three nominations of the highest theatre award in Lithuania – the Golden Stage Cross: in 2013 for Chimera’s Beads in the category Choreography (2013) and in 2015 the Golden Stage Cross for Glass Gardens, the categories for Choreography and Dance for the best dancer Goda Laurinavičiūtė.

In 2016 the AIROS Dance Theatre started its international career. On 18 March 2016 Chimera’s Beads opened the Experimental Theatre Biennale in Shenzhen, China. Two shows on 18 and 19 March were performed on the Shi Xia theatre stage of the Futian Culture Hall in Shenzhen.

Choreography: 1^st part – Anne Ekenes, Pia Holden (Panta Rei Dance Theatre, Norway), 2^nd part – Birutė Letukaitė (Aura Dance Theatre, Lithuania) | Music Antanas Jasenka | Dramaturgy assistant Silvija Čižaitė-Rudokienė | Light design Vladimiras Šerstabojevas | Costumes Thom Bara | Author of video projections Saulius Paliukas | Dancers Ema Nedobežkina, Gintarė Marija Ščavinskaitė, Haruka Suzuki, Kirie Oda, Laura Witzleben, Love Hellgren

The word godos has disappeared from daily Lithuanian vocabulary, however, our experiences and emotions are still alive in it. Godos, is a performance created by the famous Lithuanian choreographer Birutė Letukaitė and two Norwegian choreographers Anne Ekenes and Pia Holden, reveals a world, where the past, the present and the future intertwist, where feminine sensuality, secret mythological creatures and futuristic visions, meet. Panta Rei takes its inspiration from the interpretation of Godos as the song of the heart. Meanwhile, the inspiration for the Lithuanian choreography is the elemental past and its reflections in the people of today.

What is hiding in the fur of a bewitched werewolf? What spells do contemporary hags use? Who brings the luck if we don‘t believe in kites anymore?

With a subtle reference to the Lithuanian myths and legends, the dancers move in patterns, forms and rhythm that reminds of the clattering of weaving looms. A contemporary man sits down at these looms and weaves a band, which is as colorful as our life: full of thoughts about who we are today and who we will become tomorrow.

AURA Dance Theatre promotes contemporary dance in Lithuania. It was established by Birutė Letukaitė in 1980 and was registered as Kaunas City Theatre in 1995. It has been managed by the prominent chorographer up till present. During the years of its existence, the theatre created and shaped the face of Lithuanian contemporary dance and trained a great number of professional internationally claimed dancers.

AURA is constantly working on various international projects, cooperating with foreign and Lithuanian choreographers and artists in various fields. AURA represents the Lithuanian contemporary dance abroad and constantly shares innovative ideas with the dance world. International dance festival Aura, which has been being organised in Kaunas for 26 years, has eventually become an integral part of Kaunas city culture.

Choreography Ema Nedobežkina | Dancers Aime Irasema Sánchez (Mexico), Antonia Kolujartseva (Russia), Juan Madero (Mexico), Oksana Griaznova (Lithuania) | Costumes Gabija Blochina | Light design Vladimiras Šerstabojevas | Sound editing Andrius Stakelė

The performance is a kind of creed’s system. Everyone creates his own system, everyone chooses what to believe in, how to look like, how we would like to see ourselves and how we would like to show ourselves to others. The human is used to think that this is “the way, the truth and the life” of every single individual. It is like a rebellion against the old, steady system. But... Slowly, the human becomes part of that system.

In/vogue is a reference to the revolutionary 60-70’s, when the foundation for our present, saturated with “freedom”, was put. – E.Nedobežkina

“The use of Fashions in thought is to distract the attention of men from their real dangers. We direct the fashionable outcry of each generation against those vices of which it is least in danger and fix its approval on the virtue nearest to that vice which we are trying to make endemic. The game is to have them running about with fire extinguishers whenever there is a flood, and all crowding to that side of the boat which is already nearly gunwale under.” – C.S. Lewis ,The Screwtape Letters.

[voug] 1. temporarily fashionable;
2. popularity, recognition;
3. wave of success;
4. dance style, based on posing;
5. fashion magazine.

Ema Nedobežkina is a dancer of AURA Dance Theatre, nominated for Golden Stage Cross, the most significant theatre award in Lithuania. in/vogue is Ema’s debut as a choreographer.

The performance is staged on AURA’S Trampoline platform.

This platform was established to give young choreographers the opportunity to work with AURA Dance Theatre and to express themselves and their visions through other performers, working as choreographers.

AURA Dance Theatre promotes contemporary dance in Lithuania. It was established by Birutė Letukaitė in 1980 and was registered as Kaunas City Theatre in 1995. It has been managed by the prominent chorographer up till present. During the years of its existence, the theatre created and shaped the face of Lithuanian contemporary dance and trained a great number of professional internationally claimed dancers.

AURA is constantly working on various international projects, cooperating with foreign and Lithuanian choreographers and artists in various fields. AURA represents the Lithuanian contemporary dance abroad and constantly shares innovative ideas with the dance world. International dance festival Aura, which has been being organised in Kaunas for 26 years, has eventually become an integral part of Kaunas city culture.

Creator of paintings Sigi Gabrie (Sigitas Gabrijolavičius, Australia) | Choreography Birutė Letukaitė | Music Antanas Jasenka | Costumes Olesė Kekienė and Kauno kolegija | Dancers of Aura Ema Nedobežkina, Gintarė Marija Ščavinskaitė, Julija Mintautė, Gerda Butkutė, Oksana Griaznova, Abel Hernandez Gonzalez, Aime Sanchez, Juan Madero, Antonia Koluiartseva, Evgenii Kalachev, Haruka Suzuki, Kyrie Oda, Mei Chen, Love Hellgren, Niels Claes, Marine Fernandez | Partner of the exhibition and visualizations Kaunas Biennial | Artist Monika Žaltauskaitė Grašienė | Video animator Šarūnas Vyštartas

The performance Labyrinth was created in memoriam Danute Nasvytyte, a pioneer of expressive dance in Lithuania. The performance premiered at the opening of the International Dance Festival AURA 26.

During the premiere, Pienocentras Palace, the space of Kaunas modern architecture was filled with unseen and strange vitality. The unity of movement, fine arts, animation and music took the audience on a journey of mystic artistic action to rooms full of secrets. Labyrinth is based on a series of 8 paintings of Sigi Gabrie (Sigitas Gabrijolavičius), the son of Danutė Nasvytytė. The choreographer Birutė Letukaitė, in collaboration with the creative team of Kaunas Biennial, settled down the dancers of Aura Dance Theatre in the spaces of Pienocentras, where the audience is invited to travel both mentally and physically; to travel in time, in consciousness and unconsciousness, in the past and in memories, where the audience met symbolic, metaphorical figures, images and characters.

The paintings of Sigi Gabrie tell the story of a small girl and her yet unknown journey through life through the myths of Labyrinth. Her mother spins the clothes line to start her journey, and follows her watching the pathway… In this story, the idea of Minotaur is not the fear of a monstrous bull, but the fear of the unknown. The paintings are based on the physical concept of a rotating clothes line, from which various images and symbols are hanged like painted illustrated sheets. The characters (dancers) haunt the passages through the labyrinth. A photographer follows the child taking photographs of encounters with various mythical figures, and then leaves the photo records behind as memories. The photographs represent the memory of an art experience, legends and fables. The dancers in each choreography interpret and improvise on the theme of each visual metaphor seen in the paintings.

AURA Dance Theatre promotes contemporary dance in Lithuania. It was established by Birutė Letukaitė in 1980 and was registered as Kaunas City Theatre in 1995. It has been managed by the prominent chorographer up till present. During the years of its existence, the theatre created and shaped the face of Lithuanian contemporary dance and trained a great number of professional internationally claimed dancers.

AURA is constantly working on various international projects, cooperating with foreign and Lithuanian choreographers and artists in various fields. AURA represents the Lithuanian contemporary dance abroad and constantly shares innovative ideas with the dance world. International dance festival Aura, which has been being organised in Kaunas for 26 years, has eventually become an integral part of Kaunas city culture.

Choreography Vilma Pitrinaitė (Lithuania/Belgium) | Dancers Gyeong Jin Lee (S.Korea), Niels Claes (Belgium), Oksana Griaznova (Lithuania), Omer Lavie (Izrael), Paulius Prievelis (Lithuania) | Costumes Indrė Mikelaitytė | Light design Vladimiras Šerstabojevas | Music Arūnas Periokas, Mindaugas Borisa

“Nothing remains of the ancient and the future worlds, but your beauty. You never stopped being a child, silly like antiquity, cruel like the future; and between you and your beauty, exploited by the powerful, the stupid and cruel present seeped in. You always wore it like a smile between tears. (…) Your beauty that outlived the ancient world and was reclaimed by the future world, possessed by the present world, became a deadly evil. And now, the older brothers, at last, are turning back, stop-ping for a moment their cursed games, leaving their endless distractions, and asking themselves: “Is it possible that she had shown us the way ?” – Based on the film of Pier Paolo Pasolini, Rage.

This performance is a restless and fearless game with destruction. We are over soaked with the slashing, self-defending, nauseating and amazingly divine zest, which is the nature of an alive cell the destruction programmed in it. Why are you afraid? Every cell will return to the initial chaos, from which it is created. So, we are like gods, creating and destroying constellations of bodies. We are playing with fictions, signs and symbols, with the dreams of the past world, because we don’t want others to create myths for us;. we would like to create them by ourselves. – Vilma Pitrinaitė.

Vilma Pitrinaitė is a former dancer of Aura Dance Theatre. Ten years ago she went to France to study dance in the Centre for the Development of Choreography in Toulouse and in the National Choreography Centre, led by Mathilde Monnier in Montpellier. Later, she continued studying in the National Theatre school in Strasbourg. In 2010, V. Pirtinaitė created Miss Lithuania, a dance per-formance. The dancer worked with Philippe Grandrieux and la Zampa, as well as Autre Mina, a Mitia Fedotenko troupe, Dame de Pic, a François Verret, Karine Ponties troupe. Currently, the artist is living and creating in Belgium.

The performance is staged on AURA’S Trampoline platform.

This platform was established to give young choreographers the opportunity to work with AURA Dance Theatre and to express themselves and their visions through other performers, working as choreographers.

AURA Dance Theatre promotes contemporary dance in Lithuania. It was established by Birutė Letukaitė in 1980 and was registered as Kaunas City Theatre in 1995. It has been managed by the prominent chorographer up till present. During the years of its existence, the theatre created and shaped the face of Lithuanian contemporary dance and trained a great number of professional internationally claimed dancers.

AURA is constantly working on various international projects, cooperating with foreign and Lithuanian choreographers and artists in various fields. AURA represents the Lithuanian contemporary dance abroad and constantly shares innovative ideas with the dance world. International dance festival Aura, which has been being organised in Kaunas for 26 years, has eventually become an integral part of Kaunas city culture.

Choreography Niels Claes (Belgium) | Dancers Oksana Griaznova (Lithuania), Eugene Kalachyov (Russia), Aime Irasema Sánchez (Mexico), Juan Madero (Mexico), Abel Hernández (Spain) | Light design Vladimiras Šerstabojevas | Music Andrius Stakelė

“Oscar Olivera, the factory worker, who lead his people to victory against the privatisation of water in Bolivia, said: “The only things that are really ours from now on – our water and our air.”

Can you imagine life without drinkable water? In a world, where we consume gallons of water a day for personal and industrial use, it is hard to believe that this resource is not never-ending. As members of this society, we are mostly not aware of the consequences of our actions and of the (silent) wars over water privatisation. The Chinese character for ‘water’ also means ‘control’, so it is no wonder that water might become an economic good, the next oil and the next reason for global conflicts.

We are so used to consuming water without questioning the resources. Due to desertification, a result of groundwater pumping, we are literally burying ourselves in dry land. Are you ready for this?

“I dare you to enter a world, in which we are on the edge of our water supply; a world, where we are desperately trying to find a way to make the dry land fertile again, where water companies are fighting over water and where we are using the last drops of sustainable water unwisely only to be left with an empty surface.” – Choreographer Niels Claes.

The performance is staged on AURA’S Trampoline platform.

This platform was established to give young choreographers the opportunity to work with AURA Dance Theatre and to express themselves and their visions through other performers, working as choreographers.

AURA Dance Theatre promotes contemporary dance in Lithuania. It was established by Birutė Letukaitė in 1980 and was registered as Kaunas City Theatre in 1995. It has been managed by the prominent chorographer up till present. During the years of its existence, the theatre created and shaped the face of Lithuanian contemporary dance and trained a great number of professional internationally claimed dancers.

AURA is constantly working on various international projects, cooperating with foreign and Lithuanian choreographers and artists in various fields. AURA represents the Lithuanian contemporary dance abroad and constantly shares innovative ideas with the dance world. International dance festival Aura, which has been being organised in Kaunas for 26 years, has eventually become an integral part of Kaunas city culture.

Director Rūta Butkus | Performers Laurynas Jurgelis, Lukas Malinauskas, Gediminas Rimeika, Ugne Siauciunaite, Viktorija Zukauskaite, Zygimante Jakstaite | Production comma8 Dance

One More is a play presenting a motion of happy human's life. The idea was inspired by the phrase: “Since the beginning of the humanity people are persistently looking for sugar to satisfy their unquenchable desires for sweet happiness. These desires have always been driving the world towards development, however self-destruction too. The Silk Road, as an ancient global trade network operating to satisfy this human will to own what's good, played a significant role in the evolution of civilizations in the East and West, however at the same time laid the foundation for the development of today's global consumerist economies“ and reflections of today's life.

During the creative lab, six actors were looking for the original solution for what is the motion of a happy life. Ironically looking at the today's consumerist approaches and through the movement and senses that human body causes, the play tries to analyse what happiness is today.

The play One More ironically showcases today's perverted and misleading reality, where one's happy life is like a circus in a rippling ocean of preservatives and surrogates: once your cravings are satisfied and you ego is fed, you go for more, and everything starts from the beginning, again and again, like waves of the ocean.

A.Vivaldi's “The Four Seasons” was chosen to emphasize this waving of the ocean of life. Wild and broken movements, forms blending with free motions here and now pass on the vitality, pulse and explosive energy.

Rūta Butkus – is a contemporary dance performer, creator and choreographer. Her creation has been formed on the stage of the Lithuanian contemporary dance. It is hard not to notice the performative presence of Rūta’s character as a performer. Being in one environment, Rūta involves with her presence and decisions in the space, emotions broadcasted through her body. In 2013 Rūta established comma8 dance theatre.

Idea, performance Rūta Butkus | Music Miša Skalskis | Costume Lina Elmentaitė | Set design Sigita Šimkūnaitė | Artist Monika Žaltauskaitė Grašienė | Producer Rūta Bučiūnaitė | Tutors Adomas Narkevičius and Monika Lipšic

Rūta Butkus starts her dance of single Europe, surrounded by the echoes of Miša Skalskis sirens. Sigita Simkunaite’s scrapyard installation is tearing fabrics by Lina Elmentaitė apart. 9pm in people's park. Rupert is locking the door...

Rūta Butkus – is a contemporary dance performer, creator and choreographer. Her creation has been formed on the stage of the Lithuanian contemporary dance. It is hard not to notice the performative presence of Rūta’s character as a performer. Being in one environment, Rūta involves with her presence and decisions in the space, emotions broadcasted through her body. In 2013 Rūta established comma8 dance theatre.

Her new project “MII4II People’s Park” starts by observing and reflecting on topical events in Europe. You will see this project at the stage, when original expressions, lyrical and symbolical images, clichés and trivialities have emerged, manifested and were rejected. This gave rise to other ideas, emergence of new relationships, decisions non-existent until then, scattered future and synthetic realities elucidated by cosmic disinformation.

Idea Lauryna Liepaitė, Airida Gudaitė, Laurynas Žakevičius, Adas Gecevičius | Choreography and dance Airida Gudaitė, Laurynas Žakevičius | Set design and image Lauryna Liepaitė | Music Adas Gecevičius | Light design Povilas Laurinaitis

“We are immortal, I know it sounds like a joke.” – Julio Cortazar.

There is a tradition to leave a glass of wine and a piece of paper with Rayula game painted on it when visiting the tomb of Julio Cortazar, one of the most famous Argentinean writers of the twentieth century.

Inspired by this tradition and the author’s rule of the game with imagination, a dance studio “Low Air” presents Lithuanian audience with an innovative performance combining the fields of dance and the visual arts (art).

As if seriously, and as if playing, artists suggest the audience to dive into a dream, to play with their own imagination and at least once to not be afraid to stay in one’s dreams. The performance is being formed as a game with the audience, by involving the spectator into unexpected clashes of the dream and reality. The audience is shifted to specific situations, where dominant theme is the relationship - both with other people and with oneself. Fictions, subtle feelings intertwined with reality of the dream become an integral element of video and motion.

In 2012, choreographers, dancers and teachers Laurynas Žakevičius and Airida Gudaitė established Low Air Urban Dance Theatre. Low Air – is an innovation seeking dance theater of the Lithuanian younger generation. The theatre connects urban and contemporary dance elements. The Theatre’s exclusivity is characterized by the rising of new fusions and forms of the dance on the Lithuanian contemporary dance scene as a whole. In 2013, Laurynas and Airida received the most important theatre award in Lithuania – National Golden Stage Cross for their dance performance Home Trip.

Concept and performance Ingrida Gerbutavičiūtė and Agnija Šeiko | Music Antanas Jasenka | Set Design Sigita Šimkūnaitė | Video-artist Albena Baeva | Producer Goda Giedraitytė | Light Design Povilas Laurinaitis | Production Dance theatre “PADI DAPI Fish” & Identity Move

25 years after the fall of the “Iron Curtain”, the epoch of globalization is ruled by the routine imbued with western culture and western behavioural standards. Without even noticing, alongside our identity transformed by capitalism, “post-soviet” relicts guiding a person in one or another direction continue to persist. The choices of us, Eastern Europeans, are also determined by the repetition of Soviet and post-soviet behavioural patterns, squeezed between authentic, calculation and logic-based behaviour and imagined or reiterated chapters of the western behavioural patterns.

The most prominent sinusoids are reflected in women’s identity, as women who have survived the wave of feminism and radical changes in the women’s image, became lost among images as a worker – career woman – mother – housewife - beauty – lover and/or loose behaviour woman. Television and radio programmes also have a great impact on the woman’s identity by imposing their own truths, consumer-driven fashion, and social stereotypes persisting in our society.

The author of the idea, choreographer Agnija Šeiko, and the playwright Ingrida Gerbutavičiūtė chose the scientific study “Socioeconomic Conditions and Discursive Construction of Women's Identities in Post-Soviet Countries” by Dr. Aneta Pavlenko and an interview with the Czech and Lithuanian senior age women who were about thirty years old at the time of the fall of the Iron Curtain. The scientific study is also consistent with the dramaturgic line of the performance. In this performance, the creators seek to investigate and touch different layers of the woman’s personality inherent in the images of mothers, grandmothers, aunts, TV programme hostesses, beauties, winners of beauty contests, movie actresses, singers, etc. that form (un)conscious choices and behaviour of the contemporary woman.

The performance analyses the identity of contemporary woman and circumstances that form it. What determines the features of behaviour and thinking of the contemporary woman? Why one or other type decisions are made and what they depend on? Where the causes of different emotions subsist and why these causes remain of secondary importance?

The generation of women within the age group 30 to 40 is frequently called as “transitory”. This name describes not only the change in the regime, but also an internal – identity – transformation. Therefore this performance investigates the identity of contemporary thirty-forty-year old women.

PADI DAPI Fish Dance Theatre is s dance company based in Klaipėda which was created by Fish Eye Artists Group. The main aim of this company is to establish professional work in contemporary dance in Klaipėda and Lithuania. The company is exceptional and famous for interdisciplinary work that aims at connecting contemporary dance with different disciplines from various art forms to cultural heritage.

Choreography and performing Agnija Šeiko and Annika Ostwald | Texts Vaiva Grainytė | Dramaturge PeO Sander | Composer & Technician Magnus Bugge | Consultant Berglind Jóna Hlynsdóttir | Translators Torgrim Mellum Stene and Austėja Banytė | Audio assistant Kristijonas Lučinskas | Voices Ida Uvaas, Lars-Petter Iversen, Marit H. Lund, Håkon Mathias Vassvik, Torgrim Mellum Stene, Virginija Šeiko, Petras Lisauskas, Arūnas Sarulis, Arūnas Acus, Vaiva Grainytė | Co-ordinators Torgrim Mellum Stene, Greta Seiliūtė | Graphic designer Andrius Lektutis | Production PADI DAPI Fish Dance Theatre and Annika Ostwald | Producer Goda Giedraityte

“When we met her in Hong Kong, she was just about to leave somewhere we haven't been. She invited us to take a stroll in the labyrinth of her head, full of stories, while stories crossed our life. Shared memories – library of flashbacks spinning like her restless being, still like trees, it is a journey over landscapes and atmospheres”…

The team of artists from Lithuania, Norway, Sweden and Norway were working in the project to create a piece that is both universal and individual: it has a fixed dramaturgy, but it changes depending on the location and connotations it brings. The city becomes an equal performer and the universal theme of luck is differently understood both in different locations and by people with different personal experiences and nation’s history.

Agnija Šeiko gained her BA in choreography at Klaipėda University in 2001. Five years later, she completed her studies of choreography at the Rotterdam Dance Academy (the Netherlands). In collaboration with different artists, Agnija creates interdisciplinary projects employing original music, sculptural installations and video projections.

Agnija is the initiator of Fish Eye Artists Group and the head of PADI DAPI Fish Dance Theatre. In 2012, for her performance No Space at The Parking Lot, she was awarded with the Golden Stage Cross for her work promoting contemporary dance. Besides this, she was named the Artist of the Year by Klaipėda City. In 2016, she was awarded with Borisas Dauguvietis Award, as having an active social position, and a search for innovative artistic forms.

PADI DAPI Fish Dance Theatre is s dance company based in Klaipėda which was created by Fish Eye Artists Group. The main aim of this company is to establish professional work in contemporary dance in Klaipėda and Lithuania. The company is exceptional and famous for interdisciplinary work that aims at connecting contemporary dance with different disciplines from various art forms to cultural heritage.

Choreography Inga Kuznecova | Music Kristijonas Lučinskas | Dancers Eiva Dobilaitė, Aušra Krasauskaitė, Laura Geraščenko, Sigutė Juraškaitė | Costumes Lina Andriukonė | Producer Goda Giedraitytė | Art director Agnija Šeiko | Production PADI DAPI Fish Dance Theatre

“Sometimes I am princess Amnesia ...Sometimes - Princess Bum Bum Tractachtach – it depends on the day…” – R. Dautremer.

In the performance intended for children within the age group 5 – 10, ways are searched how each girl could find her exceptional “princess-like” features, love them and nurture them, create valuable and respectful relationships with other people. By transferring real life situations into the world of princesses, the dancers tell about one-of-a-kind princess inherent in each of us.

Inga Kuznecova is a Lithuanian dancer and choreographer based in Klaipėda representing Fish Eye Artists Group and PADI DAPI Fish Dance Theatre. Inga has graduated from the Klaipėda University (MA in choreography) in 2012. In 2015 Inga has got informal education teacher methodologist qualification category. She is a lector of Klaipėda University Art Faculty Choreography department.

PADI DAPI Fish Dance Theatre is s dance company based in Klaipėda which was created by Fish Eye Artists Group. The main aim of this company is to establish professional work in contemporary dance in Klaipėda and Lithuania. The company is exceptional and famous for interdisciplinary work that aims at connecting contemporary dance with different disciplines from various art forms to cultural heritage.

Idea Your name and surname | Music At your choice | Light design of the one who knows how to do it | Performance Petras Lisauskas and you may also join him

Petras Lisauskas is a charismatic and well improvising performer. He actively joined the Lithuanian modern dance world when he was a student. In the course of 12 creative years Petras has created over 40 roles in contemporary dance, theatre, and street performances. He also created choreography for 10 performances, and tested himself as a drama director. One of his roles in a film was awarded “Silver Crane” award. Petras Lisauskas’ entire creative work was awarded in 2013 with a “Young artist” prize established by the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture. He was also nominated twice, in 2012 and 2013, for a Golden Stage Cross. Since 2015, Petras has been working as an Art Director at the Alytus Municipality Theatre. In 2016, Petras decided to establish sutylA Theatre in Alytus.

Idea and performance Petras Lisauskas and Saulius Petreikis | Language in English, and the poetry of music and physical body | Poetry Yours, mine and Kabir | Equipment Projectors, office guillotine

Petras Lisauskas is a charismatic and well improvising performer. He actively joined the Lithuanian modern dance world when he was a student. In the course of 12 creative years Petras has created over 40 roles in contemporary dance, theatre, and street performances. He also created choreography for 10 performances, and tested himself as a drama director. One of his roles in a film was awarded “Silver Crane” award. Petras Lisauskas’ entire creative work was awarded in 2013 with a “Young artist” prize established by the Lithuanian Ministry of Culture. He was also nominated twice, in 2012 and 2013, for a Golden Stage Cross. Since 2015, Petras has been working as an Art Director at the Alytus Municipality Theatre. In 2016, Petras decided to establish sutylA Theatre in Alytus.

Saulius Petreikis is one of the few people in Europe who has collected a unique collection of musical instruments from around the world, and who performs his own music with the instruments. When playing music, the artist easily connects frivolous playfulness and deep sincerity, spontaneous expression and predisposition to the synthesis of a variety of styles. Saulius Petreikis cooperates with various Lithuanian and international artists, not only musicians, but also dancers, actors, and directors. Saulius Petreikis has created music for 7 performances, released 5 albums of his work, and has participated in over 30 albums recorded with other artists.

Idea Lina Puodžiukaitė-Lanauskienė | Choreography Lina Puodžiukaitė-Lanauskienė, Agnija Šeiko, Petras Lisauskas, Konstantin Kosovec and dancers | Circus artist Konstantin Kosovec | Dance Petras Lisauskas, students of National Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis School of the Arts: Tadas Almantas, Monika Šerstabojevaitė, Indrė Ivanauskytė, Marija Ivaškevičiūtė, Brigita Paškevičiūtė, Erikas Žilaitis, Valerija Gneuševa, Atėnė Misiulytė, Juratė Koreivaitė, Miglė Keblaitytė, Diana Michurovaitė | Music Saulius Petreikis | Light design Vladas Šerstabojevas | Artistic director Ina Pukelytė | Project manager Asta Urbonavičienė | Performances coordinators Lina Puodžiukaitė-Lanauskienė, Paulina Nešukaitytė

The project combines dance, theatre, circus and acrobatics. Dancers and circus artists improvised during the summer evenings in the empty Meat Hall, when the atmosphere in the hall was completely different from that of the busy morning time. One can feel how all these animals, that once became meat for sale, wake up in the evening and live their own phantasmagoric life.

The performance is conceived by choreographers Lina Puodžiukaitė and Agnija Šeiko. They are supported by a strong team of dancers and circus artists like Petras Lisauskas, Konstantinas Kosovec, students of National Art School of Mikalojus Konstantinas Čiurlionis and students of Kaunas School of Choreography.

Choreography Martynas Rimeikis | Dancers Eligijus Butkus, Genadij Žukovskij, Stanislavas Semianiura, Andrius Žužžalkinas, Jeronimas Krivickas, Miquel Lozano, David Ollero Santos | Music Monika Liu, Marijus Aleksa, Aurimas Rimeikis | Light design Levas Kleinas

Martynas Rimeikis discovered his abilities to create choreography during the Creative Impulse project, which has been an important creative initiative of the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre since 2012. In 2014, his miniature, Waiting for Godot, was part of the artistic programme of Tanzmesse NRW. In 2015, he presented his first full-length one-act ballet Everywhere We Weren't.

As a ballet dancer Martynas performed in Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre’s productions Don Quixote, Red Giselle, Zorba the Greek, Desdemona, Swan Lake, Giselle and The Blue Danube. He has also performed in Anželika Cholina Theatre and Vilnius Ballet. Throughout his career, Martynas has performed in many European countries, the United States, and China. He has also worked with Ramutis Rimeikis in Juozas Miltinis Drama Theatre and with the choreographer Kiril Simonov in Petrozavodsk Musical Theatre.

He received two Švyturiai Awards: for the Ballet Hope of the year and for the Ballet Dancer of the year. In 2013, Martynas was nominated as The Best Dancer for the Golden Stage Cross. In 2016, he was awarded with the National Golden Stage Cross for his full-length one-act ballet Everywhere We Weren't.

In June 2012, the first choreography workshop Creative Impulse was organised, where ballet dancers of Lithuanian Opera and Ballet Theatre had the opportunity to create and show short contemporary ballet and contemporary dance miniatures. Some of the dancers were cooperating with contemporary dance choreographers; others had their choreographic debut. The idea of this project is to blow new winds of creativity into national ballet, thus it would become more up to date, would dear more. The project continued in 2013 – 2016.

Choreography Eligijus Butkus | Idea Marta Vosyliūtė, Eligijus Butkus | Dancers Neringa Česaitytė, Ernestas Barčaitis | Music Jonas Jurkūnas “So Sho – Tinshima 2” | Costumes Marta Vosyliūtė | Light design Levas Kleinas | Video (idea) Marta Vosyliūtė, Deividas Podvolskis | Video Imantas Boiko, Deividas Podvolskis

After graduating from the Vilnius Ballet School, Eligijus Butkus joined the Ballet Company of the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre (in 1999). He graduated from the Lithuanian Academy of Music and Theatre as a dancing actor. In 2002 the Chairman of Friends of Lithuanian Ballet Society in Australia, Jurgis Žalkauskas awarded him with the personal Prize. The following year he received the Konstantinas Stašys Prize. In 2004 he became a laureate of the Operos Švyturiai Awards in the category of the Ballet Hope of the Year. In 2006, he was nominated for the National Golden Stage Cross for his interpretation of Iago in Desdemona, and in 2009 received the aforementioned award for the role of James in La Sylphide. In 2010 he won the Švyturiai Award as the Male Ballet Soloist of the Year, for his roles of Nathanael in Coppelia and Romeo in Romeo and Juliet. In 2016, Eligijus was awarded with the National Golden Stage Cross in Dancer’s category.

Since 2016 Eligijus has been the head of the Ballet Department of the National M. K. Čiurlionis' School of Arts.

In June 2012, the first choreography workshop Creative Impulse was organised, where ballet dancers of Lithuanian Opera and Ballet Theatre had the opportunity to create and show short contemporary ballet and contemporary dance miniatures. Some of the dancers were cooperating with contemporary dance choreographers; others had their choreographic debut. The idea of this project is to blow new winds of creativity into national ballet, thus it would become more up to date, would dear more. The project continued in 2013 – 2016.

Choreography Kipras Chlebinskas | Dancers Marta Rueda Blanco, Greta Gylytė, Inga Cibulskytė, Maja Dolidzė, Agnė Ramoškaitė | Music Onutė Narbutaitė “Winterserenade” | Costumes Milda Čergelytė | Light design Levas Kleinas

Kipras Chlebinskas graduated from the Ballet Department of the M. K. Čiurlionis' School of Arts and later studied at the Belarusian State Choreographic College. The young soloist worked on probation at the National Academic Bolshoi Opera and Ballet Theatre of the Republic of Belarus, as well as at the National Academic Musical Theatre of the Republic of Belarus.

Kipras performed in the choreographic project Creative Impulse and is regularly taking part in the productions of Baltic Ballet Group. He toured to Italy, Spain, Hungary, Estonia.

In June 2012, the first choreography workshop Creative Impulse was organised, where ballet dancers of Lithuanian Opera and Ballet Theatre had the opportunity to create and show short contemporary ballet and contemporary dance miniatures. Some of the dancers were cooperating with contemporary dance choreographers; others had their choreographic debut. The idea of this project is to blow new winds of creativity into national ballet, thus it would become more up to date, would dear more. The project continued in 2013 – 2016.

Choreography Jelena Lebedeva, Olga Rudiakėvič-Steponkienė | Tutor, consultations Igoris Zaripovas | Dancers Olga Konošenko, Igoris Zaripovas, Romas Ceizaris, Greta Gylytė, Jonas Laucius, Gohar Mkrtchyan, Haruka Ohno, Agnė Ramoškaitė, Eimantė Šeškutė | Music Giedrius Puskunigis | Light design Levas Kleinas | Costumes Jolanda Imbrasienė, Jelena Lebedeva | Set Design Jelena Lebedeva | Video Imantas Boiko

La Primavera is a tempera panel painting by the Italian Renaissance master of the Florentine school Sandro Botticelli, from 1482.

In 1995, Olga Rudiakėvič-Steponkienė graduated Kiev State Ballet School. After, she was studying at Kyiv National University of Culture and Art. In 2002, Olga joined the Ballet Company of the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre.

Jelena Lebedeva joined the Ballet Company of the Lithuanian National Opera and Ballet Theatre in 2000, as a ballet dancer and also as a projects coordinator.

In June 2012, the first choreography workshop Creative Impulse was organised, where ballet dancers of Lithuanian Opera and Ballet Theatre had the opportunity to create and show short contemporary ballet and contemporary dance miniatures. Some of the dancers were cooperating with contemporary dance choreographers; others had their choreographic debut. The idea of this project is to blow new winds of creativity into national ballet, thus it would become more up to date, would dear more. The project continued in 2013 – 2016.