UPCOMING: 19 May, Crossings festival, Maribor

Circle is a theatre essay and an installation that explores temporal layers in the materiality of public parks in ruins, and particularly the remnants of imagined futures that are layered in their soils – material relics, and how they are stored in the imagination and memories of people and other beings.

Circle is a theatre essay and an installation that tells stories about three parks at a time of their transformation. It guides us through their materiality: soil, construction materials, remaining traces of its users, animals and plants, and with their help attempts to build an understanding of how common public spaces are impacted by the socio-political organisation of work and the corresponding concept of free time.

It takes as a starting point a 19th century private park in Alexandria (the Antioniadis park) as a social form that embodies the display of wealth and power, but also a will to subordinate nature; and a working class park (the Railway Workers Park) in Cluj in Romania, as a public space that symbolically merged work and leisure cultures. In the many years of neglect and then reclaiming of the park through the devoted work of artists and activists, this park remains a public park, but the social tissue of the city has meanwhile completely changed.

Circle performance and installation propose a transformation of the gallery or theatre space into a park filled with sculptures made of found materials, scraps and fragments of ruins, and invite the visitors for a walk through these parks at a moment of their erasure or transformation. As a leitmotif, the park also accompanies other, personal stories of the narrators – as a legacy, a nonument, the trace of which remains in the memories of (former) users even after the change in land use.

Authors: Neja Tomšič, in collaboration with Nonument Group
Script: Neja Tomšič
Performing: Neja Tomšič, Nika Grabar, Miloš Kosec
Sculptures: Martin Bricelj Baraga
Sound design: Simina Oprescu, Luka Bernetič
Recordings: Neja Tomšič and Martin Bricelj Baraga
Cluj Assistant researchers: Istvan Szakats,Flaviu Petean
Documentary off-voice: Flaviu Petean
Help with research in Alexandria: Mohamed Adel Dessouki, Sarah Baghat
Statements: Viorica Zsiga, Adrian Dohotaru,Vlad Rusu, Istvan Szakats
Voice of Viorica: Jadranka Gnezda
Sound technician: Luka Bernetič, Igor Vuk, Luka Seliškar
Light design: Martin Lovšin
Costumes: Dajana Ljubičič
Technical director: Igor Remeta
Technical coordinator: Martin Lovšin
Technical crew: Luka Bernetič, Andrej Petrovčič, Duško Pušica, Manca Vukelič, Vid StarmanProducers: Alma R. Selimović, Klara Drnovšek Solina, Ajda Koloini
Thanks to: Barbara Poček, Barbara Tomšič, Maks Bricelj
Public relations: Tamara Bračič Vidmar