2002 TRANSPOSITIONS / TRANSPOZYCJE 2002
THE CRACOW ATELIER MAY 12-14, 2002

     How to preserve European diversity in the time of ever-increasing integration, amidst all sorts of cross-cultural connections? One modest effort to tackle the problem in the domain of theatre and literature, a series of annual gatherings called "transpositions": The Cracow Atelier, is herewith proposed. "transpositions"  will feature either the work of one creative personality (occasionally of a group of artists), or will be devoted to one theme or subject, the presentation of which gains a new dimension when done in the European context.

     While crossing the frontiers between cultures, languages, genres, media, (stage) conventions, styles, and generations we widen our understanding, but more often than not something is lost in the process. "Transposed" means also "misunderstood". Although the emphasis is on how things correspond, the path goes through differences. Our intention is to emphasize how one author's work, while remaining "roughly" the same, varies from country to country, from genre to genre, from written page to stage to screen, from music to the visual arts to word, from radio to tv/ video/ acoustics.

     "transpositions" is the brainchild of author, translator and theatre director Marek Kedzierski who has scheduled the first series of "transpositions" to be organized by Teatr Atelier-Kraków and the renowned Villa Decjus, joined by other Cracow's cultural institutions: Jagiellonian University, Stary Theatre (Old Theatre, Poland's National Stage) and Teatr Zalezny of Cracow's Polytechnics, with the support of the British Council, the Swiss cultural foundation "Pro Helvetia" and L'Institut Francais.

     This year's meeting, transpozycje 2002 transpositions, pragmatic in form and compact in format, will be devoted to the Irish Nobel Prize winner Samuel Beckett and three other writers of kindred spirit: Harold Pinter in Britain, Thomas Bernhard in Austria and Swiss-French author Robert Pinget. Samuel Beckett, this European writer par excellence, an artist performed, read, and translated world-wide, has inspired, although in entirely different ways, all three.


The three-day programme includes:

1. THE LITERARY PART: lectures and discussions with Paris-based Barbara Bray and Gerry Dukes, Dublin, sponsored in part by the British Council
2. PERFORMANCE: theatre performances, readings, live projections
3. VIDEO BECKETT: possibility of consulting of audio- and videorecordings of numerous international productions of the playwright's work.
4. FILM: projection of Film (1963), Beckett's only venture in the art of cinema, produced in New York by Alan Schneider with Buster Keaton as the only protagonist. A copy of Film has generously been made available to the organizers of the "transpositions 2002" by Barney Rosset, Beckett's American publisher and his longtime friend.

with the participation of:
Barbara Bray
Gerry Dukes
Dear Conjunction Theatre Company, Paris-London
Théâtre de l´Ourcq, Paris
Teatro dell'Arcipelago, Milano
Stary Teatr, Cracow
Teatr Atelier, Cracow

Performers:
Alicja Bienicewicz, Leslie Clack, Ghislaine Dumont, Cristina Galotta, Christian Ericsson, Dagmara Foniok, Miho Iwata, Marek Kalita, Patricia Kessel, Janusz Koprowski, Dorota Pomykala, Ewa Sasiadek, Yosuke Taki, Edward Wnuk.

[Programme]

[Participants]

Consult also Samuel Beckett Endpage