World renowned theatre group to host performance workshop for Notte Bianca 2017

Notte Bianca, Arts Council Malta and the Valletta 2018 Foundation are proud and excited to announce the participation of Spain-based theatre group La Fura dels Baus as part of this year’s festival.

The world-renowned theatrical group will be organising a performance workshop in Valletta, which will be held from the 23rd of September leading up to Notte Bianca on the 7th of October.

The collaboration was spearheaded by the artistic director of Notte Bianca Valletta, Sean Buhagiar. “This is a very proud moment for us. It is the highest achievement of the festival in terms of international cooperation. It was an honour for us to have La Fura interested in the Festival as it shows our goals are in line with the high standards of the international scene,” explained a radiant Buhagiar, the Artistic Director of Notte Bianca Valletta.

“La Fura have been critically acclaimed as one of the finest postwar exponents of theatre and live performance. This, along with their yearning to continually remain relevant, make me thrilled to have them in our programme. After lengthy creative discussions, we opted for the performance workshop model to launch our collaboration, a collaboration we hope to build on in the future, because we believe the experience of the participants can leave a legacy to the local artistic sector. I thank the Valletta 2018 Foundation and all the collaborators for making this possible,” he continued.

Founded in Barcelona in 1979, La Fura dels Baus have garnered a stellar reputation for their brand of theatre, which makes use of unusual settings and blurs the boundaries between audience and actor. As a self-researched company, they have worked in many different disciplines including street theatre, opera, film, macroshows, and even product presentations. Throughout their diverse career La Fura have opened the Barcelona Olympics and have performed in some of the greatest arts and culture festivals around the world. As their website states, La Fura dels Baus is eccentricity, innovation, adaptation, rhythm, evolution and transgression.

The La Fura dels Baus workshop in Malta is a unique opportunity for local artists to immerse themselves in the creative ethos of this acclaimed troupe, critically referred to as the Furan Language. Local artists of various disciplines have the opportunity to participate in these workshops. The workshop is aimed at actors, dancers, acrobats, light technicians, riggers, video artists, musicians, visual artists, set designers, engineers, and all others who share a love for stage work.

The workshop will focus on integrating these various disciplines as part of the company’s own language, which is based on the synergy between different techniques and perspectives of the theatrical scene. The workshops will lead up to a performance presentation of this work-in-progress, which will be open to the public on the night of Notte Bianca.

Interested participants will need to send a CV to workshop@nottebianca.org.mt by the 30th of January. La Fura and Notte Bianca Valletta will choose the successful applicants based on their artistic CV. Applicants must be available between 5 to 8 hours a day from the 23rd of September until the 7th of October. Successful applicants will be notified by the 31st of March.

For more information on the workshops please visit www.nottebianca.org.mt. The workshop is being held in collaboration with the Valletta 2018 Foundation, the University of Malta School of Performing Arts and the EU Collective Plays! Creative Europe Project.

Furthermore, applications are now open for all other interested parties who wish to take part in the upcoming Notte Bianca. Applications can be completed online at www.nottebianca.org.mt or www.maltaculture.com, or delivered by hand to Arts Council Malta, 16 Scaglia, Triq Mikiel Anton Vassalli, Valletta, by no later than the 6th of February. Successful applicants will be notified by the 17th of March.

Notte Bianca is organised by the Arts Council Malta. For more info on the La Fura workshop and Notte Bianca 2017 please visit www.nottebianca.org.mt.