“Performing Exiles” Festival: Full Programme Announced and Start of Ticket Sales

From 19 to 28 June the Berliner Festspiele will present the second edition of the interdisciplinary festival “Performing Exiles”, once again curated by Matthias Lilienthal and held at the Haus der Berliner Festspiele, HAU2 and Ballhaus Ost. Featuring works by Mohammad Rasoulof, Mario Banushi, Tamara Trunova, the directing duo Rabih Mroué & Lina Majdalanie and the stage marathon “100° Diaspora”, the festival will create a platform for the diverse perspectives, voices, stories and visions of diasporic artists. The full programme as been announced and tickets are released for sale today.  

 

With a programme of theatre, performance, discourse, workshops and a summer school, the international festival “Performing Exiles” explores the question of what the term exile means today and offers visibility to the many worlds of diasporic life in the city of Berlin. It presents works by both internationally renowned figures and aspiring artists who are at the beginning of their careers. The festival will open on 19 June at the Haus der Berliner Festspiele with the world premiere of “Destination: Origin”, a work by the director Mohammad Rasoulof, who has fled from Tehran. On stage the actor Eli Riccardi will appear together with Setareh Maleki, Mahsa Rostami and Niousha Akhshi, with whom Rasoulof previously worked on his Oscar-nominated feature film “The Seed of the Sacred Fig” (2024). In a series of staged scenes, the work combines questions about the meaning of home with the themes of exile, identity and striving for artistic freedom.

In another world premiere produced for the festival, the Left Bank Theatre in Kyiv has created “Confronting the Shadow” by the Ukrainian director Tamara Trunova. Originally planned as a performance about war and feminism, its focus has recently expanded: the work that will be presented at Ballhaus Ost is concerned with the abstract state of absence and investigates the disappearance of an entire country.

“Goodbye, Lindita” is a non-verbal and powerfully visual production on the great theme of grief and on dealing with loss. This guest production by the director Mario Banushi, who was born in Tirana and grew up in Athens, brings burial and funeral rituals based on traditions from the Balkans to the stage of the Berliner Festspiele.

In “Four Walls and a Roof”, Rabih Mroué and Lina Majdalanie combine their own experiences of exile with those of Bertolt Brecht. Here they have used the transcripts of the House Un-American Activities Committee where Brecht was questioned in 1947 while in exile in the USA, transforming them into theatrical scenes with critical humour, personal elements and creative digressions – the piece is presented at HAU2.

From 26 to 28 June the stage marathon “100° Diaspora” will take place at the Haus der Berliner Festspiele as a festival within the festival under the direction of Sophie Blomen. In three days, 45 performances will be presented on five stages with over 150 artists who identify as diasporic and are based in Berlin. The format is not curated by theme, instead it is presented on a first come, first served principle – showing the first 45 applications in response to an open call in December 2024. “100° Diaspora” will be supplemented by a framing programme that reflects the works presented and has been developed together with the Goethe-Institut in Exile.

Open throughout the festival in the Kassenhalle at the Haus der Berliner Festspiele, “Club de Baile” also offers a free programme of performances, live music, DJ sets, parties, talks, dance courses and cookery workshops. The cultural centre has been designed by the artist Camila Malenchini in co-operation with Sharon Mercado Nogales and Inmensidades.

A press conversation with the curators, Mohammad Rasoulof, Mario Banushi and Rabih Mroué & Lina Majdalanie will take place on Tuesday, 17 June at 11:00 h at the Haus der Berliner Festspiele.

Please direct your requests for accreditation and/or interviews and confirmation that you will attend the press conversation to Leonard Pelz at leonard.pelz@berlinerfestspiele.de.

In co-operation with Ballhaus Ost, Goethe-Institut in Exile, HAU Hebbel am Ufer.