Showroom Bis!
May 11th, Sunday
20h – M. Ivičević: Planet 8 @ &TD semicircular(50′)
20.50h– Artist talk: Mirela Ivičević, moderated by Ingrid Pustijanac @ polukružna dvorana Teatra
Scenic suite Planet 8 by Mirela Ivičević won her the “Josip Štolcer Slavenski” Prize awarded by the City of Čakovec for the best achievement in music in the year 2013.
“Among the pieces of the Croatian composers that had their first performance in 2013, Mirela Ivičević’s Planet 8 stands out from the rest, with its innovative character and authenticity… Although Planet 8 is primary music for the stage, the musical segment of the piece functions as an autonomous whole. In its “building up a new sound world of ruins of the real and existing musical elements”, Ivičević doesn’t limit herself only to “conventional” sounds of a soprano, violin, saxophone and percussion, but, through a process of ceaselessly curious and playful exploring, adds sounds of the electroacoustic provenience, as well as those of “unconventional” sources – the performers’ bodies. Musicality of these sounds (noises and even “silences”) in the context of the performance is often in the function of the scene, but this “scenicity” ultimately goes back to music itself, as the basis for all the other elements of this masterly written piece, comprising all art forms, emerge.”
Planet 8 alias Operation Neptune: theatre suite for ensemble and (self-) reflection. A child of mixed marriage of critical and sound experience of the world. Close relative of Mauricio Kagel’s instrumental theatre and archetypal Neptune, sound as a means of expression is most commonly associated with. Recycling fellow, it uses everything it sees and hears, it is tolerant and does not censor. It does not save, it questions everything that it gets hold of, even the one in whose mental galaxy it was born. It is a natural habitat of musicians who are not afraid of reality, but who, in search of subversive power of music, use the fragments of reality and existing musical instruments to build a new audio-visual world. That world is confusing, upsetting, encouraging and it makes us laugh: at the same time it is a mirror of a not-always-ideal reality, but also of the inexhaustible source of possibilities of its transformation.
Concept, music and text: Mirela Ivičević
Stage Movement Advisor: Petra Hrašćanec
Lighting design: Bojan Gagić
Stage manager & dramaturgical advisor: Vedran Hleb
Producer: Davorka Begović
Performers: Kaja Farszky (percussion), Goran Jurković (saxophone), Dunja Delač (violin, voice), Marija Lešaja (soprano)
Production: Student Centre Zagreb (University of Zagreb) – Culture of Change – Music Showroom
“Four young musicians take part in the performance: by some – excellent, in our opinion – genious, sensational and exhilarating.” Branimir Pofuk, Večernji List
The composer Mirela Ivičević (Split, 1980) graduated Composition from the Academy of Music in Zagreb and she finished her postgraduate studies at Universität für Musik und darstellende Kunst in Wien. She is the author of acoustic, electroacoustic and intermedia works, sound installations, music for film and theatre, and two operas (The Threefairlady Opera, MBZ 2007 and Karussell, ISCM/WienModern 2013). The majority of her works are conceptual and interdisciplinary works, dealing primarily with the role of sound in social and political context, in which she often uses acoustic side effects of modern society.
Her works have been performed all over Europe, North and South America. She won University of Zagreb’s Rector’s Prize (Phantom no.3, 2004), Theodor Körner Prize (Ace of diamonds, 2010), Rudolf Matz Prize (2010), as well as ISCM Prize for her Vocaltheater Composition (Gender)Bender 9,99 (2011). In collaboration with Gordan Tudor, she has been organizing the international festival of contemporary music Dani Nove Glazbe Split since 2010.