The Power of the Arts! Elek Dora and the Visegrad Project

During the 2018 Power of the Arts Forum organized by the Michaëlle Jean Foundation, we had the pleasure of welcoming Elek Dora, director of the Baltazar theater in Budapest (Hungary). She shared with us the wonderful work she does with actors with intellectual disabilities. Today in a time of pandemic, she is part of her new experience: she conducted an international theater workshop online, in 3 countries, in 3 languages and always with disabled actors. She says, “I never imagined it would work.”

Click here to see some of the ways they have created change  https://vimeo.com/546880733

Three countries, three languages, three theatres employing actors with disabilities, an online platform and a series of technical hurdles. The result is the connection of music, movement, play and choreography – overcoming hundreds of virtual kilometers.

A joint online workshop was held from 22 to 26 March at the Teatroterapia Lubelska in Lublin, the Baltazár Theater in Hungary and the Mestské Divadlo z Pasáže in Slovakia. The Budapest workshop, which was postponed several times due to the pandemic, was transferred to the online space, which posed a great challenge to the participants. But this joint work has shown that although the online form in many ways gives less possibility for theatrical work, in other respects it allows for new experiments and unusual artistic approaches. In the workshop, three companies danced in a separate space, but still interacted in a positive way. These three theaters have shown that art and the desire to connect with each other know no bounds.

For more information on the workshop: http://baltazarszinhaz.hu/en/visegrad-project-2/