Curatorial Discussion: Can theatre think?
Through his plays, Jean-Paul Sartre presented the idea of existentialism, whilst G. F. Hegel used drama to demonstrate political and philosophical dialectics. Since the 1990s, however, a notion has emerged on European stages that theatre need not merely depict thought, but that it can itself be a specific form of thought.
This is a form of thinking distinct from the discursive thinking of theory—it is bodily, temporal, and event-based thinking. What are the main tools of this type of thinking? How can such thinking be developed? And what can we expect from it? We will try to find out in a discussion with Polish director Wojtek Ziemilski and movement artist and curator Eva Priečková. The discussion will be moderated by Adam Dragun.
English
90 minutes
Adam Dragun
director, author and performer, but also the frontman of the group Berlin Manson. He is a writer, director and performer in multi-genre projects. He studied at Charles University and at the Academy of Theatre Arts in Kraków, and is currently completing his studies at DAMU (Alternative and Puppet Theatre).
His directing credits include the production *The Last Time My Parents Were at Komuna Warszawa* (Komuna Warszawa, 2022), *Prcat* (P*AKT, 2024) and *Repríza* – part of the triptych *The Slovaks Come to Life*. *Hymn for the 21st Century* (Uhol_92, 2024). At the end of 2025, his original performance *ALEX* (ARCHA+/ Batyskaf, 2025) premiered, a work that balances between personal confession, fiction and documentary. He also contributed to the stage adaptation of *Frankenstein* directed by Petra Tejnorová at the National Theatre (2025). Together with Olga Ciężkowska, he is the artistic curator of the *Based on a True Story* project and festival.
Wojtek Ziemilski
a theatre director and visual artist whose work has been presented in over 20 countries and received major international awards, including the Main Prize of the Zürcher Theater Spektakel and the Fast Forward Festival in Dresden.
His work expands the possibilities of documentary performance, exploring spectatorship and the potential for action. Combining devising, real-time composition, visual arts and various media, he creates performances that connect aesthetic experience with intellectual inquiry.
He teaches contemporary performance practices at the SWPS University, the National Academy of Dramatic Art and Warsaw University. He holds a PhD from the Royal Central School of Speech and Drama, University of London.
Eva Priečková
A dancer, researcher, and curator working primarily at the Telocvičňa residency center in Bratislava. As Eva Priečková/False Move, she organizes the SOFT CORE educational program, which connects embodied movement experience with critical thinking about the body and relationships.
She is interested in dance within the most diverse groups possible, ecosomatics, non-human resources, and rituals of mourning and celebration. She is a co-curator of the international symposium “Kontaminace.” In her work, she explores the potential of dance education to foster social justice, interpersonal responsibility, and emancipation from the unconscious repetition of normative behavior.
For her, dance is an act of the impossibility of taming bodies and minds, of curiously perceiving the world around us, of imagination, wonder, sensitive listening, and everything that cannot be expressed in words. In 2026, she completed her doctoral studies at JAMU in Brno. She loves collaboration, which is why she has been working for several years with Yuri Korec and Co., Zuzana Žabková, Katarína Poliačiková, Sonja Pregrad, and many other inspiring artists.
Big hall
