MEDIATHEK

Jiří Havelka (1980) - A distinguished figure in Czech theatre, with a good sense of theatrical fantasy and imagination, and a liking for playfulness. He studied at the Faculty of Alternative and Puppet Theatre (KALD) at DAMU, during which time he met Vost05, worked in Studio Ypsilon and now leads KALD. He is also active in a number of Czech theatres, working in both drama and dance, and tirelessly testing the laws and priciples of stagecraf, taking them apart and putting them together again. He does not see theatre as an imitation, but using free principles such as dreams, imagination and irrationality, he creates logical scenic formulae and combinations. He is labelled a theatre magician, a juggler of stage imagination, a metaphysicist of the stage. Jan Dvořák has written of him: "Both the reception of 'Brass Band' and his other recent production, 'The Last Trick of Georges Méliès', confirm that Jiří Havelka is currently on top form, at his very best - both in documentary theatre dealing with political subjetcts in recent history, in other words dramaturgically-engaged theatre, and in the culminating series of theatre with a predominantly direcotirial principle, more subjective, with deeper and more intimate starting points, theatre of the pioneering type, attacking, in all sorts of ways the transcendence of this artistic type.

Source:
22nd International Festival Theatre Pilsen Booklet (Printed Edition)

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