Things that burn easily

The production

Things That Burn Easily is a contemplative dystopia about loss and fire, both on a concrete, topical, and conceptual level. It is equally interested in ecological reality in which, as a society, we happen to exist, that is, the reality of global warming, fires, and other catastrophes that are more and more present in our lives, and the most rudimentary mechanism of human survival in the face of any crisis. The play attempts to understand mechanisms of oppression and fear that birth violence and alienation in such situations and methods of organization in a dysfunctional and selfish society, which appear as a result of individuals previously affected by such experiences.

Things That Burn Easily narrates a story of a piece of modest land, far from some larger civilisation or city, where people who were affected by a big natural (and/or perhaps human-caused) catastrophe live in relatively modest conditions. Some of them believe that they have been wronged by irreparable and epic injustice and that a system that will take responsibility and compensate for some of the consequences of the injustice should exist. If nothing else, the community members should share a space of comfort. Others, again, do not believe such things. Their skepticism has modeled for them a very strict picture of the world in which every other individual is a potential threat, and the only reliable certainty comes from social and societal isolation, retreat from complex social structures, and autonomous construction of their own systems of survival and belief. Two such principles, one being alienated and the other inter-connected, thoroughly undo each other. When a big new threat appears on the horizon, the tragedy of it will escalate into an unbearable misunderstanding of these two principles.

More details

Text and direction: Vedrana Klepica 
Performed by: Vladimir Aleksić, Hrvojka Begović, Lea Jevtić 
Movement direction: Magdalena Reiter 
Set and costumes design: Petra Pavičić 
Music and sound design: Hrvoje Nikšić 
Light design and video: Luka Matić
Photography: Jelena Janković 
Translation: Marija Andrijašević
Director’s assistant and stage manager: Srđana Vrsalović
Production and distribution: Silvija Stipanov
Mediator in Santarém: Gabriel Silva

Acknowledgements research residency in Santarém: AGIF, Agrupamento de Escolas Dr. Ginestal Machado, Professors Luís Mouzinho and Sara Gabriel and students from the Curso Profissional de Intérprete, AP Flor, ASPEA – Associação Portuguesa de Educação Ambiental, AVIGP – Associação de Vítimas do Incêndio de Pedrógão Grande (Dina Duarte), Camilo Solnado, Geota, Graça Lázaro, Grupo Desportivo e Cultural “Os Galitos da Várzea”, Iara Peixoto, Inluto – Associação Portuguesa de Cuidados Integrados no Luto, João Camargo, João José, João Viola, Manuel Botelho Oikos, Quercus, Ricardo Venâncio Lopes, Rui Rosinha, Simão Botelho, Tiago Mota Saraiva

Coproduction: Ganz New Culture of Change (HR), POGON – Zagreb Center for Independent Culture and Youth (HR) and ARTEMREDE (PT) in association with the Municipality of Santarém (PT), in the scope of the project Stronger Peripheries: A Southern Coalition, co-funded by the Creative Europe programme of the European Union

Institutional partner: República Portuguesa – Cultura I Fundo de Fomento Cultural / Direção-Geral das Artes
Support: City of Zagreb, Ministry of Culture and Media of the Republic of Croatia, Kultura Nova Foundation
Partner: Belef festival (RS)
Space support: Centar mladih Ribnjak (HR)