Playing Works (working title)
Residencies
- 26.05 > 31.05.2025
Anouk Friedli and Barbara T’Jonck are theater makers with a curiosity about the precise conditions for the smooth running of a cocreative making process in the (performing) arts. Could these conditions take the form of a (fun) game?
With Playing Works (working title), Anouk and Barbara go in search of the rules of a game for a more democratic and transparent cocreative making process. This residency at Kunstenwerkplaats is the first step in their research. They wonder if they can make the crucial moments of a cocreative process in the arts manageable with game techniques. Game techniques that provide guiding frameworks to transform relationships, responsibilities, difficulties into actions and constructive conversation. By no means do they hope for an untouchable game. Playing Works is a game that can grow with and through other cocreative making processes. Think of a deck of cards where the players themselves can always add or remove cards according to the needs of the situation, the group and the process.After all, cocreation is not only about a good end result but also about the path towards it. The process does not rely only on the genius ideas of one director but, above all, on the active involvement of all the other people who participate in the creation. Often, however, such a cocreative path turns out to be a stressful war of attrition full of confusion and (unspoken) disagreements that are forgotten as soon as the result is well received — “it was worth it!”. And so everything starts all over again, or, in the other case, work relationships (and friendships) break down. That feels wry when the intention to co-create was the promise at the beginning. A promise that perhaps had no concrete content yet, because what does co-creation really mean? And does it mean only one thing?
concept en onderzoek: Anouk Friedli & Barbara T’Jonck