27 Italian residencies host 10 artists fleeing Ukraine

The national MIR (мир) – residencies for peace project arrives in Umbria.

Twenty-seven Italian residencies dedicated to innovation and language research in the field of performing arts have created a national network of solidarity to host ten artists fleeing Ukraine in recent months.

Among them there are also two Umbrian residency centres, La Mama International in Spoleto and Spazio ZUT! in the Italian network promoting the project MIR (мир) – residencies for peace supported by MiC and several Italian cities.

The artists will be in Umbria for a creative residency from 17 June to 5 July, hosted in the old farmhouse of La Mama Umbria International, nestled in the beautiful hills just outside Spoleto.

During their stay at the arts residency centre, the usual ‘Playwright Retreat‘ will take place, an annual intensive programme hosting playwrights and theatre writers from all over the world. This year’s Playwright Retreat will be held by TODD LONDON, who, as a member of the Theatre Communications Group was the first recipient of the “Visionary Leadership Award,” with the motivation “an individual who has gone far beyond the call of duty to advance theatre as a whole…“. London spent eighteen seasons as Artistic Director of New York’s New Dramatists, the nation’s oldest playwrights’ workshop where he worked closely with more than one hundred and fifty of America’s and the world’s leading playwrights.

Together with him and all the other participants present, the Ukrainian artists will be able to work on the dramaturgy of their text, taking cues from the workshop “Screenplay as Presence, Gift and Regeneration”, for an experimental dramaturgy, focusing on sources of inspiration, in particular love, place, memory, other people and the act of bringing works into the world as an offering.

La Mama Umbria International and Zut! have been working for years in the field of artistic residencies hosting research and experimentation projects in the performing arts with national and international artists and companies. Since 2015 they are recognised by MiC and Regione Umbria as Residency Centres and since 2018 they are members of C.U.R.A. Centro Umbro di Residenze Artistiche per lo spettacolo dal vivo.