Voima-lehden vieraileva päätoimittaja Jari Tamminen nostaa esille pääkirjoituksessaan Riihimäen Teatterin. Haastattelu käsittelee sen lisäksi paitsi Janne Katajan Riihimäki -esitystä myös työtäni Todellisuuden tutkimuskeskuksessa ja Työ 5.0 – LEIPÄ -esitystä. Mukana myös Mikko Roihan ohjaaman Pesärikko-esityksen arvio. Klikkaa auki tästä.
Maija Siljander, Riku Korhonen ja Katja Peacock Janne Katajan Riihimäki -esityksessä. Kuva: Aki Loponen
Lue lisää esityksestä TOTEM-teatterin sivuilta!
Briefly in English in the previous post.
Below team Tulppaanikupla on set in Suomenlinna 30 November from left to right: Camilla Anderzén (audience participation designer), Tiina Piispa (producer), Pasi Lappalainen (performer, “Broker”), me, Päivi Rissanen (performer, “Scrooge”) and Paula Koivunen (costume and set designer).
photo: Tomi Suovankoski
Official press photo by Tomi Suovankoski, including tulip painting reproduction by Paula Koivunen
still from a video by Juho Kauti
Yesterday I was honoured to celebrate Finland’s 100th Independence Day at the Precidential Palace as one of the 1900 invited guests. I was there as a representative of Riihimäen Teatteri. What an exciting evening was that!
See my short moment in the spot light here where I shake hands with the president and the first lady. Thanks for the video, Juho!
I was also happy to share an interview by Aamulehti with MP Satu Hassi.
Aloitin tällä viikolla ohjaamaan TOTEM-teatterille kirjoittamaani esitystä TULPPAANIKUPLA – pörssiromahdus ja rahan synty. Se on osallistava teatteriesitys lapsille, jossa yleisö pääsee teatterin näyttelijöiden, Päivi Rissasen ja Pasi Lappalaisen, kanssa leikkimään hollantilaista 1600-luvun tulppaanihuutokauppaa. Esitys käsittelee huutokaupan lisäksi pörssikaupan alkeita ja rahan fiktiivistä luonnetta. Ensi-ilta on keskiviikkona 18. tammikuuta 2018.
Lue lisää esityksen taustoista blogikirjoituksesta “Järkyttävän hieno keksintö”.
This week I started directing TULPPAANIKUPLA – pörssiromahdus ja rahan synty (Tulip Bubble – stock market crash and the origins of money) that I wrote for TOTEM-theatre. It’s a participatory theatre piece for children. The audience will play 17th century tulip auction in Amsterdam with the TOTEM-teatteri actors. The performance deals with the basics of stock exhange, stock market crash and fictional nature of money. Premiere is on 18th of January 2018.
Graphic design by Tomi Suovankoski
I’m performing my stream of consciousness solo Talking Head at Oops Festival on Saturday 18 November at 15:00 hours in Aaben Dans Roskilde, Rabalderstræde 10, Musicon, Roskilde, Denmark.
photo: Finnish National Gallery / Pirje Mykkänen
Kolme vuotta peräkkäin ollaan oltu Tampereen teatterikesässä, toteutettu korkeatasoisia, kiitettyjä esityksiä, osallistuttu Tanssiteatteri Minimin kanssa teatterikentän toimintamallien uudistamiseen lisäämällä yhteistyötä teattereiden välillä. Olemme luoneet teatterille myös digitaalista ulottuvuutta ja vastikään viihdytimme presidenttiä Riihimäen kaupungin mannekiineina – ja nyt kaupunginjohtaja esittää Vuoden teatteriksi valitun Riihimäen Teatterin toiminnan lopettamista. Teatterin taiteellisena johtajana olen tyrmistynyt tästä suunnitelmasta.
Lue Yleisradion, Helsingin Sanomien ja Hämeen Sanomien uutiset aiheesta ja…
ALLEKIRJOITA ADRESSI TEATTERIN SÄILYTTÄMISEN PUOLESTA TÄÄLLÄ!
In Riihimäen Teatteri we’ve been producing highly acclaimed performances that have been invited to Tampere Theatre Festival three years in a row. Besides this, in cooperation with Dance Theatre Minimi, we have participated in reforming the national model of producing theatre to make it more collaborative and we have worked to make theatre more digitally accessible. For all these reasons Riihimäen Teatteri was selected as The Theatre of The Year 2017. Just briefly we entertained mr President successfully as the showpiece of Riihimäki – and now the mayor suggests to close down the theatre. As the artistic director of the theatre I’m flabbergasted. Sign a petition to save the theatre!
Tatu Mönttinen & Katja Peacock on stage at Riihimäen Teatteri. photo: Aki Loponen
Reality Research Centre presents: Työ 5.0 – LEIPÄ / Work 5.0 – BREAD
A bakery at Helsinki Art Museum’s HAM Corner
Open from 13 October to 23 December as follows: Wed 11-19 / Fri 15-19 / Sat 12-16
During the year’s final quarter Reality Research Centre’s Työsaareke group is baking rye bread and discussing future work with the audiences at Helsinki Art Museum’s HAM Corner. I’m one of the bakers and debaters, doing 15 shifts at the bakery until Christmas, starting today.
Work 5.0 – BREAD is a bakery, performance, forum, workshop and live installation. You can participate in it as a spectator, debater or baker. We instruct how to bake rye bread and bakers may take their bread home with them. While baking we talk about work; what is it right now, is it meaningful, is it shit or is it awesome? And what will work be in the future? What should do with it?
Every Saturday there will be a special guest baking with us and discussing future work.
More info from Reality Research Centre and HAM.
EACH LOAF OF BREAD IS A MANIFESTO FOR MORE MEANINGFUL WORK!
Photos by HAM / Maija Toivanen.
Janne Katajan Riihimäki at Riihimäen Teatteri from 14 October to 16 December 2017.
Maria Säkö’s review in Helsingin Sanomat 15.10.
Pirjo Puukko’s review in Hämeen Sanomat 18.10.
Simo Sahlman’s review in Lukupino blog 21.10.
Maria Oiva’s post performance discussion with anthropologist Sanna Rauhala 21.11. (podcast)
Scriptwriter Taija Helminen interviewed in Helsingin Sanomat 29.11.
Article including a preview video in Hämeen Sanomat 11.10.
Voima 10/2017 (pääkirjoitus ja artikkeli)
My first work of theatre in four years! Come and see! More info from Riihimäen Teatteri.
A documentary theatre performance about a fate of a small city in Southern Finland seen through the lenses of one of it’s most well known inhabitant, media person, presenter and comedian, mr Janne Kataja.
Janne Katajan Riihimäki cuts through the last 37 years of Riihimäki’s history and focuses on the tragedy of 1990’s depression that broke the city’s identity. Simultaneously it tells the story of Kataja, how he became who he is today and what role Riihimäki played in his upbringing.
The script is largely based on interviews with Kataja and other Riihimäki dwellers. How Kataja and people on the streets envision Riihimäki’s future form the main conflict of the play. Kataja’s vision is fantastic, to him Riihimäki is a picturesque French village full of colour and hope. Compared to that passer-bys’ outlook is gritty. Realistic, some might say. From their point of view Kataja is just a lucky duck but, actually, he has done great many things to build a better Riihimäki.
In 1997 Riihimäki became the Easter Capital of Finland. 17-year-old Kataja created an Easter mascot for the celebrations. It was a bunny called Eko-Riksu. The city employed Kataja to play Eko-Riksu in various functions for several years. Riksu is the city’s nickname, Eko refers to the ecological brand it tried to build back then. Riihimäki was ahead of it’s time. Unfortunately being eco-friendly took more than a decade to become fashionable, profitable business, and the idea was buried. Riihimäki remains Easter Capital but it’s true identity, or brand, is yet to be found…
On stage you get to see Janne and other Riihimäki characters played by three marvellous actors – Riku Korhonen, Katja Peacock, Maija Siljander. Eko-Riksu the Easter Bunny and another contemporary Riihimäki celebrity, actor Aku Hirviniemi, is played by the amazing Tatu Mönttinen. Eko-Riksu tries make his come back on stage but in the end of the day the three Jannes run the show…
Janne Katajan Riihimäki is written by Taija Helminen and directed by me. Stage and costume design by Paula Koivunen, light design by Sami Rauhala and sound design by Kari Paukola. Another star from Riihimäki, singer/songwriter Samae Koskinen, has composed a song exclusively for the performance.
All photos by Aki Loponen.
Riku Korhonen, Katja Peacock and Maija Siljander as Janne Kataja
Tatu Mönttinen as Eko-Riksu
Mr President Sauli Niinistö visited the region of Hämeenlinna and Riihimäki yesterday. In Riihimäki a reception was held for him at The Finnish Glass Museum. Riihimäen Teatteri was there to entertain Mr President, local politicians and kids from Riihimäki Youth Theatre with a poetry performance Ehkä liioittelen vähän. With Matti Arnkil I gave a speech about why Riihimäen Teatteri is the Theatre of the Year. After the performance Mr President understood why. He was very pleased and said that beforehand he hadn’t known how good we are. Well, we were, thanks to the actors Katja Peacock and Maija Siljander! They did a great job. And why wouldn’t they? Ehkä liioittelen vähän is a brilliant piece of poetry on stage. Based on the poems of Anja Erämaja, directed by Taru Kivinen.
Theatre Academy has published an excellent book: Performance Artist’s Workbook, On teaching and learning performance art – essays and exercises (number 61 in the publication series). It is edited by professor Pilvi Porkola and it consists of five essays and 44 performance art exercises written by artists from various countries. To me the excellence of this book lies in the combination of exercises, that show how tangible and fun performance art can be, and analytical essays by professor Ray Langenbach, Dr Annette Arlander, Dr Hanna Järvinen, Dr Tero Nauha and Porkola. It is a very practical and inspiring book.
I’m honoured to be one of the artists invited to write an exercise to this book. It’s nothing new, I must admit. “Stream of Consciousness Exercise – how to verbalise all thoughts running through your mind in front of an audience” is based on my Talking Head performance that I’ve been performing for ever. But it’s a good one and worth trying. Now you can do it yourself by following simple guidelines – or developing your own.
If you want to see me doing it, there’s a chance to see Talking Head on Saturday 18th November in Roskilde, Denmark at OoPS Festival.
Talking Head in Kiasma Theatre in 2015. photo: Finnish National Gallery / Pirje Mykkänen