The Body and Time Festival is back for the third time

The Body and Time Festival is fast approaching. The program will feature competition performances by young artists, accompanying shows, and the premiere of the winners from the previous edition. Join us from October 4 to 11!

Competition Section

The competition section is the heart of the festival. Audiences will see eight performances focused primarily on the body as an archive of experiences that are difficult to express directly. Bartłomiej Mieszczak’s *Chłopki* filters the memory of the 19th- and 20th-century Polish countryside through the bodies of young female performers, while Anna Piotrowska’s Ukrainian piece *Undanced* transforms the trauma of war and the loss of childhood into an intimate, biographical monodrama. Oliwia Gruca’s *Manosfera* explores the pressures of contemporary masculinity built in the gym, while Agnieszka Brzezińska’s *Who cares* questions the body subjected to the discipline of social media algorithms, and Hanna Stawczyk’s *Dance me till the end of love* examines the body subjected to the discipline of the craft of dance. Aleksandra Bratkowska’s *Chciałabym* is a record of an honest, non-virtuosic relationship with one’s own body, Die Duch by the Wasabibarbi group guides the audience through the female experience from birth to coming to terms with death, while Na początku była ciemność i ziemne ognie by the JAM collective—inspired by the work of Stanisław Lem—prompts us to ask what will remain of the body in the era of technological transformation.

The competition performances will be presented on October 9 and 10.

The Competition Jury

This year’s competition performances will be evaluated by a three-member jury composed of artists with strong ties to the festival and its previous editions. Jakub Mędrzycki, a dancer and choreographer, graduate of Codarts University of the Arts in Rotterdam, and member of the Swedish dance theater Norrdans, won the grand prize of the 1st edition of the Body and Time Festival. Aleksandra Nowakowska is a dancer who works with gesture, everyday life, repetition, and the relationship between language and choreography; she is a student at the Institute for Applied Theater Studies in Giessen and, together with Andrzej Józefczyk, received the grand prize at the festival’s second edition. The jury will also include Piotr Mateusz Wach, one of the most talented directors of the younger generation, a performer and choreographer, a lecturer at the Dance Theater Department of the Academy of Performing Arts (AST) in Bytom, and a recipient of, among other honors, the Grand Prix at the 21st Shakespeare Festival as well as awards at the Young Directors’ Forum and the FUGA Festival.

Accompanying Events

The festival also features a program of accompanying performances, outside the competition, showcasing the diverse languages of contemporary movement theater. The audience will see, among others, YOUR MAJESTY (October 5), conceived, choreographed, and performed by Katarzyna Sikora and Marcin Miętus, presented as part of the Przestrzenie Sztuki – Taniec – Kraków series, and BEZDROŻE.wilderness (October 6), choreographed by Marta Wołowiec. On October 7, IMMUNOKRACJA, choreographed and performed by Paulina Jaksim, Katarzyna Kulmińska, and Izabela Orzełowska, will be presented, also as part of the “Przestrzenie Sztuki – Taniec – Kraków” series. A day later, on October 8, opera.exe by the Kraków Dance Theater, conceived and choreographed by Eryk Makohon, will take the stage. The festival will close on October 11, as part of the 6th edition of the OFF Polska Festival, with a double performance of *FIDGETS*, directed by the duo Gruba i Głupia (Patrycja Kowańska and Dominika Knapik) from the Kreatura Foundation.

Festival Opening

The festival will open on October 4 at 7:00 p.m. with the performance *300-millisecond archives*, the premiere production by the winners of the 2nd edition of the Body and Time Festival, Aleksandra Nowakowska and Andrzej Józefczyk. The performance presents the body as an archive of movements, gestures, and experiences—a collection of traces that grows with each subsequent performance. An integral part of the performance is an original installation that records various qualities of human movement: trajectories, gestures, facial expressions, and the body’s organization in space, with the performers functioning as one of its “lenses” that react to the surroundings. Alongside Nowakowska and Józefczyk, who are responsible for the concept, choreography/installation, and music, Natalia Dinges and Ana Kuszarecka (performance, movement creation) will appear on stage.

Bilety