Terre di Terra
Theatre from the South

A theatre performance on our land and on our claim to it. 
Against the logics of capitalist property and a call for an exploitation-free environment.
Tolve. Basilicata. Italy

AstaroTheatro. Theatre in Motion

It has been a long journey to arrive here. And once we set foot on land, the sigh of relief was short lasting. The road ahead of us opened up and called us firmly to resume exploration.
It’s hard to say when it all began and arguably it’s not so relevant. For sure years ago we gathered around the necessity of grassroots artistic expression based on our theatre and performance experience. Music, singings, voice and body performance were also ready to be included, so that the motion of our work moved from the multidisciplinary level to the transcultural and transnational one. Voices, languages, sounds and images moved to a conformation where the cultural journey leads to the unfiltered presence of the performer and the audience.
This way of working has been bottom-up from the very beginning. Artists come together driven by the urgency of sharing in a non-hierarchical and horizontal way. Cultures, backgrounds, languages, emotions and meanings transit to a new land without artistic boundaries.
Once motion is started, it aims at becoming a perpetual motion. We created images of performers wandering around, displaced and destroyed, carrying the confusion, the illusions and the chaos of humanity, just when an explosion is necessary to bring back the light, to restore, to reconnect.
“Nationality is not a quality” finds its motion from a recitation to a transmigration. And by doing so, this recitation becomes one the trait d’union of our poetica where the experience of translinguistic performances rejects any mediation by translation. It transforms itself in playful rehearsals of self-representation, of migrant lives sharing stories after having crossed many, colonial, borders. Those who are tried to be imprisoned in dumbness turn it into voice and expression.Words, sounds, images need to transcend the fixity of our every day and provoke the audience into rising above the level of the given to that of the possible.

“As you sleep and count the stars, think of others,
those who have nowhere to sleep

As you liberate yourself with metaphors, think of others,
those who have lost the right to speak

As you think of others far away,
think of yourself and say “if only I were a candle in the night”
(Mahmoud Darwish)

We are not simply the plain summary of our past artistic journey. Our motion transcends the here and the now by being anon-going project, a work in progress constantly reshaping itself to the artistic and social challenges of our times. We keep moving to go beyond the current contingency, in order to explore our world as human beings and artists in search of a total physical presence with an emancipatory power for both the artists and the audience.
This means that to stop workshop-activities has never been an option for us. Motion is started, motion never ends. The artistic exploration moves throughout raising questions during performative moments.
1. Struggle goes on, struggle never ends. Struggle is circular.
We are current Aeneas with our fathers on our shoulders and our offspring by the hand.
Now we are here. Is this the land of milk and honey?
2. Or is this the land of the endless and pointless repetition of the same? I can adapt to the daily routine of my actions, push my body to mechanize itself, convince my mind to be only rationally productive. Is this how we want to live?
3. Also our investigation concentrates on Mother Earth. As artists we are deeply concerned about the health conditions of our mother. How can we artistically tackle this issue? And how can our artistic transhumance ever find a safe harbour?
Here is where we are now. Time to stop a minute and recap. We need to remember the items we wish to put in our artistic suitcase: artistic past, poetica, questions raised during past performative moments as well as our ability of bridging, of been, like a bridge, the connection of artists and audience.

We can easily push our imagination and see our future performances in some indoor abandoned industrial space. Or inside some space with debris scattered around. Or in any alternative venue close to you. We have strong reasons for choosing such locations, since ours has always been a theatre outside the grand theatre buildings and inside spaces generally not meant to be ‘theatrical’ in the first place. Adaptation to locations is something our performances know all too well. And to all this we add up our transcultural, transnational, translinguistic work which transcends boundaries.
Arts are here to protect the culture and memory of the one that will be lost on the dusty shelves of history, the one who tries to be quiet, the one who cannot be included in the official history pages.
Our artistic investigation is a motion of senses: analogic sounds of stones and steps, images of repopulated land, memories of touching each other, smells and tastes of seaweed.

“The wind erases the traces of the seagulls.
Rain erases human footprint.
The sun erases the trace of time.
Storytellers look for the invisible but never erased trace of lost memory, love and pain”
(Eduardo Galeano)

Terre di Terra
AstaroTheatro goes Basilicata Italy

Renato Ferreira at AstaroTheatro
Thursday 14 July, 20:30
AstaroTheatro
Sint Jansstraat 37 Amsterdam 

Renato Ferreira is a composer, saxophone and double-bass player, originally from São Paulo, Brazil.

In São Paulo, he was a member of the ensemble of Ricardo Zohyo, a long-term collaborator of Hermeto Pascoal, studying many forms of Brazilian folklore as well as Brazilian instrumental music.

After moving to the Netherlands, he played for many years in the Royal Improvisers Orchestra, together with some of the most exciting young musicians from the improvised music scene in Amsterdam and The Hague. With this group he performed several times at Amsterdam’s Bimhuis, including collaborations with Han Bennink, Steve Beresford, Phil Minton and the London Improvisers Orchestra.

Since 2015, he has been leading the Native Aliens Ensemble, a group that combines composition and free improvisation into an explosive mix with roots in traditional forms of Brazilian folk music. The Native Aliens Ensemble recorded a live CD at Teatro Munganga in Amsterdam, released by Trytone Records, and performed twice at the Bimhuis in 2016 and 2017.

He took part in the Music Of Inevitable Sounds, a project by the legendary bass player Luc Ex, joined by pianists Nora Mulder and Veryan Weston a.o., performing in several venues across Europe such as Konzerthaus Vienna as part of the Wien Modern Festival, Teatro San Leonardo in Bologna, Italy, Korzo theater in The Hague and Tivoli Vredenburg in Utrecht, the Netherlands, and Festival Ars Musica at Les Brigittines, Bruxelles, Belgium.

Renato has been an active improviser in Amsterdam since 2010, playing with musicians such as Burton Greene, Anne La Berge, Nora Mulder, Onno Govaert, Michael Moore, Yedo Gibson, Hans Houtman, John Dikeman, Jasper Stadhouders, Saartje van Kamp, Tobias Delius, Wilbert De Joode, Nico Chientaroli, Oene van Geel and many others.

He graduated at the Royal Conservatoire in The Hague, where he studied contemporary composition with Martijn Padding, Cornelis De Bondt and Gilius van Bergeijk among others.
—
Renato Ferreira
http://renatomusica.wordpress.com

Baschira & Yunus: A La Muntagna

Once upon time there was a song. A La Muntagna. And this song inspired a profound nexus of true international solidarity. From the mountains of Southern Italy to the peaks of Kurdistan.
Baschira, Italian musician and songwriter and Yunus, Kurdish musician and polyhedric artist began to play together and to influence each other. Now their different music and artistic backgrounds have come together to a higher level of inspiration for the audience of AstaroTheatro.
From Italy to Kurdistan. And vice versa

Once upon a time there was a song. A La Muntagna. And this song inspired a short theatre performance of unity and common struggle. Now this performance is ready to touch the people of AstaroTheatro.
We make the pains of the earth our own

An artistic diaspora at AstaroTheatro

Saturday 18 June, 20:30
AstaroTheatro
Sint Jansstraat 37 Amsterdam

Entrance by Donation

The Stones Under My Foot

Double Bill: Theatre Performance and Music at AstaroTheatro:

The Stones Under My Foot
These are the stones you don’t know
I become the forest, the mountain, the sea, the desert
With: Arif Murat Gür, Baschira, Roberto Bacchilega

Ell Sol
Ell Sol (him Alone) is the solo acoustic project of Joan Mena (guitar and vocals) performer, guitarist, improviser and multitask from Catalunya.
Involving his personal evocation of catalan chanson and inspired by the DIY tour world , Ell Sol jumps into a colorful rollercoaster of words, strings and presence in his intense performances pushing softly the boundaries of contemporary music.
He will be presenting a 20 minutes set of songs, poems, compositions, tricks, movements and new fantasies.
“Does Catalonian balladry involve a lot of sighing, whispering, squawking and screeching? Well regardless if it does or it doesn’t we got that. Charming and very surprising show, a whole new approach to playing a guitar.¨
Richard James Foster -The Quietus, Louder than War, Vice… (Incendiary Magazine )

BANDCAMP https://ellsol.bandcamp.com

VIMEO https://vimeo.com/ellsol

WEB www.ellsol.tk

The Stones under My Foot is the third opening of Wind Rose. Openings at AstaroTheatro
In each event Q&A, Talks and a glass of RED wine

Saturday 4 June, 20:30. AstaroTheatro. Sint Jansstraat 37 Amsterdam

Entrance by Donation

The Stones Under My Foot

Double Bill: Theatre Performance and Music at AstaroTheatro:

The Stones Under My Foot
These are the stones you don’t know
I become the forest, the mountain, the sea, the desert
With: Arif Murat Gür, Baschira, Roberto Bacchilega

Ell Sol
Ell Sol is the solo acoustic project of Joan Mena (guitar and vocals) performer, guitarist, improviser and multitask from Catalunya

The Stones under My Foot is the third opening of Wind Rose. Openings at AstaroTheatro
In each event Q&A, Talks and a glass of RED wine

Saturday 4 June, 20:30. AstaroTheatro. Sint Jansstraat 37 Amsterdam

Entrance by Donation

20 May 2022. Doors open at 20:00

Exclusive Only 20 Tickets
Includes unlimited streaming of Welcome Back – ExTENded via the free Bandcamp app, plus high-quality download in MP3, FLAC and more.

A donation of 10€ (or more) is appreciated in support of the work of Tenedle and AstaroTheatro in these hard times, thanks so much!

Wind Rose
Openings at AstaroTheatro

The earth accommodating our steps is the sky above our heads
And when I see you I see myself
The stones under my foot are unforgettable
Still I need to clear my name

AstaroTheatro opens up to embrace these four events like a wind rose from four cardinal directions

Friday 13 May, 20:30
Marx is Back
A Play on History

Friday 20 May, 20:30
Tenedle. Demetra
New Album Exclusive Concert

Saturday 4 June, 20:30
The stones under my foot
Theatre Performances

Saturday 18 June, 20:30
Baschira & Yunus
Music from Italy to Kurdistan. And vice versa

Each event will be followed by Q&A, Talks and a glass of RED wine