Ines Wurth
Presents with Zagreb Acting Studio:
I, Who Have Hands More Innocent
Written by and performed by Vesna Tominac Matačić
5 – 28 August I Zoo Venues, The Sanctuary I 19.25-20.35
Taken from the title of a poem by one of the most famous Croatian poets
of all time, Vesna Parun, and written and performed by acclaimed Croatian actor
Vesna Tominac Matačić, I,
Who Have Hands More Innocent, chronicle’s the poet’s turbulent life across
several Balkan countries, where ideals became bloody ideologies and fathers and
husbands conducted their own patriarchal agendas.
I
never kept a diary. But a diary has been writing itself, invisible on paper,
for years somewhere inside me.
A compilation of Vesna Parun's autobiographical texts and poetry was
performed very successfully in Zagreb by Vesna Tominac Matačić and awarded the grand prize in the
One Person Show theatre festival in Bitola, Macedonia in 2015.
1.What was the inspiration for this performance?
2.How did you go about gathering the team for it?
3.How did you become interested in making performance?
4.Was your process typical of the way that you make a performance?
5.What do you hope that the audience will experience?
6.What strategies did you consider towards shaping this audience experience?
7.Do you see your work within any particular tradition?
1. Vesna Parun is the greatest Croatian female poet to have ever lived. She
passed through intense moments in history and within her own personal life.
Before her
death she demystified her artistic masterpieces and revealed her life and so in
by doing that she erased the border between art and life which is my constant
obsession as an actress. So I felt inspired to create a life of a woman of whom
we can all recognize.
This performance is also a kind of homage to the poet
who still does not get enough acknowledgements in her own country. Here we are
trying to change that.
2. I give Vesna Parun all the credit for bringing our
team together from her place in the afterlife. Thanks to her, the brilliant Croatian
director Ivan Leo Lemo saw the potential in this project and Tatjana Aćimović
who is also one of the best Croatian producers was equally enthusiastic to join
us.
We then gathered
the others: Zvonimir Dusper and Ozren K. Glaser as our musicians and the professional
team of people from the Theatre &td in Zagreb.
3. Vesna Parun wrote: „I never kept a diary. But a diary has been
writing itself, invisible on paper, for years somewhere inside me. It has
written itself in eerie silence, without even asking for my permission. It
wrote itself with no words, no sentences, no grammatical forms, no orthographic
arcaneries. I knew this was happening. I knew it was writing itself, this diary
of mine, and that I would be able, aghast, to read it one day. Or hear it? “
After reading this note I felt a kind of calling to
collect all her autobiographical notes she wrote about her life and to realize
her wish to share it with the world.
4. With the process of acting, I’m always trying to
find the truth about the character. It in turn becomes a journey of my own self
truth.
The biggest challenge was that I had the responsibility
to portray the life and the fate of a real and exceptional woman. I felt the
best way to achieve such a task was to perform it as a monodrama with elements
of lyrical poetry.
5. The words of
Vesna Parun are so powerful and profound that they transcend barriers such as,
language, gender, age, faiths etc. I truly believe that through our performance
we can touch the hearts of our audience.
6.We didn't have any strategies except to be honest to
ourselves and to the great work of Vesna Parun and so our hope was that the
audience recognizes that truth and that they can identify with timeless work of our poet.
7. I have been working on the Lee Strasberg Method
Acting for many years which is based on Stanislavski system.
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