Kolkata and Delhi to host PARALLEL CITIES (CIUDADES PARALELAS)

A project curated by Stefan Kaegi and Lola Arias, PARALLEL CITIES (CIUDADES PARALELAS) invites artists to devise interventions in public spaces that exhibit parallel existences.

A project curated by Stefan Kaegi and Lola Arias, PARALLEL CITIES (CIUDADES PARALELAS) invites artists to devise interventions in public spaces that exhibit parallel existences. Kolkata and Delhi are scheduled to host the project in December 2012 and January 2013 respectively.
Hotel rooms, shopping centres, factories... these are functional places, not usually thought of as interesting to the outside eye. But without them life in the city would be uninhabitable. Their ubiquitous, parallel existences the world over mean these places are instantly recognisable, each modelled on similar rules but displaying a local face.
For “Ciudades Paralelas”, Lola Arias and Stefan Kaegi have invited several artists to devise interventions into these kinds of spaces. Six artists have each chosen a location in the city as observation stations for urban phenomena. Some of them chose to work with radio receivers or headphones, others with people in their workspaces.
The pieces vary in form: You can listen to some of them, others you can read or touch. Some are for a single, others for 100 spectators. The performers include factory workers, cleaners, a blind musician, writers, passers-by or even the audience itself.

Gerardo Naumann’s factory workers take viewers on a subjective journey along the production line at their place of work.
Via headphones, Ant Hampton and Tim Etchells whisper to us over the silence of a library reading-room.
Mariano Pensotti turns four authors into literary surveillance cameras who describe scenes in a Metro station as they happen. The viewers read the texts as a novel unfolding live on large screens over the heads of its real-life figures.
The Ligna activists choreograph their listeners in a shopping mall, turning their movements into a conspiratorial radio ballet.
Lola Arias presents hotel rooms haunted by the stories of the cleaning staff – ghosts who appear when nobody else is there and clean up after the guest has left.
And, late in the evening, Stefan Kaegi invites you to a roof with a view over the city to review all these experiences with a blind artist. Rewinding the experiences from her perspective you find yourself wondering what you will remember of the day.
The projects make theatre out of public spaces used every day, and seduces the viewers into staying long enough for their perception to change. They invite you to subjectively experience places built for anonymous crowds.
“Ciudades Paralelas” offers six perspectives on one city. A festival that doesn’t transport stage sets or companies of actors but ideas.. Via location scouting and casting sessions the six artists are networked with each city. In this way, Ciudades Paralelas wanders from country to country as a mobile research laboratory, building up an archive of guerrilla tactics for appropriating cities.
Ciudades Paralelas is a coproduction between HAU Berlin and Schauspielhaus Zürich, in collaboration with Goethe- Institute India, Teatr Nowy and the foundation of Teatr Nowy. Commissioned by Kulturstiftung des Bundes, Pro Helvetia Swiss Arts Council.
Kolkata Schedule:
11 to 18 December 2012 Factory- La fabricà / Monginis Bakery Kolkata 
11 to 18 December 2012 Library- The quiet volume / Ramakrishna Mission Library 
11 to 18 December 2012 Station- Sometimes I think I can see you / Park Street Metro Station 
11 to 17 December 2012 Hotel- Room Service / Taj Bengal 
11 to 18 December 2012 Roof- Review / Everest House
11 to 18 December 2012 Shopping Centre- The first international of Shopping Centers / South City Mall
After Kolkata, Ciudades Paralelas wil be presented in New Delhi in January 2013.
More: 
http://www.goethe.de/ins/in/kol/en10108358v.htm 
www.ciudadesparalelas.com