New Blood on the Stage 2025

Hana Kokšalová is a multimedia artist, performer, organizer, and director. Her approach is characterized by the intermingling of categories and formats, interdisciplinary research, and intimate relationships with specific spaces. Her projects take the form of (staged) performances, participatory happenings with specific groups, and interventions in public space.

Submitted project: Terra Incognita

Terra Incognita is a multimedia performative collage based on the author’s long-term artistic research on the theme of the underground, the interior of the Earth. Terra Incognita means unknown land, unexplored territory. This term was used in early mapmaking to designate territories that had not yet been discovered (colonized).

At present, there are more or less no unmapped, “free” spaces on Earth. The underground space, even though it lies directly beneath our feet and makes up a larger part of the planet than the surface space, has not been fully explored and is probably unexplorable. When studying the underground, we encounter human technical, physiological, and sensory limits.

The collection of stories that make up the performance is the author’s experiment with translating scientific knowledge about the rules of the underground environment and perspectives from the point of view of underground life into short stories combining real and fictional elements. The protagonists of the stories are always non-human actors – underground creatures, planetary phenomena, or vague voices. They create a world without clear identities and with alternative rules, where humans are pushed into the background. They are a manifesto of invisible, free life in hidden spaces. The texts seek to prioritize immersive sensory shifts and descriptions of the environment over narrative plot. Sometimes they are scary, sometimes funny.

The scenographic environment of the performance consists of a construction made of sewer pipes, which frames textile images. The construction is also soundproofed and functions as a musical instrument. The performance is a narration of short stories in communication with music, scenography, light, video, and movement. The audience moves freely through the scenographic environment, the “exhibition space,” and is invited to engage in small, non-invasive interactions. The performance has a strong musical component and can also be enjoyed purely as a listening experience. It moves between the formats of a concert, object installation, performance, workshop, staged reading, and party.
The performance is a lively hour-long collage alternating between meditative (somatic) immersions and light-hearted moments inspired by the dynamic defiance of subversive (underground) culture.
The performance is a collage of formats (concert, object installation, sound performance, workshop, staged reading, party…), alternating between meditative (somatic) immersions and light-hearted moments inspired by the dynamic defiance of subversive (underground) culture.
The audience moves freely through the art installation that forms the stage space.

60 min.

Concept, direction, dramaturgy, scenography, light design: Hana Kokšalová
Music: Vendi Heř
Sound: Barry Wan
Performers: Hana Kokšalová, Vendi Heř

PLATZforma is an independent creative platform founded by young theater professionals with the aim of providing long-term support for the creation of original productions and projects by young contemporary authors. It arose from the need to create a base for the creation, sharing, and sustainability of work that often originates outside of traditional venues. To date, it has been behind the activities of the PLÁCEK young theater festival, which focuses on intergenerational dialogue, cultural education, and support for emerging artists in the field of contemporary theater and performing arts.

Based in Brno, operating in Brno & Prague

It connects young artists through horizontal paths for the purpose of mutual education and sharing experiences during the creative process.

Relaxation and fluidity, their permeation and intermingling, are key methods for us to experience the world, preventing isolation, finality, and rigidity, strengthening us in our eternal dialogue with the world.

Project: Searching for intimacy in a two-bedroom apartment

One evening in the home of a polyamorous trio. They come home, they want to be together, and they want to share. They share space, care, and fatigue. They are at home and together – in a small rented apartment – yet their thoughts move between the walls of the housing crisis and global anxiety. In a multiverse of unpredictable crises. Distant ones, as well as those that surround them. They share space, rent costs, but also emotional support.

Energy sources are almost exhausted, from coal to personal ones. “I just want to be with you!” But where to get energy from now?

Today’s great romantic story lacks heteronormativity and fatalism – it takes place in a rented apartment and is defined by the overload of the post-information age.

A generational drama about intimacy, exhaustion, and mutuality.

Premiere on September 13, 2025, at the Venuše ve Švehlovce Theater in Prague.

Length: 80 minutes

CREATIVE TEAM

Authors: Jakub Štrba and Diviška Rysová
Director: Jakub Štrba
Dramaturgy: Diviška Rysová
Set design: Barbora Netopilová
Music: Ondřej Plecháč
Lighting concept: David Brabec
Production: Hana Severinová
Design: Jiří Kolář

Cast
Fanny: Ema Červenáková
Adéla: Šimona Horynová
Kryštof: Martin Mlčouch

Třetí hřiště (third plaground) is a small independent group of KATaP DAMU graduates (Anna Zajíček Stenzlová, Kamila Hrnčířová, Filip Novák). In the past, the group participated in the creation of the following projects: Samorosty (2022) – an opening performance as part of the Nablízko departmental festival, which combined original texts, analog photo projections, and movement through the audience. Bajka! (2022) – a street performance presented at the Jizerská 50 padesátkrát jinak festival. Hlína (2022) – a production focusing on clay in its material and existential form. Created and presented as part of a residency at Co.Labs in Brno. Medvěd (Bear) (2023) – a puppet adaptation of the story of why the bear did not become human. Created for the village of Eibental in Banat. Indiánská (Indian) (2023) – a performance inspired by Tim Postovit’s poem and our camp experiences. Performed at the Zlomvaz 2024 and Nová generace festivals, among others, in the form of a combat performance. The group led a research project, the results of which were published under the title Reflection in Space and Its Potential (online at www.autorskeherectvi.cz, 2022).

Submitted project: Sheep, Sheep, Come Home!

In this interactive performance, the audience learns the story of a shepherd and his flock and travels with them through an unknown landscape. Along with the shepherd’s story, we also follow the story of wool, from the shearing of sheep, through washing, drying, combing, spinning, to knitting and winding into balls. We approach wool as a material in various stages of processing (including sheared and unprocessed wool). We use large fleece (carded wool), weaving frames, sheep bones, and work with them as tools for creating landscapes and puppets directly during the performance. We record the sounds of the materials live: wood, wool, stretched yarn, and bones, and compose them with vocal expressions (shouts, singing). Our movements are based on observations of sheep herds and our direct experience with caring for sheep.

The process of processing wool is also related to the issue of the unavailability of wool from Czech sheep on the Czech market. A large part of the wool is currently thrown away, and Czech wool is hard to find in stores! This is one of the topics addressed in the creative workshop after the performance. In the workshop, participants experience that fresh wool is greasy, has a strong odor, and generally has a different character than industrially processed wool. The audience will first process the wool by hand and then knit, spin, or felt it.

We are working on the production as a three-member creative collective called Třetí hřiště (Third Playground). The action and story are based on our joint exploration of the theme, sounds, voice, materials, rhythm of work, and above all, encounters in the performance space.

An interactive theatrical story winding its way from freshly sheared wool through washing and drying to a tangled ball. Imagine standing in the middle of a meadow, surrounded by sheep. From the opposite slope, you hear the shepherd’s call. Your dog senses it too. Sheep, sheep, come home! We won’t go.
What lies behind the romantic idea of shepherding?

Duration: 45 minutes

Kamila Hrnčířová (author, performance, sound design), Anna Zajíček Stenzlová (author, performance, production), Filip Novák (author, performance, production), Josefína Váchová (set design, craft consultation)

The art group A.J. Nosorožec was founded in Prague in 2019 and is still based there today. The group consists of Anna Gumboldt-Romanova and Semion Kulikov. A.J. Nosorožec represents the initials of a third person between them. In its projects, A.J. Nosorožec works with real or fictional stories, objects, sounds, and images. Most often, these are silent performances intended for small, intimate environments. Sometimes we perform a piece only once. Other times we don’t perform for a long time. Sometimes we choose our audience ourselves. Sometimes we focus only on animation or scenography. But we are always open to exploring other formats with our collaborators.

Submitted project: Plastionomy (working title)

People dancing. People working. People thinking. People drunk. People tired. People with stones. People broken. People crushed. Without legs and arms. People dead. People who have just appeared. People who are changing.

We work with elements of puppet theater, object theater, and visual theater, but we prefer to call it material theater. The main materials are clay and plasticine, from which figures are created, destroyed, moved, and left frozen. The performance is an essay for adults, exploring the history of materials, but also our personal connection to them. It is a small excursion into working with clay and plasticine, their similarities and differences. But at the same time, it is about the current tragedy that has changed the lives of millions of people. It is an essay on how memory is preserved, how something is recorded, and what it means to be human in difficult times. This project explores the feelings and possibilities of the body to overcome fear, pain, and loss. The performance may also include a practical workshop where viewers can create something from the material themselves, trying out materials that are part of art therapy and creative healing practices. The visual component of the performance combines plastic materials with film technology, because as an animation director, I explore how they can come to life on camera.

Anna Gumboldt-Romanova, Semion Kulikov. We plan to collaborate with Czech artists who are involved in art therapy on this project.