The Creative Producers programme in the Western Balkans is entering a new phase, with successfully selected participants and their exciting projects which will be taking place this spring and summer in Serbia!

Creative Producers is a professional development and funding opportunity for emerging producers in the Western Balkans aiming to enhance their skills and capacity, build new networks, and contribute to co-production. It is envisioned to help create a sustainable creative sector community rooted locally but connected internationally who understand everything from creative vision and technical challenges to budgets, logistics and audiences.

The programme was launched as an open call for applications in November 2021, after which 14 successful candidates from the region were selected to take part in what came next: two weeks of online development workshops facilitated by Curated Place, a Manchester-based arts-led creative production company, which led the participants through the process of designing their creative projects. Among other valuable knowhow, the participants were given guidance on how to clearly communicate their ideas, make practical delivery considerations around where, when and how those ideas would happen and – crucially – how to determine their target audiences. 

Having successfully completed this phase in February 2022, the producers all gave their final pitch to the programme team and were given the green light and funds to begin the project inception stage – with dates and logistics firmly in place. 

A total of 14 projects will be kicking off in late spring and running throughout the summer period in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, North Macedonia and Serbia.

Our up-and-coming creative producers have it all – inspiring and fresh ideas coupled with the energetic drive to execute them, all of which is sure to appeal to diverse audiences hungry for memorable and engaging experiences this season!

Dragoslavia

Format: Performance art festival

Organisation / Producer: Kulturnacija / Andrej Ostroški

Date(s): 10 and 11 June 2022

Location: Belgrade

DRAGOSLAVIA – Live x Belgrade will be an art festival featuring the talents of 20 regional and local drag performers through panels and workshops, culminating in a spectacular drag show that will showcase fabulous diversity of the ‘Made in Balkan’ roster of Dragoslavia drag kings, queens and all in-betweens, celebrating the art of drag in the spirit of our collective’s motto – “Sisterhood and unity!”. The main events of the festival will be live streamed to make them more easily available for both local and global audiences.

LOVE

Format: Play

Organisation / Producer(s): BITEF / Nađa Marjanović & Ksenija Đurović

Date(s): September – October 2022

Location: Belgrade

The BITEF Festival, one of the biggest contemporary performing arts events in this part of Europe, is working on creating the conditions to present Alexander Zeldin, British dramatist, author and theatre director in Belgrade for the first time. BITEF will also host a Meeting With the Author, a public post-premiere conversation to gain insight into Mr Zeldin’s process and what he holds dear regarding LOVE. We also hope to organize a free lecture for the students of renowned drama and film schools in the country. LOVE is the second part of Inequalities, a tryptich of three plays: Beyond Caring, LOVE and Faith, Hope and Charity. Hosted in the Port of Belgrade, LOVE will show us a personal story of family and love in our times during the 56th edition of the BITEF festival.

The second half of September will see a festival posing questions on labour – how do we work, for whom do we work and what position does labour have in our lives and the lives of our loved ones?

“In the run up to Christmas, three families are placed

into cramped temporary, emergency accommodation.

A middle-aged man and his elderly mum,

a young family with a baby on the way,

a newly arrived woman from Sudan.

Strangers.

Forced together.

No space is personal.

As Christmas approaches, and none of them seem likely to be given a home, they come to boiling point.”

Home is where we feel fine

Format: Immersive theatre experience

Organisation / Producer(s): Aska Art / Uroš Ranković

Date(s): TBC

Location: Belgrade

Home is where we feel fine is envisioned as an immersive theatre experience that heals collective trauma, performed in different locations in Belgrade over the span of 7 days. Through the collage structure of five different stories, all of which intertwine, the artist takes a tour through the reconstructed memory of a traumatic event – the NATO bombing of Yugoslavia in 1999. The aim is to treat thoughts as cognitive flashbacks, to confront their connection to the initial event in order to achieve pain relief and take the first steps towards understanding trauma. This project will take place in several different locations in Belgrade so that the audience can experience the physical change of space after the trauma of bombing.