After the remarkable success of the separate Art Residencies in Greece, Romania, Albania and Bulgaria during the winter of 2023, ECHO III – For Memory’s Sake returns with the much anticipated Balkan Caravan tour. Actors, musicians, digital artists and writers, having already penetrated deep into the heart of Balkan heritage and the concept of arranged marriages, come together to create something truly extraordinary.
Starting in Bucharest on 20 September and making stops in Vidin, Sofia, Ioannina, Berat and Lushnje, the ECHO III – For Memory’s Sake caravan tour will give the audience the opportunity to watch parallel performances dedicated to a collective multicultural experience based on testimonies, tradition and young people’s artistic understanding of love, family and duty.
At the heart of the tour will be the magical inflatable installation “Pezize“. Entering “Pezize”, the journey begins and the four performing arts – theatre, music – poetry and visual arts await you to shed light on gender roles, social norms and the lasting influence of our traditions and ancestors.
The project behind the Caravan Tour: ECHO III – For Memory’s Sake is Inter Alia’s attempt to answer, in the contemporary social context, questions such as:
How does the young generation perceive the concept of marriage?
What does it mean to be tied for life to someone you met once?
Are there remnants of our ancestral traditions in the way we choose partners?
Where were women placed in such a context?
How do gender rules connect the past to the future?
Is marriage only an economic proposition, only a prospect of prosperity, a way out of poverty, a salvation from criticism, ridicule and gossip?
ECHO III – For Memory’s Sake aims to bring together artists from the Balkans working in the fields of theatre, music, visual arts and literature to explore tradition and culture through the themes of marriage, matchmaking and nuclear families in the Balkan context.
The programme of the Wandering Arts Caravan:
Bucharest – 20 September
Vidin – 22 September
Sofia – 23 September
Ioannina – 25 September
Berat – 27 September
Lushnje – 28 September
