OLGA CIĘŻKOWSKA
Born 1998. Director. Graduated at the S. Wyspianski Academy of Theater Arts in Cracow (Poland).
She made her debut at the K. Dejmek New Theater in Lodz with the play “Wszyscy jesteśmy dziwni” [en. We are all weird”] (2021), for which she received an award for directing in the final of the 28th National Competition for the Staging of Polish Contemporary Art (07.2022) and the Grand Prix award at the 13th Koszalin Youth Confrontations “m- theater” (09.2022). At the New Theater, she also co-created the collective performance “Who has nothing can everything” (2021) – director of part IV entitled “hell there is no hell”. She also directed at the National Old Theater (online “dance shimmy” 2020, performance reading “Kasandra the Machine” 2022), the Szaniawski Theater in Walbrzych (“Jesus” 2022), TR Warsaw (performance reading of the drama “Displaced” by Daria Kubisiak, 2022); last premiere: “Lesbian Sunset” (2023) realized with the artistic group Teraz Poliż. She also works in a directing duo and Ciężkowska/Dragun with Slovak artist Adam Dragun, as a tandem they have two performances to their credit: “The Last Time My Parents Were in Komuna Warszawa” (2022, Komuna Warszawa, Tough Love season residents) and “Deadline” (2023, co-production of theaters: P*AKT in Bratislava and Alfred ve dvoře in Prague, Visegrad Fund grantees).
She is a laureate of the 10th Young Directors’ Forum, where she received the ZAiKS Authors Association Award and the TR Debut Award of Distinction for her film project “Orpheus and Eurydice // all about love no.1”. This year’s resident of the New Drama Stage and a scholarship holder of the Ministry of Culture and National Heritage.
Olga Ciężkowska was awarded the main prize of the Koszalin Young Confrontations festival for “creating an ambiguous stage metaphor of the modern world and giving voice to the excluded.”
Norbert Rakowski
Theatre Director, Artistic & General Director of JK Opole Theatre, Vicepresident of European Theatre Convention (ETC)
Graduated from the Faculty of Drama Directing at the National Academy of Dramatic Art in Warsaw. Since 1997 he has worked as an assistant director of Krystian Lupa. In 2000 he debuted with his original production Suddenly (Studio Theatre in Warsaw) and since then he directed several dozen plays and co-operated with many theaters in Poland and abroad (such as Poznan, Cracow, Warsaw, Prague, Szczecin and others). He was awarded a few times with the Golden Mask for Direction. He mainly directs plays concerned with contemporary topics or works with classics in contemporary aesthetics. A special place in his career is occupied by a period of laboratory work focused on working with dancers and research in combining dramatic language with contemporary dance theater (performances such as Bluebeard, Flow). Since 2015 he is the General and Artistic Director of JK Opole Theatre and Director of the Festival of Polish Classic Drama ‘Konfrontacje’.
In 2016 he created a new space of unusual characters called Modelatornia. His idea was to create and consistently develop a place that would serve the implementation of postulates of Jerzy Grotowski – providing the basis for experimental explorations in the field of theatre.
radek STĘPIEŃ
Born 1993, director and playwright, pedagogue of the Faculty of Directing AST in Cracow, Poland
He made his debut with August Strindberg’s MISS JULIA at the People’s Theater in Cracow (2018), with which he began his collaboration with Konrad Hetel (among others Hetel’s DANTON and Wyspianski’s HAMLET at the Słowacki Theater, Arthur Miller’s THE DEATH OF THE COMEDIAN, Goethe’s FAUST and Konrad Hetel’s THE WHOLE OF GOD’S CAUSE at the Wybrzeze Theater, Witkacy’s WHO KILLED KASPAR HAUSER and BELZEBUB’S SONATA at the Jaracz Theater in Lodz, SŁOWACKI DIES at the National Old Theater, Schwab’s THE PRESIDENT’S SONGS at the People’s Theater, Witkacy’s MOTHER at Poznan’s Teatr Nowy, CAT ON THE HOT TIN ROOF at the JK Opole Theatre, OTWORZY SIĘ ZIEMIA by Brecht at the Capitol Musical Theater, as well as diplomas at all departments of dramatic acting in the country).
Participant of artistic residencies including Sopot Non Fiction 2018. Winner of the 2019 Leon Schiller Award. He was an assistant to, among others, Krystian Lupa, and collaborated with the Jerzy Grotowski Institute and the “Gardzienice” Theater Practices Center. Born in Pionki, he lives permanently in Warsaw.
JĘDRZEJ WIELECKI
Graduate of the Acting Department of the Leon Schiller National Higher School of Film, Television and Theatre in Łódź (2016)
He is the director of the play ‘Institute’, which was created at the Jan Kochanowski Theatre as part of the Actors’ Initiatives Stage, which is a project that gives actors from the JK Opole Theatre the opportunity to create a performance based on their own ideas. The Theatre enables the development of the submitted project from the initial concept to the premiere realisation by making its resources available and sharing its substantive, production and promotional support. Selected Initiatives enter the Theatre’s permanent repertoire and can be seen on the Bunker Stage.
Jedrzej Wielecki also has experience in the acting industry, which he efficiently develops. We could see him in such productions as Suicide Room: Haiter, On Straike! or Teściowie 2.
