15th Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space

8–18 June 2023, Prague, Czech Republic

 

The Prague Quadrennial of Performance Design and Space was established in 1967 to bring the best of design for performance, scenography, and theatre architecture to the front line of cultural activities to be experienced by professional and emerging artists as well as the general public. The quadrennial exhibitions, festivals, and educational programs act as a global catalyst for creative progress by encouraging experimentation, networking, innovation, and future collaborations. PQ aims to honour, empower and celebrate the work of designers, artists and architects while inspiring and educating audiences, who are the most essential element of any live performance.

The Prague Quadrennial is globally known as a two-week event taking place every four years since 1967 in Prague, Czech Republic. This model has been evolving. More and more designers now understand PQ as a platform: a continual stream of activities and collaborations happening across the globe with many different partners, creative professionals, artists, researchers, and theorists. Each on-site festival of PQ is now a culmination of the efforts of the preceding 4 years: a celebration and an opportunity for performing arts professionals from around the world to come to one place and share their work, ideas, and thoughts during the quadrennial festival. We work towards making the 2023 edition once again an opportunity for many new and unique shared experiences. While celebrating the diverse forms of performance design/scenography around the globe, the Prague Quadrennial strives to present it as an art form concerned with the creation of holistic performance environments, not just decorative backgrounds; these performative spaces creatively respond to current issues of our world, ask important questions, and invite us to participate in unique moments. Every four years, PQ’s central curatorial concept shapes the festival and offers its participants a fresh look at the artistic reflection of our times in performance designs and scenographies. The 2023 edition will take into consideration the strange and precarious world of uncertainty we live in. We will examine new and forward-looking visions of wondrous and imaginary worlds, as well as critical portrayals of our realities, addressing the incisive questions and challenging our thoughts and fears.

Performance design/scenography today is often presented through live and immersive experiences, where all senses can be involved and the audience members take on an active role. We see performance design/ scenography as an art form that goes beyond the visual, into experiential and sensorial realm with a focus on interdisciplinary collaboration, giving creative expression to new ideas and experiments. Contemporary performance design/scenography is an art form within parameters of multi-sensory environments – creating worlds of sensations appealing to the imagination, the mind, as well as the sensory organs: the eye, the ear, the nose, the skin. Scenographic environments take on a life that by default eludes the designer’s grasp: no matter how carefully it is planned and executed, it is truly completed by the participants engaging with the designed space. Every creation, then, is impermanent and changeable; it is also visionary and volatile in that it works with, and rests on, many unknowns. (https://www.pq.cz/)

General information > https://www.pq.cz/wp-content/uploads/2021/06/Open-Call-ENG.pdf

Video introduction and overview > https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WWks-rZtfos

 
Curatorial Team

Commissioner: Stuart Foster S.T.Foster@massey.ac.nz

National Curator: Meg Rollandi M.Rollandi@massey.ac.nz

Emerging Designers/Student Curator: Sean Coyle Sean.Coyle@toiwhakaari.ac.nz

Administration: NZPQinfo@gmail.com