"La Strada" 2017

"machine de cirque"

machine de cirque (ca)

"stadtgeflüster"

grazguides (at)

  "Cobbles that mean the world". Loosely based on Friedrich Schiller´s quote, GrazGuides will take visitors on their journey through the city. They will show detours and hidden paths, tell stories and reveal the odd secret. Experienced city scouts will also bring along curiosity, pleasure in discovery, questioning and having a good laugh. Don´t forget to bring good shoes and be ready for new things.

"mnemosyne"

effetto larsen (it)

  What is your favourite place in or around Graz, what colour is it and what memories do you associate with it? Italian artist Matteo Lanfranchi interviewed people from Graz about the places to which they feel some emotional connection and created a map of memories with the results. In the course of the festival, the map will continue to grow and draw a picture of how people and their life paths change the city. Lanfranchi´s installation connects individual memories with the collective memory of a place.

"hin & her. hüben wie drüben"

kunstlabor graz / teatri oda (at/xk)

  The EU centre of art laboratory Graz will be opened at a shop in the city centre of Graz, for the duration of La Strada; a place for thought, a workshop, an exhibition space. Together with a group of young adults, who are just finishing their compulsory schooling in Graz, here questions are asked and thoughts made visible: the topic being "Fortress Europe". On the basis of Ödön von Horváth´s burlesque "Hin und Her", artists from Kosovo and Austria will discuss border issues of our times: What are European values? What structure is hidden inside? How does the EU taste, how´s it moving? What do EU-topias look like? And is it really a shop - with opening hours and transparent borders?

"the kaleidophones"

décor sonore (fr)

  You certainly have to adjust to this unusual head dress, which enables the transformation of sounds of the city. However, you will be rewarded with a unique experience that Michael Risse will make audible for his audience. This French audio-artist sensitises perception by artificially enhancing our natural hearing. During the La Strada festival, 16 sculptures on the grounds of the University of Music and Performing Arts Graz will invite visitors to encounter brand new acoustic experiences and discover unexpected sounds.

"lance moi en l´air"

joli vyann & l´eolienne (gb)

  "Throw me into the air" is the title of this production, with which the French artist duo will awaken in its audience the desire to be able to fly for once too. With incredibly strength and yet softness too, with their bodies the artists tell a story about love, trust and interaction. And all of this with subtle aesthetics of flowing transitions, making this dance project a gorgeous experience on one of these balmy summer evenings.

"while having soup"

atsa, when art takes action (ca)

  Actually, when was it last that the street was a place to talk to each other and discuss things? Really looking at each other whilst talking, no "likes" or "dislikes" but accompanied by the will to listen properly to the other person while seeking to understand? The production "While having Soup" from Canada offers a special opportunity that should be seized. Passers-by can spend 20 minutes discussing with another person a particular topic that currently moves the city and its people, whilst having a plate of soup. And afterwards to sum up in just one sentence what had been the content of their conversation. Truly a challenge - but maybe one that we should go for again some time. Come & join in.

"pour le meilleur et pour le pire"

cirque aïtal (fr)

  "For better or for worse" is the title of this wonderful production of new circus - and it is on a journey through precisely such circumstances that the acrobatic couple Kati Pikkarainen and Victor Cathala are taking their audience. Balancing, flying through the air, holding onto and lifting each other, the two artists are staging their relationship. Letting the audience partake in the development, tension and rhythm of human togetherness; argument, reconciliation and love in the circus ring. Thus presenting their very own interpretation of contemporary circus: down-to-earth and no glitter - car radios, exhaust gas and wonderful acrobatics included.

"joe zawinul & frank zappa"

la strada´s tribute to the best

  We bow down: through the "Tribute to the Best" series, we want to pay our respects to the real musical greats in a fantastic club atmosphere. We kick off this year with none other than Frank Zappa and Joe Zawinul - doing justice to their work are Studio Dan and Eddie Luis and his Jazz Passengers.

"zéro degré"

la fabrique royale (fr)

  Gravity is not really their thing - at least it seems that they don´t really take it that seriously. Fabrique Royal free-runners, who will be developing their latest project during a residency in Graz for several days, will demonstrate on walls and objects of everyday life in the public space that we should not let ourselves be so easily impressed by something as trivial as gravity. In combination with projections and music, a work of art is being developed, with the first tryouts being shown at La Strada 2017.

"fanfare le snob"

compagnie le snob (fr)

  The musicians of Compagnie Le Snob come to the city and take along everybody who can and would like to go for a different rhythm on a summer´s day. The choice is vast: ranging from rock and latin through funk and electro to classical and jazz, that´s the repertoire of these dashing French artists, whom you can´t fail to see in their orange outfits, and certainly can´t fail to hear. You can count on one or two encores at their final performance on Graz´s Hauptplatz square.

"do not clean"

komplex kapharnaüm (fr)

  People have a strange relationship with their rubbish, which combines disgust and attraction with guilt and passion. French artists´ collective KompleXKapharnaüM makes this relationship strikingly visible. Here people at the margins of society, as well as consumers with a critical attitude towards wastefulness, have their say. Here it becomes clear that too much can be just as stressful as too little. The combination of high-tech and the respectful treatment of people and their history draws an enduringly moving picture of how our society deals with what is left over.

"schneewittchen"

theater anna rampe & theater zitadelle (de)

  Those who believe they know how the story about Snow White and the seven dwarfs goes might easily be terribly wrong. Puppet players Anna Fregin and Daniel Wagner keep finding new and unusual approaches to classic fairytales in their productions and narrate them from a very different point of view. This year they will do it with their latest production, which will have its premiere in Graz. A true pleasure, not only for the little ones.

"planet globokar"

studio dan, kinderkinder und theater am ortweinplatz (at/de/at)

  Once a day you have to go upside down in order to see things from the right perspective again. With clarinets played under water and an orchestra like a wild merry-go-round, "Planet Globokar´s" musical laboratory reminds us beautifully and vividly of this wisdom.

"open dance"

la strada

  Never miss a chance to dance. Above all when La Strada invites you to tango in the city´s streets and creates the perfect soundtrack of the very nest brass and funk music, along with songs from Kosovo, for you to dance under the stars.

"coup d´savate"

les traine-savates (fr)

  It will be colourful and loud, when the nine gentlemen of Les Traine-Savates set out to conquer the city´s streets: in yellow, orange, red and violet, wearing flares, Elvis kits and Bowie-like costumes, even just visually they´re paying tribute to the legendary 1970s. With their fireworks of brass and funk music, they draw their audience enthusiastically to follow an imaginary mirror ball through town - whilst celebrating a very special party.

"x-mal mensch stuhl"

angie hiesl produktion (de)

  When people sit on a chair high above the heads of passers-by against the wall of a house, cutting vegetables or reading the newspaper, one can rightly be a little confused. And that´s what you should be because Angie Hiesl and Roland Kaiser dedicate themselves in a very special way to the topic of aging. Old people in our society, caught up in the tensions between architecture and day-to-day urban life, are strikingly positioned. This artistic performance installation captures people´s imagination in a very quiet and subtle, yet all the more powerful way.

"fuera!"

murmuyo (cl)

  Three years ago the city fell in love with Murmuyo - and this love is indeed requited. First the Chilean street artist just blithely hitchhiked, bringing traffic to a halt. Then, last year, he looked for friends and found them. And now he wants to build a house; once again, with the help of city folk. Given how the love story between him and Graz inhabitants has developed over recent years, this will be a very special home.

"fous de bassin"

compagnie ilotopie (fr)

  It´s magic when, in the night time under the moonlight, huge gures oat over the water, shedding a completely new light on a place everyone thought they had known all along but had never actually seen. Compagnie Ilotopie uses the surface of the water as a stage, lets everyday gures appear magical and sets aglow paddle wheels and small cars as well as babies that still need nappies, hotheads and ladies in large gowns. With this performance in the Auwiesen recreational area by the river Mur, La Strada presents its audience with one of those special productions at the close of the festival that are best enjoyed sitting on the meadow, offering the perfect setting to fall in love: with life, art or the person next to you ...