[EN]
Cistifellea is a multidisciplinary collective based in Dortmund, Germany, founded by Elena Tilli, director, scenographer, technologist, and Nico Yurgaki writer, musician, and performer. Both are active scholars of somatic practices and technical and technological knowledge.
Invested in developing dramaturgy that indwells technology, they are keen on centering the relationship body-machine not around technicalities, intended as the power of the technical, and information, so-called intelligence, but rather, around perception and consciousness. They don´t want to take away the attention from the problem by materializing technology, but rather to demonstrate how the effects of computing on our societies and bodies are alterable.
Through the perception of rhythm, sound compositions, and accurate design elements they aim to mold an impetuous aesthetic approach.
As permanent migrants, they study the role played by technology as a frontier – how video technology can speak about absence. They question the implications of making technology a must-be in artistic expression. While very little should be left to information, their work should reach the deepest level of the unconscious, against any intention to convey universal messages.
Cistifellea’s works aim to bring on stage a convergence of traditional and contemporary artistic references within theater and performance. For them, each project is an opportunity for personal growth and individual and collective artistic learning.
[DE]
Cistifellea ist ein multidisziplinäres Kollektiv mit Sitz in Dortmund, Deutschland, gegründet von Elena Tilli, Regisseurin, Szenografin und Technologin, und Nico Yurgaki, Schriftsteller, Musiker und Performer. Beide beschäftigen sich aktiv mit somatischen Praktiken und technischem und technologischem Wissen.
In ihrem Bestreben, eine Dramaturgie zu entwickeln, die der Technologie innewohnt, geht es ihnen darum, die Beziehung zwischen Körper und Maschine nicht auf die Technik als Macht des Technischen und die Information, die so genannte Intelligenz, zu konzentrieren, sondern vielmehr auf die Wahrnehmung und das Bewusstsein. Sie wollen nicht durch die Materialisierung von Technologie vom Problem ablenken, sondern vielmehr aufzeigen, wie die Auswirkungen der Informatik auf unsere Gesellschaft und unseren Körper veränderbar sind.
Durch die Wahrnehmung von Rhythmus, Klangkompositionen und präzisen Designelementen wollen sie einen ungestümen ästhetischen Ansatz formen.
Als permanente Migranten untersuchen sie die Rolle der Technologie als Grenze – wie Videotechnologie über Abwesenheit sprechen kann. Sie hinterfragen die Implikationen, die sich ergeben, wenn man Technologie zu einem Muss für den künstlerischen Ausdruck macht. Während sehr wenig der Information überlassen werden sollte, sollte ihre Arbeit die tiefste Ebene des Unbewussten erreichen, entgegen jeder Absicht, universelle Botschaften zu vermitteln.
Die Arbeiten von Cistifellea zielen darauf ab, eine Konvergenz traditioneller und zeitgenössischer künstlerischer Referenzen innerhalb von Theater und Performance auf die Bühne zu bringen. Für sie ist jedes Projekt eine Gelegenheit zum persönlichen Wachstum und zum individuellen und kollektiven künstlerischen Lernen.
[ES]
Cistifellea es un colectivo multidisciplinar con sede en Dortmund (Alemania) fundado por Elena Tilli, directora, escenógrafa y tecnóloga, y Nico Yurgaki, escritor, músico e intérprete. Ambos son activos estudiosos de las prácticas somáticas y del conocimiento técnico y tecnológico.
Interesados en desarrollar una dramaturgia que habite en la tecnología, les interesa centrar la relación cuerpo-máquina no en torno a los tecnicismos, entendidos como el poder de lo técnico, y la información, la llamada inteligencia, sino más bien en torno a la percepción y la conciencia. No quieren desviar la atención del problema materializando la tecnología, sino demostrar cómo los efectos de la informática en nuestras sociedades y cuerpos son alterables.
A través de la percepción del ritmo, composiciones sonoras y elementos de diseño precisos pretenden moldear un impetuoso enfoque estético.
Como emigrantes permanentes, estudian el papel que desempeña la tecnología como frontera: cómo la tecnología del vídeo puede hablar de la ausencia. Cuestionan las implicaciones de convertir la tecnología en algo imprescindible en la expresión artística. Su trabajo debe llegar a lo más profundo del inconsciente, en contra de cualquier intención de transmitir mensajes universales.
Las obras de Cistifellea pretenden llevar a escena una convergencia de referencias artísticas tradicionales y contemporáneas dentro del teatro y la interpretación. Para ellos, cada proyecto es una oportunidad de crecimiento personal y aprendizaje artístico individual y colectivo.
Cistifellea ©2023 – All Rights Reserved
Composer, pianist, guitarist and percussionist specialized in Jazz and Afro-Caribbean music. Creator of soundtracks for audiovisuals and performing arts.
Song writer.
Double degree in Jazz Piano from the Universidad Javeriana de Bogotá, Colombia and the Escuela Superior de Música de Catauña, Spain.
Nicolás is the co-founder of the Cistifellea Collective together with the director and stage designer Elena Tilli, where he works as a sound designer, performer, and writer. His practice of improvisation and his emphatic approach during the process offers unique possibilities.
He investigates unconventional forms of participation of the public while attending a performance and as inspiration to his process with sound. He develops specific tools for interaction and builds custom-based small-scale instruments.
Using software, and electronic sounds, together with live played instruments, Nicolas allows himself a fullscale exploration that together with his wide versatility as a musician and composer, opens up a high level of complexity that translates into a beautiful, inspiring, and sometimes provocative experience for the public.
Nicolas is also a singer-songwriter, leader, and manager of the independent musical project Yurgaki since 2005.
Composer and co-producer of the projects Candombe Tierra, Sones de Marimba, Chonta Dura, in Barcelona.
His work has been presented internationally in countries such as Ecuador, United States, France, Italy, Croatia, Romania, Ecuador, Morocco, Azerbaijan, Colombia and Spain.
Nicolás also works as an educator for children, youth and adults. He promotes Afro-Caribbean music around the world through concerts and workshops where he spreads various musical genres, disseminating traditional music and transforming it through his own compositions.
Find out more at yurgaki.com
Elena is a multidisciplinary artist.
She insists on the body as the epicenter of scenic language while researching, studying, developing post-dramatic approaches to technological constructions she develops, engineers and builds.
Elena is the co-founder of the Cistifellea Collective together with the musician Nicolas Cristancho, in which she directs, and builds scenery, machines, and media design. She is also a video designer in the theater and her collaborations have been seen at The Kitchen Theater in New York, at the Barichstaadt Opera in Munich, and in public theaters in Barcelona.
After graduating in mechanical engineering (MA), Elena completed her education at Yale School of Drama studying Technical Design and Production and Design for Theater. She completed the three years program held by Claudia Castellucci at Scuola Conia Raffaello Sanzio focused on the Theory of Scenic Representation. Since 2021 Elena is an alumni Fellow at the Akademie für Theater und Digitalität, Dortmund with which she continues to partner and develop her work.
Elena creates visual experiences combining technical and technological elements, for a variety of artistic applications, such as performance, installations and theater productions. Her practice focuses on the process and aims to develop dramaturgies that inhabit technology, always guided by the commitment to find in the collaboration a unique and essential value.
n 2023 she directs, stage and technology design Coded Rituals together with Camila Scholtbach and NIcolas Yurgaki. The performance is co-produced by Cistifellea Collective and Theater Im Depot and it opened the Festival Beyond Gravity in November 2023.
In 2022, the performance Presence of Absent was funded by the Kulturbüro of the city of Dortmund and the NRW Kultur Sekretariät as part of the project Distant Land Vol I. It was seen at Lake Studios Berlin as a work in progress and later premiered at Theater Im Depot in February 2023.
With Cistifellea she directed the performances/long theater pieces Codes of Absence (2023), Presence of Absent (2022), Don’t Make it A Play (2022), Asuntos Humanos (2021), Todo Bien Todo Tranqui (2021), El Silencio no Existe (2020).
In 2023 she was the video designer and technologist in the theater piece Nomadas, premiering at Teatro OBando, Lisbon in April.
She also assisted video designer Susanne Steinmassl as a stage live camera coordinator, content creator and film editor in Die Nibelungen Festspiele in Worms in 2023.
In September 2022 she was part of Digital Body Archive residency at Lake Studios Berlin. Here she began, together with more than 15 fellows a research focusing on the principle of “no technology before need” (as suggested by TroikaRanch) as a start, to then tailor the technology she wanted to see by creating artwork that uses/misuses tech that was available.
In September 2022 she was also part of te project Togather with the installation titled Unlearning Journey into a virtual body. The project was funded by NRW Kultur Sekretariät and premiered at Favoriten Festival 2022 – Unlearning for Possible Futures.
With Cistifellea she directed the performances/long theater pieces Codes of Absence (2023), Presence of Absent (2022), Don’t Make it A Play (2022), Asuntos Humanos (2021), Todo Bien Todo Tranqui (2021), El Silencio no Existe (2020).
Find out more at elenatilli.com
