About us
KunstTeatar, a pop&art destination of the Zagreb theater scene, was founded in late 2018 in Zagreb. KunstTeatar was founded by producer Romana Brajša, actor Domagoj Janković and director Ivan Planinić, who have been collaborating as an artistic and production trio since their student days at the Academy of Dramatic Arts in Zagreb. As a cultural association, KunstTeatar brings together artists and art organizations of the independent theater scene with the aim of developing non-institutional contemporary art.
In the few years since its inception, KunstTeatar co-produced 12 plays that, in addition to being performed in Zagreb, were also staged in other cities and at various festivals. The play Flex was awarded the Croatian Actor Award for outstanding contribution to theater art, and actor Bernard Tomić received an award at the Actor’s Festival for the same play. In addition to being performed as part of guest performances at the Dubrovnik Summer Festival, the Grad Teatar Festival in Budva and the Korifej Festival in Kolašin, the play Marta and the Seven Fears was also awarded the most innovative play award at the TAKT Festival in Novi Sad. For the play You are Brave First, playwright Espi Tomičić was awarded as the best dramatic work at the Fadil Hadžić Days of Satire, and the ensemble of the play also received a special award. At the Zagreb Monodrama Festival, Karlo Mrkša won the best actor award for his role in the play Joke of Sisyphus, and the play was included in the program of the Croatian Showcase of the Croatian Center ITI. The plays were performed as part of guest performances in Zadar, Dubrovnik, Varaždin, Hvar, Klanjec, Koprivnica, Slovenia, Montenegro…
KunstTeatar cooperates with numerous artists of the younger and middle generation, as well as with organizations such as Punctum, KUFER, T25, TRAS Studio, and has also collaborated with Teatro Verrdi, Kuća Klajn, P4, Lazareti Art Workshop, the Croatian Screenwriters and Playwrights Guild (SPID), the BoliMe Association, the Goethe-Institut, the Ludens Theater, Boom!teatar, Auzivnkl and local and foreign independent artists. KunstTeatar’s theater hall regularly stages performances, often intended for specific audiences, high school students, young people, but also everyone who loves good theater.
The plays are co-financed by the Ministry of Culture and Media, the City Office for Culture, Intercity and International Cooperation and Civil Society, and the Kultura Nova Foundation.
Mission
KunstTeatar is a newly established theater space in Zagreb’s neighborhood of Trešnjeveka that gathers artists of the younger generation and organizations of the independent art scene with the aim of developing non-institutional contemporary art and culture, particularly the performing arts.
Vision
KunstTeatar wants to be a publicly recognized platform for the research, development, production, performance, positioning and distribution of works of the contemporary independent theater scene in Zagreb, Croatia and beyond. KunstTeatar wants to become an indispensable part of the cultural offering in the city and a regular partner/co-producer of other organizations with similar values and artistic principles.
Objectives
- promotion, development and improvement of independent non-institutional contemporary art and culture, particularly the performing arts;
- creation of an independent platform and space for the production, performance, positioning and distribution of cultural and artistic projects in the field of performing arts, fine arts, literature, audiovisual, photographic and other arts, as well as the research of their mutual relations;
- creation of new audiences and audience development through education and other activities;
- creating projects in culture and arts that correspond thematically with the wider community, innovative research projects and socially engaged projects that solve specific community problems;
- openness to all artistic media, fields and genres and to an interdisciplinary approach;
- artistic activity at the local, intercity and international level through associations, collaborations and co-productions;
- sustainable social entrepreneurship
Founders
Domagoj Janković
is a professional actor from Zagreb. He graduated from the Academy of Dramatic Arts in Zagreb in 2015 in the class of Professor Krešimir Dolenčić. He was awarded the special Rector’s Award for the play Škola za anđele (School for Angels) in 2017. He received the Croatian Actor Award and was nominated in the category for the best performance in a children’s play. He is a co-founder of the KunstTeatar association. He acted in numerous theater plays, feature films, short films, commercials, TV shows and animated films. In addition to his native Croatian, he is fluent in English and German.
Ivan Planinić
works as a theater director and writes theatrical adaptations, mostly for his own projects. He is a co-founder of KunstTeatar and an artistic associate at the Department of Theater Directing and Radio Broadcasting at the Academy of Dramatic Arts in Zagreb. So far, he has directed plays at the Zagrebačko Kazalište Mladih Theater (ZKM), Eurokaz, KUFER Theater Company, Punctum Arts Organization, the Novi Život Theatrical Company of the Blind and Visually Impaired, Miroslav Krleža Festival, Varaždin Croatian National Theater, Mini Teater in Slovenia and the Split Summer Festival. In addition to the Theater Directing and Radio Broadcasting at the Academy of Dramatic Arts, he also graduated from the Faculty of Law at the University of Zagreb.
Romana Brajša
graduated at the Department of Croatian Language and Literature and Comparative Literature at the Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences and Production of Stage and Performing Arts at the Academy of Dramatic Arts of the University of Zagreb. She is a co-founder of and producer at KunstTeatar, the founder and artistic director of the Punctum arts organization, and a producer and co-director at the KUFER Theater Company. She has worked at the ZKM Theater, the Moruzgva Theater, the World Theater Festival, Miroslav Krleža Festival, OTFF, and is a frequent collaborator of various independent theater and dance organizations. She is currently employed as an Assistant Professor at the Department of Production at the Academy of Dramatic Arts in Zagreb.
Partners
Supported by
