Detailed Information on Publication Record

A production of a poetry collection Bajaja by Vladimír Holan was intended for both children and adults. The production combines professional theatermakers (actors, musicians, directors etc.) and child and adult actors with Down syndrome (DS). Theatrical poetics builds on the contrasts of the individual actors, physical characteristics and performative abilities of actors with otherness. The director links a poetic word, live music and movement, uses the "otherness" of the actors' movement and language as stylization. An impressive audiovisual scenic work is created, where the difference in the actors ceases and creates a new, poetic world of poet Vladimír Holan and his daughter Káťa. Among professional productions of the integration type, this is unique for several reasons: As the only professional production of this type, it also involves child actors with DS. The director has found artistic means that excel in the spontaneity and naivety of the youngest actors with disabilities and uses any deviation from the agreed scenario as a potential to create a vivid stage form within each individual performance. Last but not least, it is an integration-type production, where the title role of Bajaja, comprising a large number of lines of poetic text, is played by the actor with DS. (It is common knowledge that people with DS have limited speech and pronunciation skills). However, the directing accentuates deviations from the spoken norm as a form of musicalization and uses the actor's otherness to create a specific theater poetics and overall thematic tone. The outputted was created within the research project Artistic research of the production of theatrical performances with actors with Down syndrome as effective means of social inclusion, supported by Technology Agency of the Czech Republic, programme ETA (project no. TL02000500).