Sweden

Gothenburg + Skarhamn
1–10 June 2018
Theatre, New Media, Guerilla Art

Humor, art & affiliation: how can humor and art help us amuse each other and build relationships?
Artists
From Sana’a, Yemen, now in Helsingborg, Sweden

Artistic mission: making people feel stronger and laugh at their tragedies in order to try changing the situation around them.
Funny about Europe and its “crises”: that Europeans believe that they are the only helping refugees, and that these can also be very important for the EU, one of the main reasons to opening the gates.
Laughter to Share: a bad experience. Once I was trying to joke and be funny when one of the mates who was with us in the group said that he thought that Muslims don't laugh.
Now in Sofia, Bulgaria

Artistic mission: to formulate new things, for which people have not yet had words and could not express them, give a new perspective, to present things in a new way with a sense of humor and easiness.
Funny about Europe and its “crises": the fear that the Arabs are now coming as refugees to be distributed everywhere and waiting for their Organizers to get up and take over Europe.
Laughter to Share: We made the woman’s symbol (The Venus symbol) as a pink torture device and put it in busy places in the city together with information about the scale of domestic violence in Bulgaria. Despite the heavy theme, the installation was mostly interacted with by men and children. The installation did not saddle people or made them angry, but made them feel more confident because someone talks so boldly about a taboo problem.
Now in Bratislava, Slovakia

Artistic mission: using art as my public voice in these difficult times that we live when hoax, conspiracies, racism are getting stronger.
Funny about Europe and its “crises”: It is funny in Slovakia. To our post-communist country full of corruption, not even refugees would come. So our people are protesting against no one.
Laughter to Share: Once we were doing one funny project with disabled people. We knew that there was a barrier between “healthy” and disabled. But we started to dance together and one deaf girl just told us that by our dance moves we were telling her really nasty words… sign language is tricky. After this we were laughing so much together that awkwardness in the air disappeared.
Now in Beirut, Lebanon

Artistic mission: to make theatre in a collective and non hierarchically way. To create with the audience critical thinking without obliging them to laugh.
Funny about Europe and its “crises”: it's a tricky question, I won't answer it, they might refuse my next visa application.
Laughter to Share: I never managed to really make somebody laugh.
Local Partners:
An inspiring meeting place for art, nature and people, an arena for art based on water, pigment and paper. The museum opened in the summer of 2000 and was designed by the Danish architects Niels Bruun and Henrik Corfitsen, and offers workshops for schools and businesses, lectures and conferences, as well as studios for artistic residencies.
Delta Ung Fri Tid is a meeting place and platform for children and young people, counting with 3 centers for Leisure and Cultural Activities, a Culture School and the Culture Pedagogue Group. At Deltapeople can learn different art and cultural expressions, run and carry out various projects, participate in different activities and workshops or just hang out and get to know new friends.