Melanie Mederlind is a Swedish director, currently Artist-in-residence at Folkteatern Göteborg. She intends to do research in Rome in preparation for a workshop at Folkteatern Göteborg, within the project Cities on stage/Città in scena. The theme of the workshop will be "European Identity" and the "Eternal City". Rome is referred to as "The Eternal City", a notion expressed by ancient Roman poets and writers.

The Cities on stage/Città in scena project, supported by the Cultural Programme of the European Union, brings together six theatres in Europe around the question "living together" in the great cities: Théâtre National/Bruxelles, Folkteatern/Göteborg, Odéon-Théâtre de l’Europe/Paris, Teatrul National Radu Stanca/Sibiu, Teatro Stabile di Napoli,Teatro de La Abadía/Madrid.

From 2011 and until 2016, different artists will bring their own individual, critical and poetic approach to this evolving continent. Seven creative works are thus crossing Europe and making their questions heard in other countries and being seen by other eyes.

Cities on stage/Città in scena also aims to reinforce the link between artistic creation and citizenship, by closely involving the inhabitants of each of the cities in the creative process, to face the contemporary challenges of cities and the realities of Europe today. As part of this wish for exchange, meetings and discovery, each theatre invites a group of young actors from one of the partner countries to work for a month with a director, and local inhabitants are included to accompany the young artists in their discovery of the city, of its cultures. After Nathalie Garraud in Paris, who was able to work with young Neapolitan actors, this season it is Armel Roussel who will welcome Romanian actors to Brussels. And for the seasons to come there will be Melanie Mederlind in Göteborg, Vlad Massaci in Sibiu, David Iodice in Naples.

In this way Cities on stage/Città in scena invites artists, young and old inhabitants to observe our continent and to invent together stories which speak of Europe today and tomorrow. This project, by means of dynamic transnational work implicating citizens of different cities, aims at creating a new lively European repertoire and connecting with the challenges of a continent in mutation and evolution.

www.folkteatern.se

Artist-in-residence November 2012